PLAN
MVP Strategy:
Test license interest with customers via social media post, testing engagement with post (likes & comments). We will need to set engagement threshold on posts to determine whether to move forward on it.
If the license shows potential (via metrics) confirm the MVP test on development calendar, and the full cut and sew collection on the calendar. These should be separated by several months.
Identify most successful product category (t-shirts?) THIS IS THE MVP
Need to determine the amount of tees that constitute the MVP. 3-5 total designs should be sufficient.
Success metrics assigned for sell throughs for MVP releases.
Design DTG t-shirts using current trends and most popular aspects of the license.
Designs should be completed quickly and sampled quickly.
Confirm samples look good.
Get approvals from licensors.
Photograph samples.
Launch on website.
Analyze sell throughs against success metrics.
Proceed with cut and sew or cancel cut and sew from calendar.
MVP Timeline:
Clicking this link below will open a new window in your browser displaying the MVP roadmap strategy. This strategy would take place place over 3 months. This time frame is just an example, this process could take up to 6 months depending on the time required to test customer interest in the license.
Design Sprints :
6 sprint stages:
Understand: user needs / business needs / technology capacities
What are our competitors doing? What licenses are they going after that we have and can be “first” to? What licenses have they done that we can do better? What licenses are our customers asking for? Do we have those, if not how fast can we get the license? How are we capturing and communicating with our customer requests, can this be done via social media? The customer is the primary stake holder but how can we engage the licensor as well so they feel compelled to help with marketing? What are our insights and ideas?
Define: Key Strategy / Focus
Develop early approachable product that can be executed quickly to test customer desire for license, focus on quality tee designs that are on trend and understandable. Define the user journey here from the point which the customer learns what license we intend to design into all the way to their purchase experience and review of the product. What 3 words would we like for customers to use when talking about our product, compare these to the actual words they use once they complete purchase.
Diverge: explore as many ideas as possible
Speed to market on un-tested properties through DTG print tees on multiple properties per month, what new licenses should we be testing, are there licenses that have performed well in the past that we can take a fresh look at? What trends would you use to design each of these licenses, can you provide quick sketches or trend pulls for reference in our discussion? We should storyboard the tee MVP collection here and show how the trend would apply to the license.
Decide: select the best ideas
Analyze thresholds for each release and determine if they warrant expanded product offerings and larger collections. Review all the licenses suggested and the trends and design ideas suggested for each and have the design team vote on which ones to approach first. At this point we can talk further about the main contenders and refine the design ideas.
Prototype: create ideas to test
Divide up top contenders amongst designers and start working on mock ups for each license.
Validate: validate ideas with stakeholders for sampling
One mockups are complete, teams review the designs with creative director and brand managers to evaluate, revise and curate the mock ups. Designs should be vetted with sales, merchandising and CEO once approved the sprint is complete and designers should move to sampling.
Agile/Waterfall Hybrid :
The hybrid method is highly suggested for this type of product as it allows us to test licenses with our customers, and using KPI’s and thresholds, determine if a license should have a complete cut and sew line. The overseas cut and sew items involve inventory investment and a much longer lead time with the potential for greater loss.
This strategy will require 2 types of design teams, team 1 would be focused solely on speed to market tee design. This team would be the tip of the spear in testing and should have strong design intuition and be able to execute the MVP designs in line with current trends and market comps. These designs will set the creative tone for the forthcoming cut and sew line.
Team 2 would be responsible for the full cut and sew line. This team should have a strong background in patterning and material usage as well as being able to apply trend and graphics to their product in a way that follows current fashion trends for our target customer. They should have an understanding of different art techniques available to us from our overseas factories and should work closely with the factory and the PD team to execute innovative products to bring to market. Both teams should be involved in meetings and design reviews for both the agile and waterfall calendar for each license, this allows for complete transparency and collaboration from concept to execution.
DTG tees are our “software” the cut and sew line is our “hardware”
Will utilize Gantt / kanban chart, waterfall calendar, agile sprint calendar
Click this link to view an example of the sprint plan.
