35 Tips on How to Conduct Cocoa Production Feasibility Study

Cocoa Production Feasibility Study: Do you have a great idea for a new product?

Perhaps your homemade Cocoa Production is famous among your friends and family.

And you’ve been thinking about turning your hobby into a business.

Or perhaps you would like to start a nanny cooperative.

But aren’t sure that there’s enough demand in your area to make the project worth your time and effort.

Or maybe you work in local government and have been tasked with overseeing the development of a new park.

But aren’t sure how to begin your research.

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Cocoa Production Feasibility Study

In all of these cases, you would benefit from performing a feasibility study on Cocoa Production business.

Put simply, a feasibility study is a process during which you test an idea’s viability: will it work?

 Although the specific questions you will have to address will vary.

Depending upon the nature of your project or idea.

There are some basic steps that apply to all feasibility studies on Cocoa Production. Read on to learn about the basic steps.

1. Get the business backgrounds

As a leading agricultural export product in Nigeria; cocoa is a well sought after product.

In fact, this is a product that has put Nigeria on the world map as the forth largest exporting nation of cocoa in the world.

In addition, the Nigeria government gives more insight into how to start cocoa farming in Nigeria.

A vital ingredient used in making chocolate; originated from the cocoa beans that grows from cocoa tree.

Many other produce derived from cocoa are:

• Cocoa butter;
• Animal feeds (from cocoa husk);
• Alcohol and soft drinks;
• Cocoa powder;
• Marmalade; and many more.

2. Conduct a preliminary analysis.

 It sounds strange to say that you need to a pre-feasibility study.

In order to know if you need to do a feasibility study.

But it’s true! A little bit or early research will help you determine if you need to proceed with a full-blown investigation. We’ll explain more in the following steps.

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3. Consider your options.

Completing a thorough feasibility study is a time-consuming and sometimes expensive process.

Thus, you want to try to save your time and money for investigating only the most promising of your ideas.

• If you’re thinking about turning your jam-making into a business.
• For example, you should carefully identify other possible alternatives to this venture before you decide to jump full steam into a feasibility study.
• For example, have you considered simply selling your apples at the market?
  

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4. Begin to assess the demand for your idea.

Your friends and relatives may all rave about the jam that you make and give as gifts.

But as much as they like your product.

It may be the case that consumers in general aren’t willing regularly spend extra for an organic, homemade product.

• Before you decide to invest the time and money into a complete feasibility study, you need to realistically assess whether or not there is a need or demand for your idea. If there is, then you can proceed to study the idea in more depth. If not, then you can move on to your next idea.
• If you’re hoping to sell locally, visit grocers and survey their shelves: if they have a paltry or non-existent display of homemade or organic jams, this could mean that there is no demand for the product. Similarly, if no or very few vendors at the farmer’s market offer jam products, it could be because buyers aren’t interested.
• If you’re hoping to sell online, you can do a key word search for your product and pay attention to the initial results: if it seems like a lot of people are doing brisk business, it’s possible that there’s demand for your product. You’ll later have to determine if you will be able to compete.

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5. Begin to assess the competition.

Perhaps you’ve determined that there is in fact a demand for your idea or services.

However, you also need to get an idea of how much competition you’ll be up against.

• For example, even if your town has an active farmers’ market, if there are ten other vendors who are all selling their homemade jams, jellies, and spreads, you’re going to have to think about whether or not you’ll be able to compete or offer consumers a different, more appealing product.
• Similarly, if you’re hoping to sell online, you want to begin to get an idea about how many other people are selling similar products, or if there’s a leading brand that dominates the market. Will you be able to compete? Begin to think about ways you can aim for a special niche market.

6. Assess the challenges.

Before you move on to the active stages of your feasibility study.

You should consider whether or not there will be any insurmountable obstacles.

• For example, if you have a pet that comes into your home at any time of the day.
• You cannot manufacture food for sale in your home. 
• You will thus need to prepare your jam in a separate structure.
• If there’s no way you’ll be able to meet these requirements, come up with the necessary funds, or tackle the associated remodeling, then it’s probably best to put this idea on the back burner for now.

Cocoa Production Feasibility Study

7. Decide if you should hire expert consultants.

If your initial investigation suggests that it looks like you have an idea that may be successful.

