Q1) COLD OPPORTUNITY (A): THE NILS BERGQVIST STORY Case Summary

Nils Bergqvist was a young boy who was born in central Sweden. He grew up in a
Norwegian family, where his father was himself a Norwegian and his family was
affiliated with seafaring folk working in the Norwegian Sea. One of Nil’s cousin was
captain of a big boat. Hence, Nils’s started dreaming to become a captain similar to his
cousin.

As Nils was growing up he developed an inclination to see the world. Hence, at the age
of only five or six years, for few times he went around Sweden on one of those boats
and also traveled to numerous other parts of the world. In addition to that, Nils also
started skiing, and soon he developed a passion for it. His passion for skiing used to
take him up to the North side of the country where he used to do skiing for around a
month until the last snow was gone. Nils always thought to either become a sailor or to
pursue something in life that he felt passionate for.

Nils's enthusiasm for nature and environment drove him to become an environmental
engineer. After he completed his school, he joined a renowned mining organization in
Kiruna (in Northern Sweden). Nils reminisced:

The most demotivating part of working in a mining company was that people
used to call each other with an employee number. Hence, my identity became my
number, 3717, and not my name. I couldn’t bear that.

In addition, Nils noticed that instead of working whole-heartedly on the job, his
colleagues used to count days and wait for the weekend. This observation made Nils
realize that he does not fit in this place.

Nils spent around eight years working at the mining company and in his spare time he
started doing canoeing and river rafting. With time, canoeing became his passion and
he started to give rides to various tourists who came by. Nils used to visit the tourist
bureau almost every day in morning time to find customers for a canoeing ride. Almost
every single day he used to find interested customers. Nils’s childhood passion turned
into a business when once, a tourist taking a ride paid him and another paid him to
come pick him up.

Continuing his day-time mining job, Nils made his hobby as a means of earning side
income and became an independent tour guide. Every day, he took one customer in his
kayak for a 40 km ride down the rapids. The customers enjoyed the rides and Nils made
some coffee money. Initially, Nils did this part-time canoeing rides just because he
enjoyed doing that.

Later, after seeing the overwhelming response, Nils decided expanding his operations
and buying bigger boats. The day Nils purchased his first bigger boat, he resigned from
the mining company. He did not have any earnings after the tourist season used to end,
but he was certain that he could find some seasonal occupation. He usually derived
enough revenue during the tourist’s season that he was able to survive throughout the
year.

In a timespan of few months, Nils had more than 30 boats on the river and he grew his
business to 40 employees.

Soon, the seasonal earnings from the business began to worry Nils as when winters
arrived it became too cold and too dark to continue the canoeing and river rafting
activities. On the other hand, Nils liked winter as he liked snow, refreshing cold climate
and loved skiing especially under a full moon. But, in Sweden as all the local tourist
office used to close down in winters it started hampering all his business activities.

Nils Meets Sakata-San

In order to find something to do in the winter time, Nils decided to travel to other winter
destinations such as Anchorage, Alaska. During his stay in Alaska, Nils saw many
Japanese tourists visiting the country. Nils was curious to know the reason of what
made Japanese travel all the way to Alaska. For research purposes, he started meeting
the Japanese tourists there and started asking simple questions on what attracted them
to this location in the winter season? In the midst of these conversations, Nils found out
that the tourists got attracted with the beautiful winter climate and Northern Lights.
Seeing this, Nils thought of an idea i.e. how to bring these Japanese tourists to his own
home country in Sweden in the winter season.

Next, Nils contacted the Swedish Tourism Board (STB) in order to find out that whether
they had any representative in Japan. The tourist office guided Nils towards the
Scandinavian1 Tourist Board in Tokyo. He further investigated with the tourist board in
Tokyo about any travel agent in Japan who was inclined towards Scandinavia. The
board gave him a list of Japanese tour operators and travel agents. Starting with a cost-
effective approach, Nils started emailing all the travel agents on the lists. When he
received no response, he tried calling them. Dialing several times, Nil’s one phone call
got connected to a person named, Sakata - San.

Sakata belonged to a family business background, where his family had a small factory
in Japan that made beautiful and creative gift boxes. Sakata was interested in
Scandinavian travel as he had spent his childhood in Finland. This became the common
thread between the two. Hence, when Nils called him and asked for a meeting he
agreed to meet him in Sweden as he recalled his childhood memories. Nils described
his meeting with Sakata and stated:

I told Sakata about my ideas of doing something with snow and winter and that I need
his help in figuring out what could we do together in this area.

