College Travel Agency - Learning Launch 

 Challenge and Selection : 

 I used to work in a travel agency in Mexico , that was on the top 3 high school   graduation trip agencies in Latin America . Our only destinations at that moment were   Cancún and Puerto Vallarta , we offered in each of them a full all inclusive round trip   ( including flights , 6 days and 5 nights at an all inclusive hotel , private transportation at   destination , daily open bar night clubs , daily private beach club , etc . )   We used to fly to each destination over 1,500 graduates every week from spring break   till the end of summer .   Our trips gave us a customer wallet that renewed every year , since we only offered trips   to high school graduates . In consequence , once a client had traveled with us , he was no   longer a potential or recurrent client again , since he would n’t fit in our offered trips , even   though they wanted to travel again with us due to the great service we offered .   We saw this situation happening for many years , wasting the opportunity of keeping   with us clients that had already traveled with us and liked our company . This was an eye   opener to us , so that we needed to find a way of selling our services again to a past   client even though he was no longer a “ graduate ” . 

 We decided to use the Design Thinking Methodology to find a solution that would be a   perfect fit to keep our clients with us through years , and not only selling to them the year   they graduate and never see them again .    At this point is where a tool like a Learning Launch comes handy , since it will allow us to   create and test a prototype as an “ alternative solution ” for our specific need , that was   “ Developing a product to maintain our clients once their average life spawn with us had   finished ” .   As we saw during the course , this tool will give us useful insight , in order to keep   iterating our prototype till we came up with an almost perfect idea . It will also let us proof   or discard any hypothesis developed during the process , so that we can enrich our   insights . Also , in order to avoid confirmation bias and to enrich all the process , we   defined a multidisciplinary team , conformed of not only people from different areas , but   also looking different peoples profiles , such as different ages , different college degrees ,   etc . 

 Application : 

 For the application , we decided to follow the process as we saw in the course videos ,   where we : Started with the hypothesis that : “ College students wanted shorter and   cheaper trips than the ones we offered to Cancún and Puerto Vallarta [ 2 - 4 days ] with   “ less party ” and to different cities ” . In a nutshell , more “ mature " trips .   In México there are more than 130 towns that receive the badge of “ Magical Town ” , they   are around all the country and people usually visits them on road trips or during holidays   in short trips .   Whit this in mind we had the assumption that combining this two elements to offer 2 - 4   days trips to a “ magical town ” during the most important holidays would be a perfect fit 

 for college students . We went through 10 workshops with multicultural teams , varying   from age , to college degree , sociocultural background , etc . , in order to understand their   needs and desires . Next we went through 3 sessions only with the operative team to   define what would be the best deal we could offer to our potential clients . After 1.5   months of investigation and plantation , we came up with 1 idea to “ San Miguel de   Allende ” for the wine and hot air balloon festival . We offered the trip and achieve to sell   the trip to 45 people , also including full round trip transportation , all inclusive hotel , and   everything needed for the festival . 

 Once that trip finished , we iterated thanks to surveys applied to our travelers and   launched a second learning launch , but now to “ Val’Quirico ” that is a place that   replicates an Italian town near Mexico City . This second time we had 55 travelers and   focused on reducing operational costs to reduce the costs of the trips , so we decided to   use what we learnt from the first experience and reduced the all inclusive hotel class ,   and only left breakfast and dinner . Because since people was outside going through the   town , they did n’t took advantage of the buffet and open bar , so that price was n’t   convenient and only inflated the overall price . 

 Insight : 

 Thanks to this tool we would be able to keep iterating and throwing learning launches till   we came up with a fully refined product .   After we threw those two learning launches , we came up with really relevant insight   since we were able to proof that in fact college students want shorter and cheaper trips ,   but not because they were more mature , it was because some of them started working   while they study , so now they were the ones paying for their trips instead of their   parents ( As it happens when it ’s their graduation trip from high school . )   We also came up with the insight that our Clientes preferred to visit a new place instead   of going again to the same destination they ’ve already gone . 

 Approach : 

 Using this tool helped us to open the eyes and see that our type of client evolves pretty   quickly , so for the next time I would keep the surveys as a good practice in order to   keep our product in Kaizen ( Continuous improvement related to lean manufacturing ) .   Since our products are more like a service , we are not fixed to develop only one product   to fit all .    Also for the next time I would consider throwing a learning launch to produce a list or   menu to see if this is better for our clients , so that they can decide from a basic plan   how expensive and complete they want their trip . This would also allow us to get to a   broader clientele to take more advantage of our previous clients . Instead of selling just   one type of trip that is something that works pretty well for high school grads . 


