Business Idea Lab
Test it before you bet on it.
Many ideas fail only after the money is spent. We look for the cracks before you commit it.
How to read it
- An ideaA new venture, product, branch or market.
- Falls awayIt stops at the first test it cannot pass.
- Worth buildingDesirable, feasible and viable: all three proven.
Four ideas enter. One fails on desirability, one on feasibility, one on viability. One is worth building.
Conviction is not evidence.
Every new venture rests on a few beliefs: that customers want it, that you can deliver it, and that it will pay. Most plans treat these beliefs as facts.
We treat them as questions, and answer them with evidence before you commit the capital. The result is a decision based on what the market shows, not on what the plan assumes.
Three questions
Every idea has to answer three questions. We answer them first.
01 · Desirability
Will customers want it?
Is the problem real, painful and frequent enough that people will change what they do today?
02 · Feasibility
Can it be delivered?
Do the resources, partners and capabilities exist to build it and run it at the quality customers expect?
03 · Viability
Will it pay?
Will customers pay enough, often enough, for the economics to hold once it grows?
How the Lab works
Map, test, learn, decide.
01
Map
We surface every assumption behind the idea and rank each by how much rides on it and how little is known.
02
Test
We design small, fast experiments matched to each risk: customer interviews, landing pages, mock sales, pop-ups and letters of intent.
03
Learn
We read what customers do, not only what they say, and record exactly what changed in our understanding.
04
Decide
Proceed, pivot or stop, on evidence you can defend to a board, a partner or an investor.
Most ideas pass through this loop more than once. Each pass costs far less than the mistake it prevents.
Inside the Lab
Evidence over opinion.
Every experiment starts with a test card and ends with a decision. The success threshold is agreed before the result comes in, so no one can move the goalposts afterwards.
Test card
Illustrative experiment- Hypothesis
- Parents of children under eight will pre-book a weekday play session.
- Experiment
- Landing page with pre-booking, two weeks
- Metric
- Share of visitors who pre-book
- We are right if
- At least 1 in 10 visitors books
Learning card
Evidence strength: strong, based on real pre-bookings
- Opinion
- Interview
- Sign-up
- Booking
Observed: 1 in 7 visitors bookedAbove the 1 in 10 threshold
- Proceed
- Pivot
- Stop
What you take away
Answers you can act on, and defend.
From 01 · Map
Assumptions map
Every belief behind the idea, ranked by risk.
From 02 · Test
Experiment plan
The sequence of tests, with cost, timing and success thresholds agreed up front.
From 03 · Learn
Evidence report
What we tested, what we observed, and how strong the evidence is.
From 04 · Decide
A clear recommendation
Proceed, pivot or stop, with the reasoning laid out for decision-makers.
Built for decisions with real money behind them.
- Founders
- Before you raise, resign or sign a lease.
- Established companies
- Before you launch a new product, branch or market.
- Investors
- Before you fund a venture on the strength of its pitch.
The cheapest time to be wrong is before you begin.
Have an idea worth testing?
Tell us what you are planning. We will tell you what needs to be true, and how to find out.
Bring us your idea