Business Idea: Let the Customer Buy at Different Stages of the Process

More and more people want to do things themselves: it’s popular to be eco-friendly, self-sufficient, handy, and to create things on your own. But not everyone can do everything, even if they want to. Why not meet the customer halfway and give them the chance to do part of the work themselves?

There are already furniture pieces that come in flat packs that we have to assemble ourselves. You can get a meal kit delivered with ingredients and recipes to cook your exclusive dinner at home. This idea should be possible to develop for many more industries and segments!

Imagine a store with products that can be purchased in several different stages— the more work the customer does themselves, the cheaper it becomes!

For example, there are surely many people out there who wish they could sew stylish clothes but don’t know how to get started. Imagine offering clothes available in different stages:

• Step 1. The most expensive option is a finished, ready-to-wear shirt. Or perhaps a very unique shirt, but ready-to-wear, so to speak.
• Step 2. The next most expensive option lets the customer do a little bit themselves. For instance, they can choose the buttons they want and then sew them on.
• Step 3. The next cheapest option is to sew the entire shirt themselves! In that case, you only send pre-cut pieces with patterns and instructions. The customer then gets to work with their hands and sew their own shirt. Perhaps you also include tips on how they can alter the pattern or design to create a truly unique garment.
• Step 4. The absolute cheapest option is to only send the pattern and instructions. It’s up to the customer to buy fabric and buttons (possibly as an add-on from you?), and to cut out all the pieces themselves.

The same principle can be applied in varying degrees to a wide range of products. Why not do as the big furniture giants and offer parts of your custom-made furniture that the customer assembles themselves? Or let them buy a piece of furniture untreated, so they can paint, stain, oil, or varnish it themselves to their own taste!

Help customers who want to build their own computer by sending all the components instead of a finished one. Or include parts and instructions on how they can use a Raspberry Pi to control all the lighting or act as a media center. Could you even send parts to assemble their own phone?

For truly niche products, you could offer raw materials, for example for an axe, along with clear instructions on how to carve the handle and sharpen the edge to create a sharp and exclusive tool. Maybe via a YouTube channel like we’ve written about earlier?

It looks like customers continue to search for “lost knowledge” that our grandparents had to know: how to sew clothes, how to grow enough to feed a household, how to renovate and build themselves, how to repair instead of throwing away, and so on.

Instead of resisting this, companies can become part of it. Help your customers discover what they can do and what they can learn. Some customers may even find a new hobby by trying to sew their own shirt or carve an axe handle!

This article is part of our interesting, exciting, or fun business ideas. The idea is that you should be able to find inspiration or spark ideas for your own business.