1.

The problem
- What is the problem?
- What evidence supports the problem exists?
- Is the problem urgent, underserved, unworkable and/or unavoidable?
- Is the problem conspicuous and/or critical?

The United States is currently facing a major issue in our schools. In the past decade our
nation has seen a dramatic spike in the number of school shootings in k-12 schools. The number
of school shootings in America has reached such a high that CNN has a running list to keep track
of these horrific events. There had been 45 school shootings across America at elementary,
middle, and high schools as well as college campuses at the time the article was last updated,
November 19th, 2019 (Wolfe, 2019). To put that number into perspective that is 45 shootings in
46 weeks which averages almost a shooting a week. This average does not consider the summer
months when schools are not in session. The criteria CNN created to define a school shooting are
one person must be shot excluding the shooter and the shooting must occur on school property.
This includes shots discharged on accident as well as shots from a BB gun. 45 is far too high of a
number.
Students should not feel unsafe going to school everyday; however, we live in a world
where this is becoming a norm. Students cannot effectively learn in an environment where they
feel unsafe so this problem is of utmost importance to educators, parents, and school boards. This
problem is underserved seeing as though our current solutions are not working well enough.
School shootings persist, and people are injured or killed, with the current systems in place.
Some schools have facial recognition locks or security guards, but the current strategies are not
working. The problem is unworkable since there are severe consequences to not finding a
solution. Teachers and students have and will continue to die if there is no better solution in
place. Lastly, the problem is unavoidable because we cannot control or predict the behaviors of
others. When someone decides to do something as terrible as shoot up a school, it cannot be
prevented without a system in place to handle such situations. School safety is a conspicuous
problem as it is frequently in the news. Everyone knows the horror of Sandy Hook and Parkland.
No one can deny the problem that is still prevalent in our nation’s school systems. This is
a problem that needs a solution. We cannot let these monstrosities continue to spread fear
throughout our nation to the point that parents no longer feel comfortable sending their children
to school. We need to create change which our group intends to do. We recognize the need for a
solution to the fear lurking in the hallways of our schools.

2. The customer
● Who is the target customer
● What are their wants and needs
● What is the market size
 While school shootings impact elementary, middle, and high schools as well as
institutions of higher education, we decided to specifically target high schools in determining
who we wanted to market our product to. We made this decision due to the nature of our product.
Our product is an app that can be downloaded on a mobile device. This app will reduce response
time as well as give students and faculty the ability to communicate in the case of an emergency.
If there is an active shooter in the school, all it takes is the press of a button to make the entire
student body and faculty aware of a danger in the school. Everyone will be notified about what is
wrong, where the danger is located in the school, and told to go to a safe classroom as soon as
possible. This reduces the chaos that may come with other strategies to make students aware of a
possible danger and allows everyone to be aware of the danger with the click of a button.
We targeted high schoolers because everyone knows the one thing high schoolers always
have with them is their cell phones. People often complain about the difficulty of pulling
students aware from that little screen, but we saw this complaint as an opportunity. By creating
an app students and faculty can download on their phone, tablet, etc., the power to send and
receive crucial information will be at their fingertips.
We found that mass school shootings are most likely to occur in small-town, suburban
America so these are the schools we decided to target (Pane, 2018). Specifically we are focusing
on public schools in suburban areas of New Jersey, Maryland, and Virgina. We chose these
states for a few reasons. One reason is because they are close to where we are. Part of our
beginning marketing strategy involves going to community events to share our product, and that
is a more feasible goal when the communities we are selling to are located within a reasonable
driving distance. Another reason we chose to target these states is because they all border major
cities. New Jersey borders New York while Virginia and Maryland border D.C.. That puts them
in the at risk category of where school shootings may occur. Lastly, these states have seen
violence in schools. Events such as what happened at Sandy Hook are terrifying for everyone,
but especially people who may have been a town or county over. It takes the saying “hitting
close to home” to a terrifying level. These schools need an improved security system in the event
that their school may experience similar dangers. Parents, teachers, and principals all want the
best for their students, and our product addresses their need to keep students safe. There are 1280
suburban public high schools in New Jersey, Maryland, and Virginia. These are the schools we
will begin targeting as we market our product.

3. The Value Proposition

- What gains will the customer experience?
- What pains will the customer experience?

From our product, our customers will gain an overall sense of security and protection for
their schools. High schools are meant to be a place to learn and grow, and the fear of an intruder
should not be looming over the heads of students and faculty every day at school. With our
security system, high schools can utilize our emergency reactor app hooked up to our in place
security system to notify the police immediately at the sign of an intruder while simultaneously
locking all doors to prevent the intruder from entering classrooms. This product will allow
schools to gain safety from an intruder at the click of a button without having to worry about
making a phone call to the police or standing up to lock the doors (USI, 2018). With our product,
students and faculty can more immediately focus on hiding and staying silent while letting our
app and security system do the work to keep the intruder out and get police help as soon as
possible. Our product will give high schools more peace of mind day to day knowing they have a
strong security system that will protect them in the face of possible danger.

