Winning in Innovation

With a portfolio of 192 brands created with Baileys, Bombay Sapphire, Tanqueray, Malibu and Smirnoff to name just a few, Steve Wilson certainly knows about innovation and its importance in any successful business in the drinks industry.

Steve recognises that most organisations want to do innovation but don’t know how to deploy it fully. As the learnings from failure are key for future success, he explains the benefits and the challenges to overcome to deploy innovation and offers some key elements to consider for sustainable growth: 87% of new product launches fail and the number is on the rise, from the one successful in making it, only 24 % are worth more in year 2 versus year 1.

With such an extensive career and expertise, Steve explains the different components of successful innovation, from a passionate engagement with consumers, dedicated cross-functional business teams, up front resources and capability development, ability to take risks, freedom to fail and patience as sometimes takes up to 5 years to break even.  

For Steve, the brand starts from the written concept and simple definition of the product and its values to the production, packaging, and evaluation before launch.

Steve’s presentation is rich in real-life examples to learn from.