Yogurt is a seven-billion-dollar category in the U.S. Globally; it is north of twenty-billion dollars. With all that demand, why hasn’t anyone made a simple way to make yogurt at home?
Ashok Jaiswal was inspired in 2016 when he was sipping on a mango lassi, a yogurt-based drink if it was possible to make yogurt at home. In his exploration, he found the effort difficult, time-consuming and challenging to control the quality. Although there were some home yogurt makers, none of them had the simplicity of Keurig for coffee.
After much tinkering, he invented Yomee where you add milk and a pod, and the machine does the work overnight.
Seeing A Category, Anew
When startups look at new product launches, often their instinct is to add a new brand on the shelves. What Ashok cleverly did was to see the trend of craft brewing, simplicity of devices like Keurig, and how broad the category was for yogurt. He decided that along the value chain, few players were thinking about home creations.
Watch this video to get the idea of how this comes together.
Lessons for Startups
- Entering a large category can be daunting unless you find a different angle, place or location to participate.
- Thinking like everyone else will lead you into a red, bloody ocean of competition – where is the blue, open ocean space that allows you to stand out.
- Observing trends and wondering how they might apply to your category can give you a new hook, perspective, and opportunity.
- Ashok noticed all the brushback to the sustainability concerns of Keurig pods so he solved that problem for Yomee with a biodegradable solution.
- Consumers crave simple, yet they always want rich and unexpected experiences.
- Healthy living, simple devices, large categories mean Yomee has an exciting opportunity.
- Look at your startup as a daring place to be different, but helpful. If yogurt is a seven-billion- dollar category, the craft, artisan, the in-home device could capture a small share of that opportunity and become enormously successful. With few players in that space, it allows you to create something ownable.
Maybe now is the time to ferment a new idea?
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Photo courtesy of Yomee, all rights reserved.
