Testing the Hypothesis, Part 1

The opportunity that I am pursuing is an alternative for people that are being screwed over by the airline industry. There are travelers that are severely inconvenienced due to the incompetency and error of airlines.

Who: There are very few that have the needs that these travelers have. By just offering services to those on a regular basis you wouldn’t be servicing the problem at hand.

What: The challenges faced in this scenario would almost certainly be at airports. People missing their flights and being stranded in strange cities is something that is definitely a problem for a lot of people every day.

Why: The why will differ in certain situations. Some circumstances will be the fault of the airline, some will be because of the airports, and then some could be because of the weather.

1.       My first interview took place with my mother. When first bringing up the topic to my mother she thought that it sounded good in practice. A problem that she brought up would be that airlines could easily push me out of the market by offering my services but better. Also, the who that is in question could refer to any people who are looking for last second lodging or travel accommodations. The opportunity relies in people needing things very last minute.

2.       The second interview was with my roommate. He was pretty agreeable with most of the points that I was making. There were a few great points that he made though. When looking into the “why” part there are a few things that we disagreed on. I said that people would be willing to pay high prices for immediate solutions to problems that seem like the end of the world. His stance was that people could already pay high prices for solutions but are usually too cheap to go and check with another airline. They would spend the night in the airport before they were to pay high prices for my solutions.

3.       Next interview was with an old high school friend that is interested in being an engineer. The points that he contributed to the mix primarily consisted of the what. Our discussion boiled down to the very nature of the opportunity that I wanted to cash in on. He noted that the “what” could consist of any situation where a customer is needing an IMMEDIATE solution to their problem. So the scope of my opportunity could be spread much farther than simply the airline industry.

4.       This interview was with an old teacher from my high school. There a high level of agreeableness in our interview and it seemed as if she felt she was doing me a favor by agreeing with my ideas. Our conversation primarily consisted of discussing the “how.” This teacher wanted to know the ins and outs of how I planned on the logistics of getting people places and being able to provide the value that I am speaking of. This conversation brought up a bunch of questions for me that I would really need to answer before moving further.

5.       The final interview I had was with a colleague in one of my business groups on campus. We had a very good conversation on the “what” that would be provided to the individuals looking to benefit from our service. He focused primarily that there is a huge market for immediate services and it is growing exponentially. There would be a great opportunity to go into any market with the mindset that I have. However, he mentioned that being able to do this in the airline industry would be revolutionary because of the sheer distances and difficulty in logistics that come with it.

A lot of the conversations that took place in my interviews were questioning the logistics that would be needed to take place in order for something like this to work. It would truly be difficult to make something like this work but it would provide immeasurable value to the people that desperately need it on short notices. The fact that this is so hard is proof that being able to do something in this sphere would help a lot of people.