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Palapa Azul was recently featured in Fortune Small Business, and I was frankly quite inspired. What they call “Mexican-style premium frozen treats”, their most popular product is “la paleta”, a popsicle.

Hoping to create a high quality, authentic product, the two owners still needed to find a way to do research on a budget. So as they were trying to decide on names and flavors, they hit the streets and did the market research themselves.

They were able to find out trends related to things such as culture:

As the weeks went by, we noticed patterns. Asian palates seemed to prefer tart flavors such as plum and kiwi, while pineapple sold particularly well in African-American areas.

And gender (read this, it cracked me up and I’ll tell you why):

More interesting, we noticed a gender difference: We could offer two dozen flavors, and still most men would want strawberry. Women, however, were much more adventurous and willing to try new flavors. Women would say, “You have mango-chile? Interesting! I’d like to try that.” Men would say, “You have mango-chile. Interesting! I’d like strawberry.”

(So why did that last line make me laugh? I decided to ask my husband while I was reading the article: “What’s your favorite flavor of paleta?”…his reply: “Strawberry”. I guess their market research worked!)

Now being sold in such stores as Whole Foods and Costco, the Palapa Azul products are on the market…and the owners did it all by themselves. Check out the article below to read their whole story.

Palapa Azul

Via / Fortune Small Business