Using SCAMPER for Cannabis Product Innovation

Cannabis is the land of the “me too” products. Truly innovative companies are few and far between, and any time something innovative comes to market, everyone else seems to jump on the bandwagon and copy it. These same companies find themselves fighting over shares of an increasingly-competitive segment of the cannabis market, with no real way to differentiate themselves from one another.

The end result? Companies compete on price (because that’s all they have to compete on), which inevitably leads to that race to the bottom that we’re all too familiar with. I believe this lack of innovation is primarily due to cannabis operators lacking a cohesive, effective product development strategy that they can leverage to bring unique solutions to their target consumers.

In this regard, SCAMPER is an invaluable brainstorming tool for spurring innovation and creative problem-solving. This acronym stands for Substitute, Combine, Adapt, Modify/Magnify/Minify, Put to Another Use, Eliminate, and Rearrange/Reverse. Considering that some of those actions don’t relate to cannabis particularly well — and more importantly, it doesn’t really flow off the tongue — I’ve simplified it for our purpose to:

• Substitute: can you replace an aspect of an existing cannabis product?
• Combine: can you group existing cannabis products into a new product?
• Adapt: can you add features or functionality to an existing cannabis product?
• Modify: can you change one or more aspects of an existing cannabis product?
• Purpose: can you repurpose an existing cannabis or non-cannabis product?
• Eliminate: can an aspect of an existing cannabis product be removed or simplified?
• Reengineer: can an existing cannabis production process be reorganized to create a unique product?

Let’s take a look at each step of SCAMPER separately to see how it can be utilized to aid cannabis businesses in their brainstorming to generate new and exciting product ideas, stay competitive, and meet the evolving needs of their market.

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