My Duquesne kids are just finishing up a project for an independent business here in the area. At the risk of exposing the “client” (don’t worry Dean Miciak - no money changed hands), let’s just say that they are a type of restaurant/entertainment facility called “Joe’s Place.”

Joe’s Place opened for business some time ago - but they are still a good distance from regular profits. Joe is a friend and so we worked out a deal whereby Joe and his key partners would provide relevant background data and my students would conduct professional market research.

The kids worked hard and eventually they created and then presented their research which found holes in the owner’s methodologies.  Lots of them. Which lead me to think, how can there be so many misfires when Joe and his team had first spent money and time planning everything before opening their doors?

So I asked if I could look at the business/marketing plan they had written prior to actually starting-up. They complied, and once these data were in my possession, I immediately went to the research sections related to Market, Product, and Competitive Research. I just had to learn what they were thinking when they formulated their Product Concept and Positioning Statements.

Time and some very ambitious research ultimately revealed the following verisimilitudes:

• There was no “research” done prior to acquiring/building out the facility and opening its doors. Instead, it seemed that all key decisions regarding who and what the business should serve and thus BE, were pretty much visceral.
• Key strategic decisions made by Joe and his team and related mostly to the “Product Concept” (e.g., the “who/what we are” decisions) too often became compromises. (Example, a whole lot of “I’ll trade ja” took place; that is, one constituency was empowered to pick the type of background music so long as the other constituency got to pick the type food.)
• There were no “industry players” on either the Board of Directors or Advisory Board. Again, this lead to a situation wherein strategic decisions were made without any rational input from the Owners/Founders. Not good.

So, how many fundamental questions went unexamined? Especially in a money-draining, capital-intensive start-up like this one? Well, I’m guessing that most of you probably already know this answer. If you surmised that the Founders of this start-up most likely didn’t want to know these answers - you are probably right. I say this for a couple of reasons:

• The odds are incredibly against any start-up, vis-à-vis Product Concept and Strategic Operations. Further, the reality of any competitive start-up is almost 180 degrees from the business concept that is in your head when you conceptualized the business in the first place. (In fact, most start-up concepts aren’t even reasonably congruent with the realities of the marketplace. Think this through and see if you don’t agree.)
• You more than likely “fudged” at least some of your numbers when you created the plan(s). Why? Because you were running short on money (and time), and also because “it was a small tweak” - hardly likely to affect the “Big Picture.”
• It’s entirely possible that the research findings revealed an insoluble problem! This in turn means that you have to shut ‘er down even before the project starts. How do you explain this to all of those who have backed you to this point? How can you possibly ever recover the lost dollars?  It’s easy to forget that these initial dollars PALE in comparison to the bucks (not to mention time) that you are about to lose by following a bad plan into war!

Because - people don’t want to know what’s in that certified letter coming from the IRS, the Hillman Cancer Center, or your son’s junior high principal.

Because - if we don’t know bad news, well then, there’s a reasonable chance that it may not be bad news … right?

Do yourself a favor and Do the Research. Do the research and (as I so often say to my students at Duquesne’s School for Entrepreneurial Studies) the research will write the business and marketing plan for you!

Honest.