Students present to Allrecipes

Guest post by Lisa Anton and Travin Keith, Foster School and CISB Custom Track students

After winning the grand prize in the 2013 CISB Foreign Market Strategy Project, the Foster School’s Certificate of International Studies in Business Custom Track students presented their case at the office of Allrecipes on April 11. The students presented in front of a large number of Allrecipes employees and successfully defended their presentation for about an hour, earning compliments from the audience. Their performance was even compared to that of consultants who have presented in the past.

The prize for best teamwork went to the Japanese Track and prize for best presentation to the U.S. Track/Australia team.

Their proposal was to form a strategic alliance with Homeplus, the second largest retailer in South Korea, to provide their content as an additional service to their already-existing E-commerce. Users would be able to look up recipes online provided by Allrecipes and be able to purchase the ingredients on the same page from Homeplus with Allrecipes getting a percentage of the revenue. They also suggested that Allrecipes perform joint marketing projects with Homeplus in order to promote the service.

In addition to presenting to Allrecipes, the Custom Track also received an office tour from VP Patricia Smith and Senior Product Manager Vasantha Kostojohn. This experience was really enjoyable, as the office seemed more like an open community center than the headquarters of a major international recipe site. The décor was open and colorful, adorned with national flags, sticky notes from different team projects, and fun posters with cute animals and motivational quotes. The atmosphere was personal, warm, and mirrored the positive attitude that radiated off all of the staff members present. The track was also able to get a sneak peek of a mobile app that Allrecipes is gearing to launch next year and learned from the lead project manager about its development.

Overall, the Allrecipes office was as colorful and creative as its website, and it was a truly great experience to be able to go behind the scenes of such an innovative company.

Learn more about the Foster School’s Certificate of International Studies in Business Program.