Johnathan's Entrepreneurship Blog

Check out my first elevator pitch for my new entrepreneurship idea: crafting user friendly allergy menus for small restaurant businesses. This would serve to expand those business' costumer base, improve the average customer experience and increase restaurant options for individuals with food allergies. Don't forget to like and comment! Enjoy! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FvQ63erVCz4&t=2s

Interviews: 1. Owner of PDQ Gainesville This is a repeat from Part I, but I had extended interview time and asked him some extra questions that made him a great fit for this portion of testing the hypothesis. I learned that:         PDQ has an allergy menu         PDQ outsources some functions of its business (marketing, customer outreach, etc.)         The owner of PDQ Gainesville could not outsource the creation of an allergy menu to me even if they did not have one because he does not have the authority as merely a franchise owner representing an entire brand 2. Owner of Relish Burger I learned that:         Relish does not have an allergy menu         Relish sees not need for an allergy menu because all of their ingredients are displayed in front of guests and the workers can assist customers with any further inquiries 3. Manager at M...

The Problem: Individuals with food allergies have difficulty navigating which restaurants they should visit/what food they can order safely when many restaurants do not have an allergy menu. The Solution: At this point, I am considering one of the following two routes: (1) Approaching restaurant businesses (small places at first, and then potentially expanding into franchises) that do not have an allergy menu and explain to them the benefits of having an allergy menu for customers. After that point, if they would be willing to provide me with their nutritional information, I would charge a small fee to consolidate the information into a convenient, easy-to-use allergy menu. (2) Creating a website where I could consolidate all local restaurants with allergy menus (and restaurants w/o allergy menus that are very solid at accommodating individuals with food allergies) and their allergen information so that students with food allergies at UF have an easy place to acce...

Issue: 10% of the U.S. population has food allergies and many restaurants do not have an allergy menu that allows that portion of the population to consider restaurant menus in a safe and convenient manner. Who, What, Why: Who: (1) Individuals w/ food allergies (2) Restaurants w/o exhaustive allergy menus What: (1) Cannot identify safe/desirable places to eat (2) Miss out on/don’t fully exploit a large potential market Why: (1) Individuals w/ food allergies do not have the means to lobby for all restaurants to have an exhaustive allergy menu (2) Restaurants are unaware of the importance of allergy menus or are unsure how to create an easy-to-use allergy menu Fleshing out the WWW’s Further: Who: (1) Parents of young children with food allergies (2) Public school systems What: (1) Cannot identify safe places for their young children to eat (2) Cannot maintain the safety of children with food allergies Why: (1) Lack of allergy menus (2) Are unaware that allergy men...

Economic Opportunities: 1. Trend towards Passive Investing a) There is currently a trend towards passive investing. Many individuals would rather focus on low-risk, small returns than high-risk, large returns. This has led to the artificial price inflation of blue-chip companies with “low risk:” stock, which could ultimately lead to a market crash, at which point there will be a trend back towards active investing. I have developed this knowledge through reading the Wall Street Journal. b) Listening to various industry experts who have spoken at UF events has led me to believe this is an issue. c) Customers who are well-off financially (mostly because those who are wealthy are those who invest). d) I feel that this opportunity would be difficult to exploit because (1) there is no telling when the market will crash and (2) one would need to develop a track record of successful past investments in order to attract new investors. e) I feel that given my particip...

In the general spirit of entrepreneurship (that is, in the spirit of solving other’s problems), many of the problems discussed below lend themselves to non-profit solutions. These stories come from a couple of different newspapers that report in and around my hometown near Tampa, Florida. 1.      Community Rallies to Help Fire Damaged McLane Middle School Link: https://www.ospreyobserver.com/2019/08/community-rallies-to-help-fire-damaged-mclane-middle-school/ The story: In July of this year, a local middle school was struck by lightning and destroyed seven classr5ooms leaving teachers to purchase new supplies and move the classrooms to new, portable locations. The problem: Seven teacher and seven classrooms of middle school students are without a permanent classroom location, which could lead to uncomfortable working conditions for teachers and underperformance on the part of students Who has the problem? The teachers, administration, and studen...

1.  I believe that there is a problem in that not all restaurants have expansive allergy menus. 2.  I have grown up with severe food allergies and around others who have severe food allergies. I have always been more drawn to and virtually forced to eat at restaurants which have expansive allergy menus. Individuals with severe food allergies can have life-threatening complications when exposed to allergens and this is a problem in children  and  adults. Considering my experiences and the fact that the percentage of Americans with food allergies is roughly 10% (and the percentage grew by a factor of 3 between 1997 and 2008), it seems that a small restaurant business would be able to expand their customer base and improve their average customer experience if they are very capable of accommodating people with food allergies. I believe that a company would be willing to outsource the creation of an exhaustive allergy menu to an individual with experience relying on...