Context

This project was conducted under Prof. J. Kwon at the UNSW Business School as part of a consulting-style engagement.

The client was a large international brewery group exploring entry into the Australian FMCG market, specifically within emerging categories such as tropical beverages, energy drinks, and mental-health positioned products.

The objective was to generate structured consumer insights and market understanding to support go-to-market and pricing strategy decisions.

Problem

The client required deep consumer insights to understand whether new beverage formats would resonate with the Australian market.

Key unknowns included:
– Consumer perception of emerging beverage categories
– Pricing sensitivity across segments
– Gaps in current FMCG offerings
– Competitive positioning opportunities

Without primary user insight, early strategy decisions would rely heavily on assumptions rather than data.

Approach

Consumer Research Execution

My primary responsibility focused on supporting consumer research design and execution.

This included:
– Designing structured surveys targeting category-specific behaviors
– Drafting and refining focus group discussion frameworks
– Supporting multi-round research cycles involving over 200 participants

The participant pool included individuals from diverse ethnic and cultural backgrounds, which helped capture variations in consumer preference across segments.

Competitive Benchmarking

In parallel, I worked on competitive benchmarking across existing FMCG and beverage brands operating in the Australian market.

Key actions included:
– Mapping brand positioning across segments
– Comparing pricing and packaging strategies
– Identifying underserved consumer niches
– Studying messaging patterns across competitors

Iterative Strategy Development

Research outputs were translated into structured presentations that supported ongoing strategy development.

The process involved:
– Presenting findings across multiple review cycles
– Refining hypotheses based on feedback
– Iterating on GTM positioning ideas
– Supporting pricing strategy exploration

Insights

The research process revealed several patterns that influenced strategic thinking.

Key insights included:

• Pricing sensitivity varied significantly across product categories and positioning styles
• Consumers showed strong curiosity toward hybrid beverage concepts, but trust signals played a major role in adoption
• Several niche positioning opportunities existed where current offerings did not fully address specific user expectations

Outcome

Reflection

This experience strengthened my understanding of how structured research shapes business decisions.

It reinforced the importance of validating assumptions early and grounding strategy in real consumer behavior rather than theoretical positioning.