29 September 2018

Today was our first morning lecture with mentor Roderick Chia. We covered some basic expectations, deadlines, lessons plans as well as housekeeping matters. Roderick also shared his contact with us, and we were reminded to set up a WhatsApp or Telegram group with him in it so that we can easily ask or consult him for any issues.

We pitched our business idea, which was to sell small, desk-sized terrariums for offices or study tables. We wanted to use real plants instead of artificial ones, so some considerations we had were that the plants had to be hardy and low maintenance, as our target market is full of people who are busy and who might not have time to maintain or take care of their plants.

Roderick was generally approving of our venture as it covered the full range of entrepreneurial traits that this course was looking for - supply and product sourcing, marketing, sales, design etc. He offered some advice, as listed below:

1. He suggested that we keep in mind some logistical concerns, such as storage and transportation, as we had to have a place to keep our plants before we arrange them in their terrariums and a place to keep the completed terrariums as well. We had to remember to be careful in terms of transportation as well, as terrariums might be fragile and difficult to transport from one place to another.
2. We will need to consider the type of plants we would be using because some plants are deceptively difficult to maintain (such as tillisandias). He suggested that we also consider using moss, which is relatively easy to keep and is aesthetically pleasing.
3. We need to be mindful about our prices and designs, as the terrarium industry is usually competing in those two aspects. At our presentation, we will need to show a few quality designs and samples so that he can evaluate the potential of our venture.