Co-creation & Closeness - Brilliant moments. Episode 1

The most powerful co-creation I’ve led involved the power of the 3 C’s in one session - in this case consumer, customer (retailer/distributor) and company (supplier, manufacturer).

It works brilliantly because you have every voice that you need to drive change represented in the room.  Each party also brings their own expertise:

• The Company (supplier/manufacturer): your insight, strategy and experience

• The Customer (retailer/distributor): their insight, strategy and experience

• The Consumer: their needs, preferences and perceptions

Having the consumer in the room at relevant stages of co-creation shifts the focus away from confrontational agendas to a focus on mutual category growth. And of course, to enhance creativity you can be bold with the consumers you invite into the room: ‘Do you want bleeding edge, diverse groups or the mainstream?’, ‘What tasks will help you identify the unlockers of category growth?’.

We ran a series of these events for a client. In each, brand owners and retailer teams co-created ideas with consumers on the first day, we turned them into concepts overnight and then the teams tested the ideas with fresh consumers the next day. 

Because both the Customer (the retailer) and the Company (manufacturer) were involved they were able to move forward quickly with an action plan with the confidence the ideas created were a win:win for all 3 Cs.

Feedback from the retailer team attending was overwhelmingly positive: ‘Great to see that this supplier is focusing on what our customers need and how we can use insight to meet our mutual strategic objectives. By involving us they have built on what we are doing to create something actionable that will lead to results’.