Our customer will experience pains in terms of the financial aspect. Due to the advanced
technology necessary for our product and the fact that it is installed in the entire school, our
product is definitely more on the expensive end. Additionally, the instillation of the security
system into the school building could cause the customer to experience pains due to the
additional cost of instillation and the time it takes to install the product.

4. The Minimum Viable Product

- Who are the competitors and their customers?
- What are our minimum viable features?
- Are our features valuable and rare?
- What is our prototype?

Our competitors are companies that sell security systems such as security cameras. Their
customers are a little different than ours though. They serve a wider range of customers, usually
homes and sometimes schools, while our product is targeted directly toward high schools. Our
competitors often have multiple products and their customers are often families, schools, and
other institutions, while we have one main product we are targeting just toward high schools
(Ridzyowski, 2018).

Our minimum viable features include an easy to use app that simultaneously alerts the
police of the nature of the intruder, including whether there is a weapon or not, and initiates the
security system to activate. It is viable because an app on a cell phone is something that all
faculty and staff will have quick access to. The other viable feature is the system which locks
every door from the inside so nobody can get into the classrooms. It is viable because it is
extremely fast responding with the simple click of the button on the app and protects students
and faculty in every classroom from the intruder outside. Our product is viable because the
combination of the app and the security system makes for the most efficient and effective form
of security in schools. Apps are so common because people always have their phones on them,
so being able to quickly take out a phone and go on the app to initiate notification to the police
and the activation of the system is extremely quick and does everything at once.

Yes, our features are valuable and rare. No other security product is geared toward
schools that combines an app and a security system to insure for the most productive security
measures possible. Our features enable the police to be contacted without having to call them and
explain the situation, in order to remain quiet and notify the authorities as quickly as possible. It
also allows you to choose the nature of the emergency and the intruder through the app so the
police are even more informed without having to explain the situation by mouth. These features
are not utilized by any other school security products. Additionally, the app’s instant correlation
with the in school security system enabling all the doors to lock with the click of a button is
valuable and protects the whole entire school with only one person’s phone.

Our prototype for our app includes a home screen, which requires the user to enter a
password specific to their school. Once they enter the passcode, a button pops up that says,
“intruder emergency.” They click that button, which automatically locks every door in the school
and notifies the police. There is a comments section below where they can state additional
information they have, including who the intruder is, what they look like, and if they have a
weapon. The police are directed to the school address associated with the password entered, and
they receive the additional information as it comes in. There is also an option to cancel, which
unlocks the doors and notifies the police that the situation is all clear.
https://xd.adobe.com/spec/5f065518-b436-4fe7-7e6d-cd4b342414b1-2937/

5. The Price
- What are the competitors’ pricing strategies and prices?
- What is our pricing strategy and prices?

Since there are no companies that solely focus on selling security services for schools, we
broadened our competitors to general security companies, such as ADT, Frontpoint, SimpliSafe,
Vivint SmartHome, and Protect America. All of our competitors utilize the product line pricing
strategy where there are different packages sold at various price points depending on each
consumers’ needs and ability to pay. ADT monitoring security prices range from $36.99 to
$52.99 a month, with the standard monitoring system valued at $850 and installation costs
starting at $99 (ADT Security, 2019). Frontpoint costs a base price of $99 and monthly fees of
$44.99 to $49.99 (Berman & Tuohy, 2019). SimpliSafe security systems start at around $200
with monitoring services costing $14.99 to $24.99 per month (SimpliSafe, 2019). Vivint
SmartHome costs a base price of $599 for the starter kit and a one-time installation fee ranging
from $49 to $99 depending on the equipment installed. They also charge a monthly fee of $29.99
for the basic security plan (Berman & Tuohy, 2019). Protect America costs a $19.99 per month
for the most basic plan (Protect America, 2019).

Like our competitors, we will also use the product line pricing strategy to determine the
price of our product. There will be multiple packages that offer different numbers of features
depending on the price. For the most basic plan, there will be an upfront cost of $5,000 that
covers the purchase and installation of the security system with monthly fees of $5 for the app.

6. The Placement Strategy

- What are our distribution channels?
- Who are our intermediaries?

We will be using a dual distribution channel that combines direct selling and indirect
selling, which involves intermediaries. The majority of our business transactions will occur
online. Consumers can access our website to learn about our various packages and prices and
ultimately purchase a product. Once we receive the payment and the client’s information, we will
send our employees to the specified location with all the required materials and equipment to
install the security system. The app itself, however, will be distributed indirectly through the App
Store and Google Play Store.

