at Wed, 28 Dec 2005 06:12:38 GMT in
.com>,
(Chembake) wrote :
>at Tue, 27 Dec 2005 10:41:10 GMT in
s.com>,
(Chembake) wrote :
>...
..
>Indeed, that's a possibility, and in fact an excellent marketing strategy
>can "rescue" a middling product. But when you get the combined effect of a
>well-received product and a good marketing campaign, you can get a sales
>bonanza.
> By contrast even the slickest marketing can rarely salvage an
>honest-to-goodness dud. The simple fact that such duds can and do occur in
>the food industry indicates that the evaluation process as you describe it
>isn't infalliable.

A product that is destined not to succeed is because of the failure of
the new product developer to assess the product quality that it will
conform with the customer needs which should have been already
anticipated .
But it seldom happens as its a team effort and there are a lot of
pragmatic and sensible people in his or her team to offer ideas that
will help the food designer.
Besides a failed product is not only something of sensory quality. It
may fail even if it satisfies many the criteria what the consumer
wants from that product..€¦.but if the developer expectation or much
more the company behind his team expect so much for that particular
product and they have their own projection for its performance and it
it happens it does not reach the standard of performance as in their
best selling products they will just stop selling , bring it back for
more study and see if they can improve it further before they can
relaunch it the same or as a different product name
They consumers may say that it vanished , it means it failed because
the consumer dislike it but its only half the truth
>>>>It's very similar to the process of drug research....
....
>>>No, a clinical trial is by definition performed on human patients.
>>Nope... clinical means analytical and coolly dispassionate in doing
>>the task but is expected to get results in an objective manner.
>>Not in the case of the medical industry. In this context the clinical
>>trial means those trials conducted on live patients...
>A food professional rarely worries that the use of such term that
>indicate objectivity will be construed as medical in meaning; in fact
>it was applied occasionally to describe how the evaluation is to be
>done..i.e in clinical manner.
>Perhaps not, but since this was a term introduced to refer to my analogy to
>the medical/drug research field, in this case the term must be used in the
>sense inferred in the medical industry.

In the general sense, but not in particular to a certain developer who
want to see things in clinical fashion as how he or she interpreted the
term.

>>It sounds like you misinterpreted the analogy, because in the medical
>>field the purpose of lab work on animals is to understand baseline
>>characteristics of a drug and establish, often at a microcellular
>>level, the biological and biochemical processes taking place - the
>>"objective" side of the analysis where you're trying to break down the
>>behaviour of the drug into its constituent effects.
>Nope
>What, exactly, are you disagreeing with here?

Its the comparison of subjects for ( drug use and confectionery
consumption evaluation).

>The relation is between the 2 groups of *test subjects* in the 2 cases -
>lab animals vs. professional test panels, human patients vs. consumer
>panels. However, and this is important, I'm not equating the external
>characteristics of the individual subjects, so that in no way am I trying
>to imply that professional testers are like lab animals. What I'm saying is
>that the body - the group, performs a similar function whatever their
>external characteristics. So that if in the medical case the need is for
>somewhat unintelligent creatures as test subjects, and in the food case for
>test subjects who are anything but unintelligent, that's wide of the
>analogy itself.
..That analogy is funny from the confectioners point of view.
>If you tried to extract the same level of detail out of the consumers for
>the same product, you could expect larger variances - i.e. a wider overall
>statistical distribution of the results, but this would be a reflection of
>the level of detail sought, not the accuracy of the analysis that can be
>performed. You'd just be trying to obtain finer resolution of the data than
>the available sample could accurately reveal. If, on the other hand, you
>restricted your questions to simple like/dislike response - the sort of
>level a consumer would probably respond on, then you would get probably
>equally accurate results - or to be precise in the language, results whose
>sample variance accurately reflected the distribution of the entire
>population. That's the whole goal of test panels - to estimate, by
>sampling, the overall statistical response of the population.


Yes and no responses, like and dislike €¦. Its not just not accurate
enough to describe the attributes of the food product.
Yes the result can also be statistically evaluated but it will never be
used as the major factor that the product fits the expectation of the
customer.
Likelihood that the consumer may buy something or not because from
rough statistics its shows it so is not a reliable indicator that the
product will succeed in the market.
A lot of marketing establishment have done that on other consumer
products but produced mixed results.
But if the product developed was really well thought of and exhaustive
study was done along the line of the particular customer expectation
then the marketing people will be exerting less effort to promote the
product.

