For this blog post, I decided to look into the company, Envirofit International, and develop a business model canvas around it. I also worked with Chris Fereno on this blog post.

Envirofit International is a social enterprise that innovates smart energy products and services such a wood burning stoves and human-powered flashlights.

The key partners in this company are quite large. From the partner sections on their website, partners include The One Acre Fund, OPIC, Shell Foundation, Ukaid, GIZ, and many more (1). These are partners that the company works with to provide funding and revenue streams. Key partners can also be found in acquiring materials for the creation of these products, however, these partners aren’t public knowledge.

The key activities for this business are providing affordable alternatives to normal wood burning stoves, by creating a wood burning compartment at the bottom of the stove, to conserve the heat given off by the burning wood. This reduces the amount of wood required to cook any given meal and saves time and resources for those using it in a developing country. Along with the stoves, Envirofit also produces hand-crank flashlights and solar-powered lanterns. These devices allow those without a steady electricity source to produce their own electricity and thus light and power for a multitude of applications. These technologies allow people in developing countries to save energy, time and money to be more efficient and opens up many different doors for the people that use them as the applications are endless.

The key resources for this business are also quite large. It requires metal producers for all of the stove components, and for the flashlights and lanterns a multitude of different metals components such as wires, casing, and circuit boards required to create the product. Also, plastics for casings, buttons, and other internal parts are also needed (2). Of course, packaging and shipping supplies are also required but aren’t a part of the product itself. Envirofit’s key distribution channels are through their partners like UKaid that pays for and delivers hundreds of these stoves and flashlights across a multitude of developing countries.

The value proposition is quite simple actually. The entire point of this company is to provide energy and money saving products to those in developing countries. Their products claim to reduce the required energy by upwards of 80% in some of their products. This allows users in developing countries to save money, resources and time which are rare commodities in developing countries. The biggest issue the company address is the lack of available biomass to burn to cook food and boil water.

Envirofit is able to create very strong customer relationships due to the marketing strategies used and the nature of the product itself. The product itself makes a fire appear as though there is little to no smoke, possibly confusing people who do not understand how it works. Since people may not use their products if they do not understand the way they work, it is important that people go and explain how the product works and why it will make their lives better. This also can double as a marketing plan, if people saw how great the product is they are more likely to spread the word about it, raising awareness about the product and possibly creating more future clients. Moreover, as the company grows and is able to provide less hands on support they also have create a very reliable customer service branch of their company. Moreover, Envirofit is able to partner with companies that also care about making a positive impact throughout the world financially helping people in eveloping countries while simultaneously making a positinve ecological impact (3)

Envirofit has been able to build several distribution channels throughout the years. The website for Envirofit includes many options for distribution. People can become a dealer of the stoves themselves, possibly spreading the product locally. Similarly, people or groups of people can sign up to become distributors. These distributors would handle very large shipments of products. Large companies and organizations can partner with Envirofit to distribute stoves to places in need (4).

The customer segments for Envirofit fall under two main characteristics, those who cannot afford the price of gas or fuel and those who can. People who are unable to afford this product could possibly change their by having one of these products, helping them save money over time. Customers who are able to afford gas could use this product save some money as well as help the environment. Since the stove product is cheaper and more ecologically friendly than normal stoves, it could help people financially as well as help them pollute less. Those who cannot afford the cost of gas are the most important customers as they may not be able to eat or stay warm without a stove.

The cost structure of Envirofit  revolves around the total price of their product. There are many factors that go into the final price of an Envirofit product. Having materials that are inexpensive is essentially necessary for a company that intends to help those in developing countries. Without the ability to manufacture the product at a very low cost it would not be feasible for Envirofit to service developing countries. Similarly, Envirofit had to build the distribution channels to reach more people in need, without the cost of reliable distribution many people may not have received the help that an Envirofit product provides.

