Deciding who to build protein snacks for, and what

The question

Two questions came in order: who are the people who look for protein in a snack, and which ideas are worth developing for them?

The first answer had to be something an innovation team could brief from. The second had to give the brand a few directions clear enough to take into development.

Our approach

We started from the evidence that already existed, then added qualitative work and a survey in two markets.

From these we built a typology of protein-focused snackers, an innovation framework on top of it, and estimates of how many people each type covered and what the opportunity might be worth. They are research estimates to plan with, never sales.

We then worked inside the client’s own program, running the ideation with a multidisciplinary team and the consumer clinics that explored and refined the most promising ideas with the people they were for.

Throughout, what people believed protein would do for them was kept apart from what a product could claim. Possible reasons to believe were treated as routes to explore, so a concept would never promise more than a product could say.

What the team came away with

The brand had a typology of protein snackers and a framework built on it, so every idea could start from the snacker it was for.

With them came sizing estimates to plan with, and ideation and clinics run as part of the program itself.