> Taking a costumers comment seriously that are untrained is
>similar to relying on the belief that the consumers never lie on their
>experience , but how do you know if they have a certain prejudice for
>that item which can influence their decision making?
That can be gauged by their reaction to the new product and possible
feed back they can submit to the marketing survey.
>That's half of the reason to include the consumers in the sampling - to
>account for inbuilt bias as opposed to trying to eliminate it which if you
>do will give you the sales results that could be expected in a hypothetical
>universe where everybody bought free from prejudice as opposed to the real
>one where individual prejudices factor into the buying decision.
>In fact,
>you could probably suggest certain prejudices by comparing the results of
>the trained panel (who we hope will be close to neutral - although they may
>have their own prejudices) with that of the consumer panel. Major
>discrepancies would suggest a difference in expectations.

Difference in expectation is not what the trained test panel and the
untrained consumer panel had in mind.
The former knows from their experience and voluminous data what the
consumer expects and the latter understand that their own expectation
of the product is already taken care of.;even before the taste the
product.
And its pretty common in confectionery manufacture and seldom they
will ask second opinion from somebody outside who does not understand
what that confection is.
There is a wide variety of confectionery products and even me I dont
like many of them; so are the customers; there is a certain target
client for a certain confectionery item and that will be expected to
patronize them if all their needs for that certain item is filled up.

Therefore Target market is the keyword here
Every food designer have it in their mind before they embark on such
particular food product development
So when customer who is interested on that particular item will buy
the product they are optimistic that they would appreciate it.
Only people who has no affection for that certain confectionery line
will dislike it..
Take it for example supposing I am a consumer...and it happen that
.....
I dont like licorice but does it affects its sales?,,,,I am certain
that if I am your so called consumer panel I will be the offer a
vehement objection that I dislike it and so if supposing the consumer
panel is composed of equally of people who like and dislikes licorice
how can that judgement be taken as reliable and better than the trained
in house panel( who do it clinically/objectively) in judging a new
licorice product?
As most consumer panel are just randomly selected how can the
evaluators see a reliability that they have amassed the right target
customer for that particular product line?
A lot of consumer panel loves freebies.... and they have nothing to
lose but something to gain.
They may not like the product but out gratitude for the freebies and
compensation for their time and effort they will gladly lie in the
sensory evaluation to please the leader of the consumer panel
evaluation team.
How common is that occurrence of deceptive people whose integrity has a
lot to be desired; but they are consumers and therefore should be
included in your so called consumer panel to ultimately judge the
product that your developing team made exhaustive efforts that the new
item is what the particular target market wants.
>Meanwhile, yes, you can always run into the consumer who is going to lie
>blatantly on a panel for a variety of reasons. Again, this should be
>allowed for as much as possible in the way the panel is set up, the
>questions that are asked, etc.

....
>Subjective? Shallow? Possibly. And in fact a lot of buying decisions are
>made for those sorts of subjective, shallow reasons. Therefore you can't
>design a product on the assumption that people will buy it for objective
>reasons. You have to design it to play to the kinds of subjectivities
>people actually exhibit. Just because data is subjective doesn't mean it's
>any less "real". It just means it's much more difficult to rationalise -
>explain away through a logical thought process that one could follow
>algorithmically.

 Again, most people don't follow an algorithm when making a
>purchase decision.

That justifies the reasoning that its not wise to trust the customers
judgement as they are capricious . and most of the time unreliable.

..
>I would emphasize that the trained panel see the elephant in many
>angles so its more exacting than feeling only a part of it.
>Except that it is the customers who are buying the product. So if the goal
i>s to sell an elephant, then you have to appeal to the blind customer,
not
>to the sighted panel. The panel may be able to expound on qualities that
>would be important to those who can see, but to the blind man such
>qualities might well be immaterial. Yes, the panel has a richer
>description, but all that richness of description means little when the
>buying decision is being made by somebody with a more impoverished
>perspective.

This sums up that if a certain consumer only see a part of the whole
picture then how can their decision be taken into account as reliable
basis that the product is good or bad?
>Introducing also an alternative counterexample, I would portray the
>customers as people who can see, and who see...an elephant. They don't care
>much about the shape of the ears, or the length of the trunk, or any other
>feature that the trained person sees and integrates into a description.
>What they want is an elephant, pure and simple. In some sense you might say
i>t's the customer who has the more holistic viewpoint, refusing to see
an
>object as a collection of distinct subobjects.
That is what I mean€¦.to see things as a whole€¦.but if you judge it
by the term or like and dislike (which is common in consumer panel )
which are half truths ...it does not say anything to be taken
seriously by a competent evaluator as it does not say anything valid(
if not solid) descriptors that can be used to relate to the
technically trained panel.
>Unknown products?....how can that be a confectionery product is
>supposed to be known and its not as dangerous or risky if compared to
>drug use
>It's not that the reaction might be dangerous, it's that it's
>unpredictable, precisely because, as you point out, customers are
>notoriously subjective. So it's difficult to quantify the response ahead of
>time, and the only way to get real data is to experiment on the real
>subjects. Drugs are unpredictable in dangerous ways, and now it's not
>because the patient's system responds subjectively, but because it responds
>with a complex of only partially-understood mechanisms. But in either case
>the result is the same - you can't predict the outcome as well as you would
>like without field trials.