Our intermediaries will include the App Store and Google Play Store, which act as the
main distributors for our app. This will improve our product by making it more widely available
to consumers who can easily access the ihe intermediaries and download our app.

7. The Promotional Strategy

- What is the advertising plan and budget?
- What is the public relations plan?
- What is the personal selling plan?
- What is the direct marketing plan and budget?
- What is the sales promotion plan and budget?

Our marketing budget for our product is $20,840. It is important to keep in mind that
advertising is a subdivision of marketing. Our group made the choice to allocate our funds to
direct marketing instead of advertising through other platforms, therefore, in a sense, our
advertising budget is $0. While some may consider this a risky move, the founders of our
product really value direct marketing specifically with our product and the field of school
security and believe that presentations at teacher conventions and sponsoring events in small
towns will market our product in the most efficient manner to our target customers and
emphasize the need for our product in enhancing school safety.
 While developing our public relations plan, we turned to our more experienced
competitors to see what does and does not work in the public relations field of school safety. We
analyzed one of our largest competitors, ADT (American District Telegraph) who has by far the
largest amount of followers via social media. According to a case study pertaining ADT
facebook ads, “The home and business security provider ran Facebook and Instagram lead ads
using automatic placements to reach new customers and generate more actionable leads,
resulting in a 40% higher lead completion rate (ADT Security, 2019). For our first year, we
allocated our marketing budget to direct marketing, however, once we amass revenue in our first
couple years of operation, we would like to end up with ads on facebook and a large Facebook
following, however we know we must start small to get here.

Personal selling is a really large factor in our promotional strategy and relates to
connecting reps directly with the consumer. This is what we dedicated our marketing budget to
and is what we believe is the most effective way to sell our product in our company’s beginning
stages. Through presentations at teacher conventions we can reach out to teachers who
experience the fear of school safety first hand in the classroom. By showcasing everything our
product has to offer to these teachers and those that work in the school place they can first hand
see how this product will save lives and change the way school safety operates. We also chose to
sponsor town events related to school safety so we can appeal to those concerned and tell them
about our product.

Direct marketing is a marketing strategy that reaches out to potential customers directly,
such as through email, text message, or through face to face contact, rather than through a TV ad
which does not directly reach out to potential customers. Our marketing budget is 8% of our year
1 projected sales, therefore, equals $20,840. Of this money, $10,000 will be allocated to holding
presentations at teacher conventions to spread the word of our product and another $10,000
sponsoring events in towns to spread the word about school safety and explain how our product
will help. For our product specifically we really value in person marketing of our product so we
can explain how crucial it really is to solve a problem that plagues every school especially in
today’s society.

Because our product is so needed and necessary in today’s society, with schools now
being a dangerous place for kids and parents having to worry whether or not their children will
come home after they send their children off, we have decided to not include promotional sales
in our first year. Take the Stoneman Douglas Highschool shooting for example, a teen gunman
opened fire, killing 17 on a supposed to be normal academic day at the highschool (NBC, 2018).
The governor of Florida responded to the shooting saying it was an act of “pure evil” (NBC,
2018). No sales promotion should be needed to protect the lives of our young, our product is so
necessary to doing so, that us founders have decided not to include promotional sales in the first
year.

8. The Sales Process

We will approach prospecting by looking at schools in our target markets and giving
presentations at teacher conventions to prospective customers. We will pre-approach in our
presentations, demonstrating why our product is necessary. Our product is so necessary we have
chosen to not include a sales promotion, however, our presentation from step one will appeal the
product to the consumers. For step three and four our presentation at the conventions will allow
us time for a Q&A afterwards to get a better feel for our customers needs and wants. Next, we
will present at the teacher conventions and during this process we will uncover concerns that we
can refute or fix. For the last two steps, we will be able to close a deal between our company and
customer and follow up to see where improvement is possible.

9. The Revenues and Costs

- What are our itemized estimated costs in year one and year two?
- What types of revenue streams are used by competitors?
- What types of revenue streams will we use?
- What are our estimated revenues in year one and year two?

In year one our expenses will estimate to about $260,440 and in year two, our expenses
will round up to $260,440. Our research and development costs will approximately be $50,000
per year one and two. Further, we will spend $20,840 in marketing in years one and two.
Furthermore, our costs of goods sold rate will be at 3% rate. Our estimated total dollar number
for salaries will be $189,600. Our company’s profit before we have to pay corporate income tax
will be 60k and profit after taxes will be approximately 48k.

The type of revenue streams our competitors such as ADT, Frontpoint, Simplisafe,
Protect America and various other security system companies, are using transaction revenue and
recurring revenue streams. Recurring revenue streams are the type of revenue stream that is
generated by people purchasing continuing access to your product (Chenell, 2019). For example,
ADT monitoring security systems charge an installation fee that starts at $99, and a subscription
fee that range from $36.00 to $52.99 a month. An example of a transaction revenue stream is
Frontpoint security systems offers equipment that is easy to install with a base price for a home
starter package at $99 without any subscriptions fees.

