We have learned a lot about the complex life cycle of our clothing over the past 7 weeks. When we first met CJ McCollum, he challenged you all to make our clothes a force for good. Now we need your help to explore solutions to the impacts created by them.

- What type of business would you launch to make clothing more sustainable?

While this is a very broad question, CJ is back today to introduce a tool to help you refine and test your ideas. This tool is the foundation of every business – a Business Plan.

Present CJ’s Introduction to Business Plans Video.

What is a Business Plan?

A business plan describes an idea for a product or service. It allows you to create a map for success by planning out the different elements of your business. Today we are going to focus two specific elements, the idea and marketing that idea.

All businesses begin with an idea. Successful businesses begin with a great idea. What is your great idea?

• Is your idea a product or service?

• What makes your idea unique?

• What do existing products/services not offer that yours will?

• Why will people buy it?

Before you answer these questions, let’s examine several characteristics of great business ideas:

• They solve problems – What problems do you have? What problems do others have?

• They solve things that may become problems – Can you solve future problems before they become problems?

• They improve solutions to basic needs - We all have basic physical and emotional needs. The way we fulfill them evolves throughout our life. Think about music, a solution to human emotional needs throughout our history.

  • For centuries, the only way to listen to music was to play an instrument, know someone who did, or attend a concert.

  • Less than 100 years ago, records were invented allowing people to play their favorite music in homes aroundxsde the world. Records then evolved to 8 tracks bringing music to our cars, then cassette decks allowing you to bring your music with you, to CD’s that improved the process, to today’s downloadable digital files.

  • Each of these steps was a fundamental shift in the business ultimately allowing consumers to listen to whoever they want, whenever they want, wherever they are. How do people currently satisfy their basic needs, and can you think of a way to improve it?

• They save people money - Can you develop a less expensive solution to people’s problems?

• They make people’s lives easier, or chores and tasks more enjoyable - What action, product, service, or chore that could be adapted to make your life easier or more enjoyable?

In groups, or individually, ask the students to come up with their own great idea. Display the Great Business Ideas Slide so students can refer to 5 characteristics of great ideas.

Now that you all have identified your great idea, the next step is to share the news. Marketing refers to activities a company undertakes to promote the buying or selling of a product or service. It includes advertising, selling, and delivering products to consumers or other businesses.

The first question to answer is who is our target market? To do that, answer the following questions:

• Who will you sell your product/service to?

• Are your customers businesses or people?

• Where are your customers located?

Now that we know who our target market is, how do we convince them to purchase our product or service? Let’s start off by naming our business.

• What is the name of your business?

• What does the name say about your business?

• Is it meaningful to your target audience?

Now that we have a name and product/service, how will our target market find out about it?

• Where will they buy it?

• How will you promote your product/service to your target market?

• What is your message to your target market?

In groups, or individually, ask the students to name their business and create a tag line (Just do it, for example) that is meaningful to their target audience.

In groups, or individually, students share the great idea, name of their business, and tagline/hashtag to the class.