1) There are four elements of the marketing mix shown in the podcast including product, distribution,
promotion, and place. Firstly, the product is meat made from plants. Pat Brown initially decided to
distribute it by forming a partnership with a famous chef. Some of their promotions included giving
samples to different chefs, and by having Dave Chang post positive tweets about their meat. The place that
it was sold first was a restaurant in New York.
2) Pat Brown places a big emphasis on failure. Personally, I think that failure is a big factor in successful
innovation. There is a certain kick people get out of failing a few times that makes the success that much
more rewarding. The example that everyone uses to show that failing at something is okay was Thomas
Edison and the light bulb. He failed 1,000 times before he had a successful product, the light bulb. While
it must have been frustrating failing over and over again, it is what made the invention that much more
impressive, so yes, I do believe that failure is a factor because it pushes you to keep going until you
succeed. Pat Brown seemed to have his fair share of failures as well. When asked if he was a good
student, Brown responded “I was actually not a pretty good student - I was a chronic cutter of classes.”
Not only this, but, before becoming a businessman, Brown also did not succeed in staying with his job as
a pediatrician or a professor.
3) Pat Brown described a few different metrics in the interview. Firstly, he described that they planned to
double in volume every year for the next 15 years. He also said that brand awareness played a big part in
his company. He said that he knew that in order for his product to succeed people cannot only like it as
much as animal meat, they have to like it more than animal meat, in order to be a more popular product
than the animal products, so that eventually less animals are slaughtered as a result. One metric that he
could have used that I didn’t hear were examples of engagement rate. This is important to know because
there's a big difference between buying a burger once to try it, and continuing to buy it because it tastes
good.
4) Pat discussed some pushback to his product. He even said “A lot of people thought that I was a little
wacky”. The industry trade groups are unethical. This is because they are known to treat their animals
poorly all the way up until their slaughter for human consumption. I feel that the consumer groups who
say that they cannot eat it because it isn’t real meat have a point. As Brown himself says, “people have
very visceral reactions, it’s not your frontal lobe calling the shots” which makes it odd to eat. However,
marketing can work to alleviate these concerns, and in this example, it did. These no meat burgers were
being sold and marketed at locations like Burger King, AppleBees, and White Castle, which are all well
known and trusted establishments by burger lovers. This helped to show customers that these were trusted
burgers.
5) No, I would not have accepted Google’s offer because if they were willing to buy my brand from me
for 2 or 3 hundred million dollars, then it must be worth even more if I continue with it myself. A suitable
partner would be someone who isn’t trying to completely buy my brand from me and take that idea.
Perhaps, Google would have been suitable if instead of buying off the brand, they wanted to sponsor me
or work with me instead of taking my place. The “Customer Job to Be Done” is a way in which a
customer’s desire can be communicated to the people in charge of the product. In this case, it would be a
mess, because Google knows lots about software and data, not about burgers. Pat Brown says “nobody
else has that level of focus and commitment” to the burgers, when asked in regards to Google.