It could be helpful to hire a consultant to manage and conduct your feasibility study.

Depending upon the nature of your project.

You may also need to commission reports from professionals such as engineers (if, for example, you are tasked with seeing if a public works project is feasible).

• Thoroughly research your need for expert consultations, and learn what their fees will be. You will either need to make sure to budget enough to cover these costs, or if the costs are too high even at this stage, you may not want or be able to continue with the study.
• You want your final report to be as objective as possible, so make it clear to whomever you hire that you want honest answers, and that you’re not hiring them to give you the answer you want.

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8. Set a time-table.

Performing a feasibility study can be an involved process.

And can easily take up a lot of time.

If your initial analysis has indicated that you’re sitting on a good idea and that you thus need to complete a more detailed study.

You’ll want to make sure that you can get the job done in a timely manner.

• Is the report due to your potential investors, your boss, or the city council by a certain date?
• If so, work backwards from the due date and make firm deadlines for when the individual phases of the study need to be completed.

9. Learn about the market.

Once you’ve determined that you have a potentially workable idea.

You need to learn as much as you can about what the market currently for your product or service is like.

If it’s changing, and how you can fit into it. 

You’ve already done your initial survey of the market, but now you need to dive in deeper.

• If you’re hoping to sell your jam, get out there and talk to vendors and shop-owners about where they get their merchandise and how much business it brings in for them. For example, see if the vendors at the farmers’ market are willing to talk to you about their experiences—are they able to make a full-time living selling their goods, or is this a hobby or side business?
• Perhaps you’ve identified a number of local shops that are willing to sell locally produced items; you’ll want to learn about what their best-selling items are, or if they sell less of particular items at certain times of the year. For example, do they see spikes in sales around the holidays, but a big drop-off in January? You want to try to find out how steady your sales might be.

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10. Use data from the Economic Census.

You should be able to find even more detailed information for the demand for your product or service by studying the results of the government’s Economic Census, which is conducted every five years.

• Business owners are asked about their sales, number of employees.
• Business expenses and types of products, among other things.
• You can find the results of the most recent Economic Census online, and customize your search to learn as much as possible about your area of business, the market for it, and your community in particular.

Cocoa Production Feasibility Study

11. Survey people directly.

A great way for you to learn as much as possible about what your potential consumers or audience want and need is to interview them and ask them specific questions.

• For example, see if customers at the farmer’s market are willing to complete a survey or be interviewed about their buying habits and preferences—perhaps in exchange for a free sample of your product.

12. Conduct market surveys by other means.

Besides interviewing people directly.

You can also reach people you think would buy or benefit from your idea by mailing them surveys to complete.

If you do this, be sure to include a return envelope with pre-paid postage.

• Depending upon your audience, you may get better results by conducting telephone or email surveys.
• You can also direct people to a web-based survey by using social media like Twitter or Facebook.

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13. Design your surveys carefully.

Make sure that whatever methods you choose to learn about your audience’s needs and wants, you take the time to compose detailed, specific questions for your survey.

• For example, if you want to sell your jam, be sure to ask who typically buys jam in the house-hold, and who it is bought for (is it for their kids, for example?). Ask what their favorite flavors are, whether there are other flavors they’d like to try but have never found, and how much they are willing to spend.
• Ask them as well about what they like about their current brand: the color, the consistency, the company that makes it, etc.

14. Analyze the competition’s claim on the market.

It’s also important that you try to determine how much of a share your top competitors have.

And how long they’ve held on to that position.

This can let you know whether you’ll realistically be able to take a significant portion of the market for yourself.

• For example, if you learn that a local company dominates the jam market and if the results of your interviews and surveys have shown that customers are very loyal to that brand, you may want to consider moving on to your next great idea.
• If you haven’t already, be sure to use the information from the most recent Economic Census.

15. Identify your potential share of the market.

Once you understand how your competitors fit into the market.

You should be able to estimate how you’ll be able to fit in.

You want the results of your feasibility study to outline.

With as specific of numbers and percentages as possible.

How you’ll fit in and how you’ll likely grow over time.

• For example, will you be able to serve the 10% of people who indicated that they would prefer an organic jam option? What will that translate to in terms of how much jam you’ll have to produce?