R&R Case Study

What factors created an opportunity for Bob Reiss and the “TV Guide Game?”

In order for Bob Reiss to be successful with the “TV Guide Game,” he had to be aware of a multitude of factors that would lead to his success. For starters Bob had a background in business from Harvard Business School, one of the most prestigious school in the nation. This business education gave him many key insights into the market and how to conduct a successful business. For example the article cites that when he started his own company he “kept overhead very low, even in good years, and never own or be responsible for a factory.” He had great people skills. This was proven by the fact that he wanted to be paid a low salary and a high sales commission. This is not something that most people ask for when first starting off. He must have been confident in his intrapersonal skills and understanding what people wanted when being sold a product. Bob saw an emerging market, in Canada alone there were 100,000 copies sold of the trivial pursuit game. He knew the market well enough to understand that there were be 10x the sales in the U.S. that would be 1million copies merely starting out. He worked for a couple other companies before starting his own to understand the business and how to build sales. At the time there were not many competitors in the market-space so he was able to act quickly enough before all the major game manufacturers jumped on board. All of these factors combined lead to a very profitable business for Bob.

What risks and obstacles had to be overcome in order to pursue the opportunity successfully? How did Bob Reiss accomplish this?

One of Bob’s first obstacles was to create something slightly different than trivial pursuit, a different theme/concept. Lucky for Bob he had contacts in high positions in the industry that he could bounce ideas