Balancing Intentional Innovation

Our company is built on innovation. We have globally patent-pending technology that allows bitter, unpleasant flavors to nearly disappear in anything that you can taste. It’s groundbreaking and revolutionary and redefines products’ taste profiles daily, allowing customers to create healthy, great-tasting products for humans and animals alike. 

Alright, so our products are innovative. Is our company? Possibly. 

Let’s dig deeper. 

• What does innovation look like when we meet the needs of our team?
• What does innovation look like when we meet the needs of our customers?

A quick Venn diagram sketch allowed me a bit of introspection on our business structure, specifically through the lens of “innovation.” The overlap of similarities was much smaller than I anticipated. 

The risk of constantly trying to be one step ahead is investing resources in superfluous, superficial gimmicks that may overcomplicate and/or under-deliver. The intention is there, but the deeper, thoughtful consideration of impact may not be. As a scrappy startup, we’re nimble and allow data to help us evaluate as we go. We’re not here to hop onto every new trend just to be the frontrunner of spending - and our CFO is forever grateful. With the rapid and constant technological innovations that are always updating and easily accessible, we choose to pause and consider impact. 

For example, ai-generated content like ChatGPT is ground-breaking, free, and able to do so much in so little time. At times the output feels surprisingly authentic, and at others, well… tweaking is required. As with the advent of any new technology, there are issues and glitches. Seeing ai-generative technology as a tool allows us to explore what content can look like, with human input steering needs and edits. Naturally, more and more innovations have arrived that decrease the reliance on humans - after all, isn’t the goal of convenience often an integral part of innovation? 

The question then becomes, where do we spend our time? And is this actually what our company and customers want?

There are stark contradictions between these two camps, and we’re curious about what you are finding in your company.

For the Team

In 2022, with projects proliferating, we invested in a large in-office whiteboard and the project management platform, BaseCamp, to keep projects on task and completed. After a few months of both systems, I asked the R+D team what was working and if one was better than the other. Immediate responses across the team spoke to the need and appreciation of both systems. One Scientist appreciates that “every time I walk into the lab, I see the tasks in front of us and do not need to log in to the program to find out what we need to prioritize.” Our in-house culinary expert added to this, saying:

"Being able to physically write our tasks at the beginning of each week creates a sound mental checklist of what we have to do, making it an efficient medium for task management."

Basecamp offers the ability for visible progress that colleagues can track alongside the R+D team, provides ease of access from various devices, and the archival structure - seeing all that you have accomplished - is motivating. Another Scientist also shared that she likes the organization of BaseCamp and ability to save notes in vital details within each project.

The whiteboard is more tactile and more team-building. It has already been proven that writing out notes is better for retention than typing, so theoretically, projects are being considered more thoroughly. There’s also the ever-satisfying component of erasing, rearranging, editing, and the act of creating marks that can allow for joy in the ownership of projects. This is further supported in that only R+D is allowed to write on the whiteboard. The whiteboard also promotes movement, which also benefits diverse learning styles and spurs creative thinking.

Another pain point for team members, but most significantly for our CFO, Rob Nicholson, was receipts, tracking, and reporting. While many credit cards offer the chance to upload receipts, there is often a wait time or a hiccup in the system with a delayed auto-save and could be time-consuming for the employee. Instead, Nicholson brought in Ramp in late 2022 with promises of easy receipt tracking and real-time departmental P&L reporting. Ramp allows cardholders to text a photo of the receipt straight away on their phone or upload an invoice online, and members can select the pre-loaded accounting tag. Nicholson reflected on the benefits of Ramp:

"I dreaded when month-end came around and I had to code charges from our old credit card program. I found that receipts weren’t attached to the charges and I didn’t have the visibility to code them easily. I had to go to each employee and ask them what the charge was and for them to attach receipts. It was exhausting. Ramp changes all that." 

The ease allows Nicholson the opportunity to streamline reporting and employees are grateful for the ability to text receipts straight away. 

Our Marketing and Customer Success teams also benefited from new digital tools like our Popl business cards. TastesNatural™ had the Popl cards custom-made with our logo and chose the metal option for durability. A quick tap (or a QR code scan if the NFC technology isn’t supported), and the new prospect has your contact card in front of them, complete with photo, and can simply “save to contacts”. One card instead of hundreds. The reduction of paper use and reduction of printing costs are an immediate win. Our VP of Marketing and Brand Strategy, Shannon Duggan, reflected on the usefulness of these cards, stating:

“One card that fits in my wallet, one tap for the new connection, and an image to boot makes this card ideal. It is elevating the experience of building connections - with the photo to help remember one another and an informative profile that fosters dialogue."

These digital tools help ease some of the more tedious, slower aspects of day-to-day business and reflect our fresh company culture. They were intentionally designed and intentionally purchased, offering the team tools that allow us to expand where we need to spend our time: with our customers. 

For the Customers

Now for the harder questions:

• Do our customers care if we are innovative, or are they simply looking for something that works?
• Do our products showcase just how forward-thinking we are?
• Where does the customer experience need innovation? 

Each of our customers comes to us with unique formulations and recipes. Therefore, each solution (user rate, choice of product, etc) is also unique. The process of getting to that solution is one of trial and error for the customer. Instead, we support that process both in-house and on-location to streamline the R+D cycle. 

There is no online Shopify checkout, which feels oddly against innovation in a time that shoppers prioritize “Add to Cart” and texted receipts. And yet, how could we set our customers up for a one-size-fits-most when we recognize and value their one-off and often complex recipes? 

Need a sample, fill out a survey and get a call. Review ideas with an expert, and develop a relationship with your Rep as you learn about our revolutionary taste technology. Our customers value the ability to talk to a person - not a bot. Questions are honored and answered through thoughtful listening and reflection. 

Our goal is more traditional: prioritize custom, authentic responses with our customers, while communication trends are sharply shifting to ai-generated content. 

There are companies with little to no customer support offered, very few staff, and quick-trigger automated purchases. There are phone numbers that loop recordings and chatbots that are infuriating at critical times of need. Or, there is Nancy Ralston , and she’ll guide you through formulas, impart knowledge, and share insight; just call. 

About TastesNatural™

As an established leader in bitter blockers and taste technology, TastesNatural™ brings products to the market that are all-natural, non-GMO, and zero-calorie. Their patent-pending products are used globally in a range of industries. TasteNatural™ is known for its excellent customer service and support, helping customers' R+D departments towards scalable solutions.