IBD Travel Blog: Parla Italiano?
Project Country: Italy / IBD Client: Passione Beauty
Written by: Roshan Ravikumar, Chidera Osuji, Leslie Castro, Michelle Le, and Wayne Chung
Two former consultants, a data scientist, a government affairs specialist, and an operations professional walk into a bar an office in Vicenza, Italy. You may ask, what are they doing in Vicenza? Fresh pizza, gluttonous seafood pasta, and Veneto wine might come to mind. But no. They are here on a mission to help an Italian beauty brand evaluate a new business opportunity.
We had travelled to Vicenza after four months of remote work in Berkeley on our client’s business question. Our weekly client calls, research, and brainstorming sessions revealed the factors that would be most salient; however, the opportunity to experience Italian culture, the company’s values, and the complexity of a fast-growing enterprise was invaluable to our insights.
Week 1: Company deep dive
On day one, we gave introductions to the team and toured the warehouse, getting an overview of the company’s value chain. Over this first week, we dove deep into the company structure, interviewing key stakeholders in every department from marketing to procurement, finance, and IT. New challenges and opportunities emerged from these conversations that influenced our initial hypothesis and deepened our insights. We debriefed every day with an essential meeting, aiming to Get Everyone’s Learnings And Takeaways Organized. With nine interviews down and countless pages of notes, we closed out the week with a team dinner, excited to implement our learnings and looking forward to the weekend ahead.
A weekend in the Veneto region
With limited time and lots of things to check off our sightseeing list, we launched into the weekend with an idyllic lunch at Enoteca della Valpolicella, based off a recommendation from our client, before heading off for a wine tasting. Then, we visited Verona to reenact a noble clash of ancient warriors in front of the Verona Arena, a legendary amphitheater that actually predates the Colosseum. We even stopped by Juliet’s (of the infamous Romeo and Juliet) house to see if she was home (she wasn’t).
On Sunday, we thought, when in Rome, do what the Romans do… and toured one more vineyard estate followed by another bucolic lunch spot just off of Lago di Garda, following another recommendation from our client. After lunch we took a stroll by the water and stumbled upon a flea market where we bought souvenirs to remember the trip by. To top it off, we spent the evening at a spa and thermal bath off the lake and watched the sunset together.
Week 2: Finishing touches and presentation
Refreshed from the weekend, we kickstarted week two with a presentation to the client’s CEO and company contacts. With their helpful feedback, we spent the next few days synthesizing the new information we had gathered from interviews, refining our approach, and conducting additional desk research to round out our recommendations. Taking a break from our analysis, we combined one of our final team dinners to celebrate Roshan’s birthday. HBD to our fearless leader!
On Tuesday and Wednesday, we each had the wonderful opportunity to get treatments at the client’s on-site nail lab to better understand the products. Feeling empowered with our fresh manicures, we dug deeper into our analysis to close out lingering questions in our workstreams. On our last day in the office, we presented our findings to the whole team, including the stakeholders we had interviewed in week one. They engaged with the content, asking questions and chiming in with comments from their respective teams. We closed off the day with a company lunch, chatting candidly with everyone we had the pleasure of interacting with during our time onsite over authentic northeastern Italian food. It was a bittersweet goodbye as we turned in our company badges, remembering the amazing time we had, but looking to the future with all the learnings from our experience, ready to take on the next mission.
Grazie mille to our gracious hosts and company contacts, and missione compiuta.
Ciao!