The revenue streams of Envirofit revolve around the great value their products have. Many people throughout developing countries struggle with the costs of daily life and they are able to receive some financial help by using Envirofit products. People are able to improve their overall quality of life for themselves and their families. Moreover, their products also provide ecological value to their customers, according to the Envirofit website, their stoves are able to reduce fuel use up to 60% (5). The Envirofit products give people a chance to reduce their impact on the environment without sacrificing any part of their daily life.

 

 

1. https://envirofit.org/distribution/#quotes-from-our-partners
2. https://www.trails.com/facts_6417_crank-flashlight-work.html
3. https://www.ukaiddirect.org/about/fund-priorities/
4. https://envirofit.org/distribution/
5. https://envirofit.org/our-story/#our-story

One of the main takeaways I took from guy Kawasaki’s talk was that we should accept any business that we get even if it was not our main target of customers. It would be almost discouraging to see people other than our target audience have interest in our product although at least someone would be using it even if we weren’t making the most impact possible. We could use the momentum from our customers to help us expand to the areas where we can make the most impact. Similarly, another takeaway I had revolves around a method of thinking. I took away the idea that we shouldn’t overthink anything, like a mission statement or design for the test strip. Our time and energy could be used in better ways than developing the perfectly worded mission statement, or other things of that nature, and I believe keeping that in mind will help us stay on track as we progress our project forward. Another takeaway I had from his talk was that I believe a MAT would be very helpful for our project. Due to the many grants and conference deadlines that are around us, we could benefit from the organization of a MAT. We would be able to stay on task and complete our goals in a very organized manor which would be useful. Another thing I learned from his talk was that we are always high and to the right with this project. We are providing something of high value to many people, eventually allowing them to live more healthy lives.

• Value Proposition
  • Our test strips will provide people with a screening device for a very serious genetic disease. People in developing countries are unable to get themselves tested for sickle cell which is why we are developing our product.
• Customer Segments
  • Our customers are generally from developing countries where people do not make much money. They would not have the resources to receive the medical attention and testing they need so we would provide them with our test strips.
• Channels
  • Our test strips will be given to the people who help with the most births. This could meant that community health workers, doctors, nurses and other health care workers will most likely have our test strips available to them to be used when children are being born, to screen them for sickle cell.
• Customer Relationships
  • We would need to expand where our test strips are available in order to gain new clients. AS new children are born each day, they can be screened by our strips which would essentially give us a constant flow of new customers. We are unable to keep our customers as our product shouldn’t require more than one use. Our customers should essentially be hospitals and other organizations which would be purchasing our products consistently as a very cheap way to screen people for sickle cell. In order to make sure these organizations continue to buy our products we need to ensure the low price, and the quality of our test strips along with make connections with the people in these organizations to make sure they understand that we want to help as much as possible.
• Revenue Streams
  • We would sell our products in mass amounts to hospitals and governments which would sell and distribute the test strips as they see fit. It is very likely that these places would make consistent purchases each year to deal with newborn children.
• Key Resources
  • In order to execute our business plan we need to make sure we have the finances to do so along with a manufacturing plan to create the correct amount of strips needed. We would also need methods to deliver our product to the locations of choice. We have needed experts to help consult us on problems we have run into throughout our testing. Without these things we would never have a chance of making this venture work.
• Key Partners
  • Lehigh University and the funding they give towards this project are most likely the most valuable assets we have. They provide professionals with experience who can help guide us towards the correct solutions. We also have relied on companies such as GE to deliver some of their products to us. As this becomes more of a large scale operation, we would need consistent deliveries from GE and Sigma Aldrich which would give us the materials to construct our test strips.
• Key Activities
  • In order to make our business model work, we must develop a working product that can provide people with significant and helpful results. Without this we would have no product and therefore no business. We also need to make sure we have a positive relationship with the people we are supplying our product to as their business is very important to the success of our business model.
• Cost Structure
  • We will spend our money producing and shipping our products while we should be able to gain steady incomes from hospitals, governments and other groups as it is very important that people are screened when they are born.