Tethered Opportunity
#opportunity
In 1930 Ray Kroc was selling paper cups for Lily Tulip Cup Company. That year he made a sale that brought massive boost to his volume and gave him new insight into a distribution strategy. Kroc sold cups to the Walgreen Drug Company just as they entered a period of expansion. They used the cups for their soda fountain. Observing the traffic these fountains had at noon a new opportunity came to mind (tethered to his own success).
If they had new cups they could sell to-go drinks to the overflow crowd. "You're crazy, or else you think I am," McNamara their food service guy said. "Mac, the only way in the world that you can increase your soda fountain volume is I add to people who don't have you a stool... I will give you 200 or 300 containers with covers, however many you need to try this for a month in your store" Ray Kroc proposed. Finally McNamara agreed. It was a wild success. They implemented this service in every Walgreen store. Every time a new one opened Ray Kroc got more business. The opportunities multiplied.