Because customers are the most important asset to our start-up, we will incorporate two
types of revenue streams that will help generate more money for our start-up.We have selected
revenue models streams that is a close fit. For example, because we are aware that school safety
systems for faster response is needed, we will invest $10,000 in marketing promotional activities,
such as teacher conventions to spread the word about our product in schools. Furthermore, Our
company is using two types of revenue streams. First, we are using transaction revenue, which
revenue is earned from customers making a one- time payment for our product. Because our
product has to be installed by a technical engineer we charge a one-time base installation fee.
Our installation base price ranges from $5000 to $20,000. In addition, our company is using
recurring revenues, where customers will be making consistent ongoing payments to the
company. To further explain, customers will be paying a subscription fee for an app after
purchasing our product, depending on the level in which the schools purchases. The app costs $5
to $12 a month. The benefit of incorporating a subscription revenue streams is subscriptions lead
to higher revenues and customer relationships (Chenell, 2019).

Our estimated revenues in year one are $260500 and year two expectations are double
that. We expect to earn double our revenue in year two than one. To reach this goal we will
market to high schools in northern America. Currently, there are 1280 public high schools that
we will pitch our product to.

10. The Funding Plan

- What are our funding requirements?

- Who are our candidate sources of funding?

Because finding financing can be challenging for star-tups, we will consider various
ways to raise money for our start-up. One way to earn capital is to market ourselves at teacher
conventions and to seek sponsors. Also, we will look for a co-founder to partner with and offer
them 10 to 25 percent equity to get our business on the market faster. In addition we will seek
out family and friends who are interested in investing in our company. Also we will try
crowdfunding to raise money at a relatively low cost. Moreover, we will pitch to angel investors
and hope to find one who is willing to help fund our company. To get more exposure we will
spend about $100 a month for online advertisements. For example, most middle aged people who
have children spend their time on facebook so we will advertise on facebook to get the attention
of people who are interested in school safety for their children.

One of our candidate sources of funding are friends and family members who choose to
invest in our company and will make a 5% profit. Asking friends or family members who are
financially affluent is effective because it will help get our company started sooner. According to
a survey poll, 5% of adults in the U.S. said that they have provided funding to someone starting a
business and of those respondents, 32% said that the funding went to a friend or neighbor, and
26% to a close family member, and 11% to some other relative, and 8% to a work colleague
(Gunn, 2019). Another source of funding are angel investors who will provide capital for our
start up in exchange for part-ownership and receive a 10% profit. The advantage of having an
Angel investor is that it is less risky than taking loans due to the fact that lions do not have to be
paid back if the company fails. On the other hand, if the company is a success the Angel investor
will have some part ownership. Lastly, another option we have for funding is to seek venture
capital funding who will receive a 15% profit. Venture capital funds are investment funds that
minister the money of investors in startups who have a high growth potential.

11. The team

● Who are the founders?

● Who are the advisors?
● Who are the key partners?

The founders of our company are Emily Mountain, Sammi Salter, Iesha Walters, Tiffany
Yen, and Emily Cohen. We all agreed that school safety is not at the level it needs to be at. We
came together to brainstorm ways to improve this critical problem and worked diligently on
creating this system to maximize the safety of all students and faculty.

In order to create the best possible product we wanted to have a variety of advisors that
correlate with the different aspects of our product. We knew that it would be helpful to have a
connection to people with experience teaching in schools in the area to advise us on the best
methods to creating a security system specifically for high schools. We decided to have Dana
Lynn-Grosser be one of our advisors. Dana teaches classes on teaching mathematics in high
schools at the University of Maryland. In addition, we chose to have a high school principal,
Kimberly Bolden, as one of our advisors. We also decided we would benefit from having an
advisor be someone with a better understanding of the business aspect. We chose Jeff Miller who
is a business management expert and business consultant expert at the University of Maryland.
We also wanted an advisor who has experience in technology sales as we are selling an app as
well as a physical security system. We chose Mike Cohen to advise us on maximizing sales. He
is an IT salesman for GXS. Our final advisor is John Yagel, the senior director of continuous
improvement at Hubor, Engineered Materials. We chose John Yagel as our advisor because he
has experience with creating the physical security system.

We also plan on partnering with other organizations to maximize the safety of schools.
Our first partner is the Prince George’s police and fire department. We are partnering with them
to shorten the response time in the case of an active shooter. We also are partnering with a math
curriculum company. This company sells curriculum material to schools. Since we have similar
markets, partnering with them could help both of our companies. Another company we are
partnering with is the School Construction Company. This company works to build schools and
would be beneficial for installing the physical security system. Lastly, we plan on partnering
with Active Shooter Self Defense Training to educate our buyers on safety tips.
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