Happy Minds - Feb. 2002

I have an addiction to books on tape. One provider of great stuff on tape is The Teaching Company. They have a website, www.teachco.com. The business these guys are in is to have top professors from universities around the Untied States develop courses fro presentation on audio tapes and CDs, and even videos for people who need to watch television. They have some really great courses for sale. many larger libraries have some of their tapes and videos available to borrow.

One I recently listened to, a course in economics from Dr. Timothy Taylor, gave me some things to think about. In his introduction, Dr. Taylor states that one measure of society's wealth is the amount of happiness people have in their minds. He did not explain how the experts go about measuring this happiness, but I accept it as a basic fact of economics that they can and do.

This simple statement explains so much about our industry. The consumers who buy our products cannot eat them or wash their with them; they can only get happiness in their minds. That is what they are seeking.

The question is, are we delivering enough happiness?

I have spent a little time in stores that sell our products, just watching the customers. One very strong impression I have gotten through the years happens when a customer (usually a woman) stands at a flower cooler that is filled with beautiful bouquets. You can see and even feel the strong emotions of desire and fear that she is experiencing. She is thinking "the beauty that is now in the cooler could be on my table for me to enjoy." But, there is the fear that, "When I take it home, it will quickly wither, and that would make me unhappy."

We know for sure that desire for our floral products is always present. How do we know? Because at all of the most important events in our lives we are compelled to enhance the events with floral products. We could not fit all the flowers in the car when I took my wife home from the hospital after the birth or our first child. Can you imagine a wedding without flowers? Even in death we seek to soften the blow for the living by sending flowers. We have a holiday that equates love and flowers. Valentine's Day. Consumers overcome their fear at these times because the events are too important not to include flowers.

People desire our product because just being around it makes them happy. They are happy when the product performs well, but unhappy when it does not. All we have to sell is happiness, so we need to maximize the stuff that makes people happy and reduce the stuff that makes people unhappy.

It sound so simple. Well, it it, sort of. If people know what to expect and then they get it, there is a much better chance that they will not be unhappy with our product. We can make specific guarantees on vase life (or flower life for flowering plants) that will take away risk. This would help a great deal, but if the product does not perform, it is usually going to be too much trouble for the consumer to take it back for a replacement.

The only way to grow the market for our products to its full potential-which I think is many times greater than current sales-is to grow better, stronger products, and to distribute and retail them quickly and in a manner that will not destroy them. We also need to tell the consumer what to expect and how to care for the product every time she buys something.

I know, I know-you have heard it before and maybe even said the very same thing before. Growing better plants is not nearly as exciting as some snazzy advertising campaign that will magically jump our sales volume without any real work on our part. It is all pretty dull, hard work. Basic execution of the right things every time is beyond tedious. I do not especially like it myself. I just do not see any other way to get consumers back to happy.

We have spent many years teaching our customers to fear the stuff we grow. It will take years of solid product to get them to trust us.