Revlon and Happen worked with a range of grooming and tools experts including Miss South Carolina, a horticulturalist and a fly fisherwoman to create breakthrough insights and ideas for stand out presence in retail.

“The process that Happen introduced Revlon to resulted in multiple deliverables including a number of fresh new consumer insights, a new positioning platform that will help Revlon take uncontested space in the category as well as a 3 year pipeline of innovative product and Marketing ideas. In addition to the ideas that we have actioned immediately, the project delivered consumer interviews, clues and insights that we can continue to mine for years to come.  The Revlon Beauty Tools business is poised for future success as a result of the partnership with Happen.”

Donna Baird
Vice President Marketing
Revlon, New York

Happen have put their innovation skills towards a good cause with a pro bono project for volunteering charity TimeBank. TimeBank is a national charity offering volunteering to individuals, large corporations, and small businesses focusing on mentoring and youth-led volunteering. They approached us in need of a defined business plan and a clear strategy of where they needed to be as an organisation. Happen facilitated a two day interactive session with the Senior Management Team, supporting them to break down the barriers that were preventing them from getting to where they needed to be and tackling them in small manageable chunks. With our innovation tools we helped TimeBank refocus their vision, mission and values, establishing an aligned strategic direction and a new brand for the charity.

Dan Quinn joins us to help pioneer the further growth of our European business. With an international team based in Amsterdam we'll be placed to deliver better on the needs of current clients across continental Europe as well as identify and attract new clients to the Happen group. Amsterdam's status as the European heart of the creative industries, as well as the Netherland's track record in industrial design and creative problem solving makes it an ideal location to locate a business designed to deliver ideas which win across borders and drive up innovation success rates.

Back in 1994 Apple were messing around in their Jobless era and trying to reinvent themselves. Meanwhile, the newspaper publishing company Knight Ridder were creating the future.

OK, the multi-touch function wasn't foreseen, but that wasn't Apple's invention either. Almost everything else is there, something tells me they snuck an early edition of Angry Birds somewhere in there too.

Watch the visionary video here and join me in wondering who should be suing whom over the look and feel of a touchscreen tablet. [via Paleofuture]

A warm welcome to a new team member on the Happen UK team, Michael Aviles. He has 5 years project management experience in online and offline research projects including online communities and international consumer and pharmaceutical panels. Having worked with GFK, All Global and Research Now, he is used to working on challenging briefs with teams such as General Motors, Microsoft, Google, Activia, McDonalds, The BBC and PwC.

In his spare time Michael is a passionate Android OS beta tester and can be found on many Android forums providing technical support and reporting on usability issues.

The Happen family grows again, now it's the North American team: Vanessa Howe. Vanessa is no stranger to high performance with her experience in developing successful social media strategies for a range of clients.  A talented media planner, graphic designer and sales professional.  She is also an accomplished rower who now gives back to the rowing community by coaching high school students. And as if that’s not enough. This summer she is competing in her first Olympic distance triathlon.  We’ll have a hard time keeping up with her, but we’ll sure try.

Read more about Vanessa here.

Just in case you thought you were on to a good consumer insight, or particularly happy with the conclusions you've just drawn from a piece of market research: you're probably biased. Severly biased. Totally blinkered. [via Discover Magazine]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_cognitive_biases