That is one of the major reason that I dont want to compare drug
evaluation to confectionery assessment . They are different : a food
item is never comparable to a medicinal product..
It does not give any sense or even logic at all for an equivalent
comparison.

>>Trying to have every food product created by the food designer be
>>tasted by the consumer is a grossly expensive and time consuming...
>>Most statistical controls have to do with testing samples as opposed to
>>the entire production run, however, you can't simply translate the
>>statistical data from one product to a different product, even if the
>>products are similar. The new product must have its own statistics be
>>generated and this involves data-gathering.
>Your understanding of the statistical tools is unfortunately not
>sufficient enough in order to comprehend its importance in food
>product development
>I've actually not described my background in statistics. FWIW I've done
>extensive theoretical and practical work with statistical models - and in
>both the sense of developing specific statistical tools for specific
>industries, and in developing the overall theory of statistical analysis.
>My specialty is in fact in computing technologies using statistical methods
>as an alternative to deterministic digital processing. This involves both
>an understanding of the ground rules of statistical analysis and a
>development of processing models that allow one to implement statistical
>functions in computer hardware. Computer hardware itself is also fabricated
>using methods of statistical process control. So I've had opportunities to
i>nteract with the field at many levels. Do you have a specific
technique in
>mind that you think I might not be familiar with (perhaps, for example, one
>very much unique to the field you're in)?

Uniqueness..?....maybe not as food product development is an applied
science the statistical tools are related as in other field..

In my field our personnels use statistical tools to improve the
efficiency of product development such as good design of experiments
including robust product design , formulation optimization techniques
,Quality function deployment , and related statistical tools and it
helped us a lot to hit the right product according to the customer
requirement for such. item.

In addition by extensive database of confectionery related matters
including product movement, consumer expectations etc
We already gained an understanding of customer wants and needs of a
certain product and we develop product requirements( and specification
) along that line to ensure that customer wants are being addressed
and the product is likely to succeed once its done.
There is no need to go the customer everytime to ask them if this is
what they want as that is redundant.
Taking consumers as the source of positive feedback before the product
is to be developed is an absurdity.
By the way
If your statistical thinking is correct and just focusing on the taste
aspect alone, then what have been found in the laboratory and pilot
scale studies including sensory analysis already produced positive
result that the majority of the attributes as what the customer
wants ( for that certain product)then why would the consumer will be
expected to say grossly the opposite that is not what they want?
Where is the positive correlation statistically speaking?




Another thing is
Why would the developer rely on the outside feedback to dictate them in
their jobs when they are already aware what the consumer want and they
are developing the products in that direction?
Besides a certain company who has already established reputation for
their confectionery product performance in the market have already
amassed voluminous data what the customer wants for a certain
confectionery product and so any new project is based on that mine of
information..
They have use any available tools in their facility to get things done
in behalf of the customers.

I have seen a lot of product development done by big confectionery
establishment ( not necessarily in the US) that was not even subjected
to much consumer testing but succeeded in the market; and I have seen
some new products from different small confectionery business that
dont have good technically trained personalities in their workforce
but just an assembly of chefs and kitchen personnel who made
confections and relies on consumer feedback to judge their new product
but to fail ultimately in the market.
I have also seen some chocolatiers who had long experience in the field
that he does not need to ask the customer what they want but he can
create a novel products that really sell!
The big decision if the product will fail or succeed in the market does
not come from the consumers but within the producers ranks; These
people are not crazy to waste resources without having a forethought if
that particular product is doomed to fail .They are certain the know
what the customer wants and they are going in that direction.

Therefore this validates my earlier statement that the consumer panel
is just SUPPORTIVE or CONFIRMATORY in any confectionery related
development.

>Except that in the specific case of lecithin a customer has some reason to
>believe the confection *might* be fatal and no hard data to assure him that
>it won't. It's for that reason that some people in the soy-allergic group
>are scrupulous about avoiding soy lecithin.

That is dubious thought....lecithin to be fatal....when similar lipids
exist in the human body?
And it was proven time and time again that is safe...regardless if
comes from soybean or other plant material.
If there is somebody who is really allergic to it is very rare and not
a cause of concern for the confectionery manufacturer.