Bridging Horizons: 'Carnivore Nights' Intersects with Entrepreneurial Ventures, Innovation, and Product Leadership — Part I

In this is a 4-part story I will take though my journey from creating & opening my own business to closing it, an entire product / business lifecycle, and all from an Entrepreneur & PM Point-of-View (PoV).

Each part will address a different set of milestones in the product's lifecycle, and contain a link to the previous part, for the readers who’ve missed the previous part and want to catch up.

In this first part we will cover the Ideation phase in a product’s lifecycle.

Part I — From Itch to Ideation

It is often said that every (good) product is brought to life to solve someone’s problem / scratch an itch, if you will. This story that I lay before is no different.

Around 2010, I had a good job, we lived in our (then) dream-house that we built in a new community neighborhood up north, my 3rd son was born, and everything was fine.

Nothing to complain about, yet, amidst this bliss, an elusive void lingered. I couldn't quite put my finger on it.

After months of coming home from work every evening, spending time with my wife & kids, I still couldn’t shake the feeling that something was missing.

Finally I decided to take a look around my social surroundings, and there it was…as we lived in a new community-neighborhood (private homes and such), I noticed that the neighborhood’s women were having their own women’s night - where they gathered once a month in someone else's home, with refreshments, and just had their night out to unwind & bond.

I immediately knew what was missing for me — my very own men's group to unwind

with, near home, with as minimum fuss. What do you need for a men’s night? Simple, meat & alcohol; and so the concept of 'Carnivore Nights' was born – a socially-disruptive initiative.

I reached out to my male friends in the neighborhood, and scheduled our first gathering. 11 men should up. We enjoyed it, so we sent another gathering for the following month and ~20 men should up. Little by little our gatherings grew bigger, growing the momentum from event to event, until we reached ~40-50 participants.

The gatherings were entirely non-profit, social, and exclusive to the men in our small community.

We started off with only charcoal grills, but soon enough I introduced a meat-smoker which I brought with me on one of my business travels to US. It was was an unknown / scarcely known gadget at the time (2010) in Israel, and the audience LOVED it! I had stumbled on to something intuitively, while merely trying to scratch my own itch.

Word of these meat-nights spread out to nearby communities, and I found myself fielding phone calls from enthusiastic participants.

At first I turned everyone down, but after some consultation with my wife & closest friends an ‘Ideation’ took place and I decided to open the first, one of a kind, home food-entertainment business for ‘Carnivore Nights’.

This was never done before I opened a whole new blue-ocean for my business.

As I was paving my way in uncharted territories, I had to create a blueprint for it, so I asked myself a few questions:

- Q: "what do I want?"

A: "to make people enjoy themselves & unwind before the weekend; I want them to loosen up, and have as much fun as I has with my entourage; and I wanted to educate & expose them to the various cuts of meat in an animal"

- Q: "what will intrigue people to read my ads?"

A: "a catchy name that will encapsulate the essence of the event – Meat & Eat – a word-play with a wink"

- Q: "how will I make the experience a High VFM (Value for Money) to gain reputation, returning customers, and expand my brand awareness through word of mouth?"

A: "All of the points listed below, giving the audience an experience they've never had before"

* Expand my ‘Total Addressable Market’ (TAM) — It would be open to every adult, not only men and not only from our community;

* The sitting would be informal on garden furniture;

* It would be only about high-end quality meat — beef, lamb, poultry; no salads, no side dishes;

* You would eat with your hands - giving the primal experience;

* It would be BYOB — aside from cold water, and my specialty spiced tea alongside one of my wife's famous home desserts;

* It would be limited to 40 participants;

* It would start at 21:00, but there would be NO deadline - it ends when it ends (usually 3-4 hours);

* It would 'Paleo Friendly' – I prepared all rubs, sauces, and glazes were made from scratch, w/o any processed sugars or nitrites or any other artificial ingredient;

* It would be about public education of what is known today as “nose to tail” — each such evening will consist of at least 10 different cuts & courses from various animals; there's more to an animal than the “holy trinity” - Ribeye, Sirloin, and Tenderloin;

Once the blueprint & Ideation phase were done, it was time to move forward to the

Discovery phase.