Customer Interviews No. 1

     I’ve always had a love for mugs and since I don’t like tea or coffee I have often found myself eating food out of mugs, similar to a bowl; as I’m typing this I’m eating mac n’ cheese out of a Peach Valley mug. For me, I love that mugs have handles and that mugs/bowls keep the contents hotter longer since the food isn’t spread out, as it would be on a plate. I always had the idea that if I was to open a restaurant/café I would serve everything in mugs to add an interesting trait, in an effort to stand out among other places.

     My target age group for my costumer interviews was 13-30 year olds because I see this type of business thriving in a college town environment.

     I started by asking everyone what their age was, how often they eat out, what their favorite place was, a why they liked to eat there. This series of questions gave me a sense of what they look for in a place to eat. Next, I explained what Satchels was to those not familiar with it and proposed a scenario about having a Satchels next to a chain pizza restaurant and asked which they were more likely to visit and why. For my last question I was interested in learning where each person would take someone that they haven’t seen in a long time for a casual lunch or coffee and why. This question was targeted at identifying what type of places each person saw has having casual environments.

     Inserted below is one video of all the audio clips from each interview. I sought out people between 13 and 30 that had an opinion of restaurants.

     I think that there is an opportunity for my idea to be successful. From the interviews, I’ve found that most people would prefer a place with a good atmosphere, food, and service. For those who weren’t familiar with Satchels, they said that they would be interested in trying it because it was something different and that they were open to new experiences. Overall, I found that people prefer unique places to chain restaurants when given the choice. After the interviews some of the people asked me to explain my idea and seemed interested in visiting a place like it. In general, I think that as long as I adapted certain aspects of my idea to fit was the costumers’ want; I can see this being successful.

     I learned that interviewing costumers isn’t that hard. I targeted people that were eating, that way I knew they didn’t have to be anywhere soon. Everyone I asked were super nice about the whole thing. I had one girl that didn’t really provide any helpful answers to my questions but it was easy to find someone else that did. I found that interviewing in groups could be a good thing and a bad thing. My first group interview was very positive but the second wasn’t, I think because the first was a group of two and the second was a group of four. For my next round of interviews I think I’m going to target groups of two because I think it makes the interviewees feel less put on the spot.