EMAIL: 
ID_NUM: 
NAME_STUDENT: 
PHONE_NUM: 
STREET_ADDRESS: 
URL_PERSONAL: 
USERNAME: 

### Task: You are a PII (Personal Identity Information) Detection. Given a essays written by students, you have to identify ONLY the following:
NAME_STUDENT - The full or partial name of a student that is not necessarily the author of the essay. This excludes instructors, authors, and other person names.
EMAIL - A student’s email address.
USERNAME - A student's username on any platform.
ID_NUM - A number or sequence of characters that could be used to identify a student, such as a student ID or a social security number.
PHONE_NUM - A phone number associated with a student.
URL_PERSONAL - A URL that might be used to identify a student.
STREET_ADDRESS - A full or partial street address that is associated with the student, such as their home address.
### Input: College Travel Agency - Learning Launch 

 Challenge and Selection : 

 I used to work in a travel agency in Mexico , that was on the top 3 high school   graduation trip agencies in Latin America . Our only destinations at that moment were   Cancún and Puerto Vallarta , we offered in each of them a full all inclusive round trip   ( including flights , 6 days and 5 nights at an all inclusive hotel , private transportation at   destination , daily open bar night clubs , daily private beach club , etc . )   We used to fly to each destination over 1,500 graduates every week from spring break   till the end of summer .   Our trips gave us a customer wallet that renewed every year , since we only offered trips   to high school graduates . In consequence , once a client had traveled with us , he was no   longer a potential or recurrent client again , since he would n’t fit in our offered trips , even   though they wanted to travel again with us due to the great service we offered .   We saw this situation happening for many years , wasting the opportunity of keeping   with us clients that had already traveled with us and liked our company . This was an eye   opener to us , so that we needed to find a way of selling our services again to a past   client even though he was no longer a “ graduate ” . 

 We decided to use the Design Thinking Methodology to find a solution that would be a   perfect fit to keep our clients with us through years , and not only selling to them the year   they graduate and never see them again .    At this point is where a tool like a Learning Launch comes handy , since it will allow us to   create and test a prototype as an “ alternative solution ” for our specific need , that was   “ Developing a product to maintain our clients once their average life spawn with us had   finished ” .   As we saw during the course , this tool will give us useful insight , in order to keep   iterating our prototype till we came up with an almost perfect idea . It will also let us proof   or discard any hypothesis developed during the process , so that we can enrich our   insights . Also , in order to avoid confirmation bias and to enrich all the process , we   defined a multidisciplinary team , conformed of not only people from different areas , but   also looking different peoples profiles , such as different ages , different college degrees ,   etc . 

 Application : 

 For the application , we decided to follow the process as we saw in the course videos ,   where we : Started with the hypothesis that : “ College students wanted shorter and   cheaper trips than the ones we offered to Cancún and Puerto Vallarta [ 2 - 4 days ] with   “ less party ” and to different cities ” . In a nutshell , more “ mature " trips .   In México there are more than 130 towns that receive the badge of “ Magical Town ” , they   are around all the country and people usually visits them on road trips or during holidays   in short trips .   Whit this in mind we had the assumption that combining this two elements to offer 2 - 4   days trips to a “ magical town ” during the most important holidays would be a perfect fit 

 for college students . We went through 10 workshops with multicultural teams , varying   from age , to college degree , sociocultural background , etc . , in order to understand their   needs and desires . Next we went through 3 sessions only with the operative team to   define what would be the best deal we could offer to our potential clients . After 1.5   months of investigation and plantation , we came up with 1 idea to “ San Miguel de   Allende ” for the wine and hot air balloon festival . We offered the trip and achieve to sell   the trip to 45 people , also including full round trip transportation , all inclusive hotel , and   everything needed for the festival . 

 Once that trip finished , we iterated thanks to surveys applied to our travelers and   launched a second learning launch , but now to “ Val’Quirico ” that is a place that   replicates an Italian town near Mexico City . This second time we had 55 travelers and   focused on reducing operational costs to reduce the costs of the trips , so we decided to   use what we learnt from the first experience and reduced the all inclusive hotel class ,   and only left breakfast and dinner . Because since people was outside going through the   town , they did n’t took advantage of the buffet and open bar , so that price was n’t   convenient and only inflated the overall price . 

 Insight : 

 Thanks to this tool we would be able to keep iterating and throwing learning launches till   we came up with a fully refined product .   After we threw those two learning launches , we came up with really relevant insight   since we were able to proof that in fact college students want shorter and cheaper trips ,   but not because they were more mature , it was because some of them started working   while they study , so now they were the ones paying for their trips instead of their   parents ( As it happens when it ’s their graduation trip from high school . )   We also came up with the insight that our Clientes preferred to visit a new place instead   of going again to the same destination they ’ve already gone . 

 Approach : 

 Using this tool helped us to open the eyes and see that our type of client evolves pretty   quickly , so for the next time I would keep the surveys as a good practice in order to   keep our product in Kaizen ( Continuous improvement related to lean manufacturing ) .   Since our products are more like a service , we are not fixed to develop only one product   to fit all .    Also for the next time I would consider throwing a learning launch to produce a list or   menu to see if this is better for our clients , so that they can decide from a basic plan   how expensive and complete they want their trip . This would also allow us to get to a   broader clientele to take more advantage of our previous clients . Instead of selling just   one type of trip that is something that works pretty well for high school grads .
### Output: 