Case Story: Discovering New Market Share: The Invisible Label That Unlocked €1.5 Billion
The Challenge
Even under the brightest streetlight, some truths remain hidden. A global sports performance giant, a company with revenues in the tens of billions, found itself grappling with a perplexing challenge: how to unearth significant new growth in a seemingly saturated market. Their existing strategies, fueled by extensive (and expensive) market research, confidently confirmed what they thought they knew: the skateboarding market was overwhelmingly male. Naturally, their product development and marketing efforts followed this illuminated path.
The Investigation Beyond the Streetlight
We believed the answer wasn't in asking the same questions, but in asking different ones. Our approach began not by accepting the established "truth" of the market reports, but by applying the Organisational CT Scan. This meant looking beyond aggregated market data, diving deep into the granular reality of customer behaviour and perception. We meticulously analysed not just who was buying, but who was Browse across all channels, and paid close attention to the subtle inferences gleaned from real-world discussions, reviews, and online communities. We were searching for the emotional nuances and the "unseen" customer disconnects.
The Revelation: The Invisible Label
The truth, once illuminated, was hiding in plain sight. Our diagnostic assessment unveiled a massive, vibrant, and deeply underserved market that conventional reports had effectively rendered invisible: female skateboarders. Our verifiable data proved that females actually represented over 42% of the global market spend. They were passionate and willing to invest in the skateboarding culture, but were consistently being alienated by a single, critical oversight.
The company's skateboard sneakers, though entirely unisex in design, were exclusively labeled and marketed as "Male". This tiny, overlooked detail, shining brightly under their own internal streetlight as a simple product identifier, was actually an invisible barrier, a piece of "bad flora" poisoning the customer's perceived "Customer Grove."
The Solution: A Single Word, A Profound Shift
The solution seemed almost too simple to be true – a testament to how small, overlooked details can create enormous blockages if curiosity is lost. The recommendation was to change a single word on the sneaker’s packaging from “Male” to “Unisex”. This wasn't just a label change; it was an acknowledgment, a validation of a customer segment that had been there all along, simply unaddressed.
The Verifiable Impact
The results were immediate and explosive:
Immediate Market Breakthrough: Inexpensive in-store tests confirmed the finding overnight as the newly labeled shoes sold out to female customers.
€1.5 Billion Revenue Boost: This bold move, driven by the courage to see beyond the streetlight, unlocked a massive new market segment, boosting the category's revenue by over 185% and adding €1.5 billion in new, sustainable annual revenue.
This case powerfully illustrates a key Maxim of the Maze: What Shines Brightest Isn’t Always What Matters Most.
Sometimes, the biggest barrier to growth isn't a competitor, but the label you've unknowingly put on your own customer. By daring to look where others don't, we can transform unseen disconnects into verifiable value.
