Blue Corp. Announces the Launch of Melinda, the Smart Mailbox Melinda is the physical mailbox designed to securely receive and keep safe all your e-commerce and grocery deliveries. PR Newswire, Atlanta, GA, November 5, 2019 Today Blue Corp. announced the launch of Melinda, a smart mailbox that ensures secure and properly chilled delivery and storage for your online purchases and groceries. With Melinda, you no longer need to worry about getting your deliveries stolen from your doorstep or spoiled groceries. Plus, you’re notified as soon as your packages are delivered. Packed with smart technology, Melinda costs just $299. Today, 23 percent of online shoppers report having packages stolen from their front porch, and 19 percent complain of grocery deliveries being spoiled. With no easy solution to these problems, customers give up and stop ordering online. Melinda, with its smart technology and insulation, makes stolen packages and spoiled groceries a thing of the past. Each Melinda includes a camera and a speaker. When a delivery courier arrives at your home, Melinda tells the courier to scan the package barcode by holding it up to the camera. If the code is valid, the front door opens and Melinda instructs the courier to place the package inside and close the door securely. The built-in scale in the base of each Melinda verifies that the weight of the delivery matches the weight of the item(s) you ordered. The courier receives a voice confirmation, and your purchase is safe and secure. Melinda sends you a text letting you know that your item arrived along with a video of the courier making the delivery. When you return home and are ready to retrieve your delivery, just use the builtin fingerprint reader to unlock the door. Melinda can store and recognize up to ten saved fingerprints so that all members of your family can access Melinda. Do you use Instacart, Amazon, or Walmart for online grocery delivery? If so, are you tired of spoiled groceries in the hot sun? Melinda keeps your chilled and frozen food cold. The walls of Melinda are two inches thick and made with the same pressure-injected foam used in the best coolers, keeping your groceries cool for up to twelve hours.
Melinda fits easily on your porch or stoop, taking up just a few feet of space, and you can choose from a variety of colors and finishes to make Melinda an attractive addition to the appearance of your home. “Melinda is a breakthrough in safety and convenience for online shoppers,” says Lisa Morris, CEO of Blue Corp. “In creating Melinda we combined a number of the latest technologies at the low price of just $299.” “Melinda is a lifesaver,” said Janet Thomas, a frequent online shopper and customer of Instacart. “It is so frustrating when one of my packages is stolen from my front porch, and it can be time-consuming to work with customer support to get a refund. I use Instacart every week for grocery delivery, and many times I am not home when my groceries arrive. I love knowing that they are kept cool and secure in my Melinda. I selected the natural teak inish for my Melinda—it looks great on my front porch.” To order your Melinda, simply visit keepitcoolmelinda.com, or visit amazon.com, walmart.com, Walmart stores, and other leading retailers.
Internal FAQs Q: How large is the estimated consumer demand for Melinda? A: Based on our research, we estimate that ten million households in the United States, Europe, and Asia would want to buy Melinda at a $299 price point.
Q: Why is $299 the right price point? A: There are no directly comparable products in the marketplace today. One similar product is Amazon Key, which allows couriers access to your home, garage, or car using smart lock technology. Another similar product is Ring Doorbell, which ranges in price from $99 to $499. We based our price on customer surveys and focus groups combined with the price needed to ensure profitability.
Q: How does Melinda recognize barcodes on packages? A: We will license barcode-scanning technology from Green Corp. at a cost of $100K per year. In addition, we need to develop an API that will allow us to link a Melinda customer account with any e-commerce provider (Amazon, Walmart, eBay, OfferUp, etc.), which provides us with the item tracking number from the ecommerce or delivery merchant. This way we can recognize the barcode with the package tracking number and know either the exact or an estimated weight for each item.
Q: What if a customer receives an order from an e-commerce provider and they haven’t linked their account yet?
A: We make it easy for customers to link their orders because we will offer a browser plug- in for Melinda customers that detects when they place an order with an ecommerce provider, which then links their account and the order details to their Melinda. Q: What happens if a customer gets more than one delivery in a day?
A: Melinda can accept multiple deliveries each day until the unit is full.
Q: What if the package is too big for Melinda? A: Packages exceeding 2′x2′x4′ won’t fit in Melinda. Melinda can still record the delivery person and scan the barcode, but the item is stored outside Melinda.
Q: How does Melinda prevent a courier from stealing items that are already in Melinda from a prior order? A: There are several ways. The first is that the forward-facing camera records any activity or access to Melinda. The second is that there is a scale at the base of the unit that detects the weight of the shipment and verifies that this matches the item(s) ordered. If a second delivery is made in one day, Melinda knows the weight of the first delivery and the estimated weight of the second delivery, so if the net weight is lower, Melinda knows that the courier has removed something and will sound an alarm.
Q: What is the estimated bill of materials (BOM) or cost to manufacture each Melinda, and how much profit will we make per unit? A: The estimated BOM is $250 for each Melinda, meaning that our gross profit per unit is $49. The most expensive parts in Melinda are the shell and insulation ($115), the fingerprint reader ($49), and the scale.
Q: What is the power source for Melinda?
A: Melinda requires a standard AC outlet.
Q: What size team is required to build Melinda? A: We estimate that we need a team of 77 at an annualized cost of $15 million.
There are several teams required to build Melinda, but these can be broken down into hardware and software teams.
On the hardware side, we need a team for each of the following: The physical shell, color choices, and finishes (6) Integration of the various smart and mechanical components, including the fingerprint reader, the camera, the automatic (open/close) door, the speaker, and the camera (12) On the software side, we will need a team for each of the new services.
Below is our current assessment of what teams will be required and how many people should be on each team, including product managers, engineers, designers, and so on: Voice commands to couriers (10) Fingerprint capture and storing (8) Package tracking and item weight details (11) Barcode reader (7) API to link e-commerce accounts to Melinda (12) Browser plug-in/web interface for account linking (5) Melinda app for iOS and Android (6)
Summary This fictitious PR/FAQ is designed to illustrate the kinds of thinking and problems that the author and readers of a PR/FAQ should consider. The product itself is both realistic and unrealistic. The customer problem of stolen packages and melting groceries is very real (although the research/stats here are phony), and the various components and technologies all exist. The Melinda, as described, is not realistic in that the costs are almost certainly underestimated (the product is overly complex), and the total addressable market for the product is probably very small. However, the example enables us to illustrate the ways in which the PR/FAQ process helps authors assess the viability of any new product by forcing them to consider and document all elements and constraints, including (but not limited to) the consumer needs and total addressable market, the per-unit economics and P&L, key dependencies, and the feasibility (how challenging it is to build the product). A good PR/FAQ is one in which the author has clearly considered and grappled with each of these issues, seeking truth and clarity on each.
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