There's a business looking for funding which is trying to change the way we shop. It's called Independence Market. You basically order pre-prepared meals and they are delivered - like Hello Fresh or Gousto although not on subscription.
They are exclusively targeting middle class mums and to spread the word and get more customers. They want the Mums to hold dinner parties to recruit other Mums to buy. They're calling it Amazon meets Avon.
Does anyone else find this business model offensive? They say the way into the household shopping budget is through Mum. I can't help but think this is at best old fashioned and at worst sexist. Surely we should be giving the responsibility to 'parents' not expecting Mum to sort it all?
Here's what the CEO has to say:
Here’s the reality: 94% of family households are managed by women and numerous studies suggest women feel underserved by the majority of businesses because they don't feel those businesses take their unique needs into account. This mainly because most companies are run by men. Case in point: I worked on the strategy for a multi-billion pound grocery retailer who wanted to 'create a store of the future that would be a game changer in how customers perceived them'. I interviewed the entire senior exec team, 15 people, 14 of whom were men, average age 48, none of whom shopped with their wives. I asked each of them to tell me what they thought their business was fundamentally about - at the end of 15 interviews 2 people mentioned food and 1 person mentioned women: the high-value shopper in every grocery store is a mum, and the research suggests that even when a man does go shopping he's got a list provided by his wife. This is an example of why grocery stores, and big companies in general, are broken. We're certainly an inclusive company but, just being honest, I'm willing to risk upsetting the occasional man to let women know we work hard to understand them.
What do you think?