Scenario planning has become critical to Geez Louise founders Carmen Douville (left) and Lauren Jones.SUPPLIED
Toronto-based beverage company Geez Louise has attracted devoted fans of its prebiotic sparkling water since it launched in 2022. Founders Carmen Douville and Lauren Jones say they share an obsession for bubbles and gut health.
But this year, they’ve fixated on something else: the cost of aluminum.
It was already the priciest item in Geez Louise’s production, and expenses rose this past March when Canada imposed a 25 per cent retaliatory tariff on imports of aluminum cans from the United States. Despite that, the company – carried by major retailers such as Farm Boy, Longo’s and Whole Foods – decided to keep its prices steady.
“We’re a premium-priced product, and we know that customers just aren’t spending the same amount of money [as they used to],” says Ms. Jones.
Though Geez Louise absorbed some increased costs, it was able to mitigate the impacts thanks to sound planning. The company has developed models that capture as many business scenarios as possible, and it has scheduling production far enough in advance to take advantage of big-volume vendor discounts. “It allowed for us to not have quite the shock that some others have faced,” says Ms. Douville.
To further keep costs down, the partners even packed and delivered some of their own orders.
This isn’t the first major challenge Geez Louise has overcome. When the COVID-19 pandemic was wreaking havoc on supply chains in 2022, the company still managed to secure a national grocery distributor. As Geez Louise grows, its founders have learned that they need practical strategies to both survive and thrive during periods of economic uncertainty. That means innovating and also stress-testing their operations for extreme scenarios.
“Everything’s scary every day, but we just have to develop our own projection models,” Ms. Douville says.
Across Canada, businesses are facing the spectre of stagflation, unpredictable trade policies, escalating energy costs, and other potential shocks. “This is the most complex operating environment I have ever seen,” says Sinead Bovell, a Canadian futurist now based in New York City, and the founder of WAYE, a tech education company.
Izzy Poirier says AI can be a tool to both conduct business and strategize.SUPPLIED
With so many factors at play, she says too many business leaders “play Whack-a-Mole with headlines,” jumping from one challenge to another without a co-ordinated long-term plan. That isn’t much of a strategy, says Ms. Bovell.
Nobody can predict the future, but scenario planning allows leaders to stay adaptable, she says. Ask yourself what business you’re in, and what is the edge of your market doing. “That’s where you’ll probably be disrupted in terms of your business model.”
Every business will have its own process to anticipate and prepare for future events. Many are jumping on AI tools to make the processes easier. “They’re using artificial intelligence to almost ‘war game’ the operating landscape,” says Ms. Bovell.
Of course, the impacts of AI are among the challenges for businesses, but no company can afford to ignore AI’s potential in planning. “It would be akin to not adopting electricity or the internet,” she says.
Organizations that tend to be more familiar with scenario planning, such as financial companies, are among the leaders in AI-assisted planning. But some creative industries are also beginning to adopt AI to help future-proof their businesses, from big-picture tactics to day-to-day efficiencies.
Ottawa-based brand designer and strategist Izzy Poirier leverages ChatGPT to analyze business strategies. She feeds the platform information about her goals, and says she can now have a conversation with it “as if it was another strategist.”
For Ms. Poirier, AI isn’t just shaping how she plans for what’s next – it’s also transforming how she works in order to compete. She now uses image generation tools such as Adobe Firefly and Midjourney for design assets. When creating a logo for one of her clients – an Ottawa-based bakery called SweetCheeks – Ms. Poirier fed design concepts into an AI image generator. She then sketched on top of the results by hand. “I still wanted to bring in the true artistry of logo design,” she says.
While AI can trigger existential dread for many creatives, Ms. Poirier says the tool is helping her achieve good design faster. “I jumped on the bandwagon because I figured if I don’t, then I’ll be left behind.”
Like Ms. Poirier, the Geez Louise team isn’t avoiding risks but is preparing for them. Navigating uncertainty requires agility, curiosity and a willingness to be bold. “We’re still learning, and we’re not afraid to do what’s best for the business,” says Ms. Jones.