Where to start in the US?

Since we have determined the US as the most promising market for Ambro, the following analysis will help to determine where in the US Ambro’s product should be launched first.

Logically, the company should choose a region for which the density of their target group is particularly high. Besides this, existing relationships might play a role for that decision.

Based on these factors, we feel certain that the highest potential for Ambro is exists in the San Francisco West Bay Area, including Silicon Valley, in California:

Population:

Ambro’s main target group, which we have determined as 20-35 year old professionals with academic education, is fairly well represented in the area of Silicon Valley and San Francisco. Sillicon Valley itself has a working population of around 125000 people. For the San Francisco area, the working population can be estimated. This is done by using the total amount of the San Fransisco area inhabitants, filter everybody out who does not belong in the working population (everybody younger than 18, older than 65) and apply the unemployment rate of 6.5% to it. The final conclusion gives a total of around 771000 working people in the San Francisco area. This gives a total working population of around 896000 people in the greater San Francisco Bay area.

The following diagram gives an overview for Santa Clara and San Mateo Counties, showing that around 1/3 of the population is between 25 and 44, which provides a good basis for the spread of Ambro’s product:

In San Francisco, the age distribution is similarly beneficial for Ambro. The median age here is 36.5 and 30% of the habitants belong exactly to the category of Ambro’s target group; they are between 20 and 35 years old.

Health awareness:

In general, California is well known for its residents to be more interested in healthy eating than it is the case for the majority of other American states. Californians try to remain in good shape by working out and eating comparatively healthy. Data about overweight and obese individuals is in line with this statement.

Statistics of the student population that is overweight or obese in Silicon Valley, compared to California as a whole, shows that between 2005 and 2010 this number has been on average 5% lower for the Silicon Valley area:

A comparison between San Francisco and the US in general illustrates this even more clearly. Whereas almost 70% of adults age 20 years and over are overweight or obese in the US, in San Francisco this group accounts for 42% only.

High entrepreneur rate:

Both San Francisco and the Silicon Valley are popular locations for startups. Many young entrepreneurs start their business here. The relative growth of small business loans in Silicon Valley, compared to data for the US, supports this statement:

Since entrepreneurs are often very busy, ambitious people who care about their health and prefer to eat healthy food, they seem to perfectly suit Ambro’s target group.

Another interesting aspect about startups in the San Francisco Bay Area is that the amount of food entrepreneurs has significantly increased. Venture capitalists are investing much more into food projects than during previous years. This might hint at sufficient demand for products like Ambro's in this area.

Hard-working employees:

Ambro’s geographical target market should feature a great number of busy and hard-working people since they are particularly interested in fast and healthy meals. In the Silicon Valley area, these individuals can definitely be found a lot. David Shaywitz argues that the key to startup success is also to work very, very hard. He suggests that the majority of Silicon Valley entrepreneurs is not able to keep up with a healthy work-life balance. The demand for healthy and quick nutrition seems to be extremely high.

Apart from all the reasons stated above, Ambro already has connections to Standford University via the Startup Sauna. These can help to break into this market and perfectly support our recommendation to launch their product in the San Francisco West Bay Area.


Source for the graphs:
Silicon Valley Index Website http://www.siliconvalleyindex.org