The meeting with Sakata resulted in a strong bond of friendship with him. Few months
later, on the basis of Sakata’s networks, few Japanese tourists started visiting the
Swedish Lapland. While, now was the time for Nils to visit Japan
The Trip to Japan

Nils visited Japan a couple of times, where once he got a chance to visit Hokkaido2,
which was famous for its display of big snow festivals. After seeing the ice sculptures
outside his hotel, Nils inquired whether any of the guests staying in the hotel was an
artist. Upon investigation, he got to know about Miho Aoki – an ice artist in Japan. After
a good networking with Miho, Nils invited her to visit Sweden to which she agreed to.
Hence, in November 1989, Miho and 14 artists came to North of Sweden and worked
the whole weekend long to make ice sculptures. Next day, on Monday morning, they
had to conduct a small workshop where they wanted to demonstrate on how they
worked with ice (see Figure below).

The Ice Sculpture Workshop

On Sunday evening the preparations of the event took place. Nils along with the artists
made beautiful ice-sculpted eagles and reindeers made by cutting the frozen rivers
nearby. The displayed ice sculptures gathered a lot of local village residents and media
attention. A lot of people came by and took photographs as the people were astonished
after looking the beauty of the art displayed and the unique skill-set of the Japanese
sculptors. Finally, the day arrived when the workshop had to be conducted.

On early Monday morning at 6 A.M. Nils heard something strange. To his disbelief the
temperature dropped and it started raining!!!! When Nils came down he saw the ice-art
reindeer laid down – destroyed. In a state of quandary, Nils started wondering as what
would happen now as the tour had to start at 11:00 AM.

With the heavy rain pouring down the already destroyed ice sculptures, and local
residents and press beginning to arrive at the event, Nils sat down on the river bank to
think what should he do next?

You are required to address following questions;

Q1) What factors helped Nils to start his canoeing business?

Q2) What information does he need to replicate the ice-sculpturing event in

Sweden?

Q3) What was the role of various stakeholders in the development of the business?

Q4) When life gives you lemons, make lemonade, in the context of this phrase, what
shall Nils do after the rain takes place?
Figure: Various Ice Sculptures

Solution:

Q1) what factors helped Nils to start his canoeing business?

As Nils’s dream was to become a captain similar to his cousin. At the age of only five or six
years, for a few times he went around Sweden on one of the boats and also traveled to various
other parts of the world. Nils always thought to either become a sailor or to pursue something in
life that he felt excited about.
The first factor is the demotivation while working in a mining company that people used to call
each other with an employee number. His identity became his no. and not his name.

Second factor that Nils noticed that instead of working whole heartedly on the job, his colleagues
used to count days and wait for the weekend. This observation made Nils realize that he does not
fit in this place.

He spent around eight years working at the mining company and in his spare time he started
doing canoeing and river rafting. With time, canoeing became his passion and he started to give
rides to various tourists who came by. Nils used to visit the tourist bureau almost every day in
morning time to find customers for a canoeing ride. Almost every single day he used to find
interested customers. Like this Nils’s childhood passion turned into a business when once, a
tourist taking a ride paid him and another paid him to come pick him up.

Q2) What information does he need to replicate the ice-sculpturing event in

Sweden?

In order to find something to do in the winter time, Nils decided to travel to other winter
destinations such as Anchorage, Alaska. Nils thought of an idea i.e. how to bring these Japanese
tourists to his own home country in Sweden in the winter season.

Nils visited Japan a couple of times, where once he got a chance to visit Hokkaido2, which was
famous for its display of big snow festivals. After seeing the ice sculptures outside his hotel, Nils
inquired whether any of the guests staying in the hotel was an artist. Upon investigation, he got
to know about Miho Aoki – an ice artist in Japan.

After a good networking with Miho, Nils invited her to visit Sweden to which she agreed to.
Hence, in November 1989, Miho and 14 artists came to North of Sweden and worked the whole
weekend long to make ice sculptures. Next day, on Monday morning, they had to conduct a
small workshop where they wanted to demonstrate on how they worked with ice

Q3) what was the role of various stakeholders in the development of the
business?

The role of various stakeholders in the development of the business was like the role of Sakata
San that with the help of him few Japanese tourists started visiting the Swedish Lapland. The
second stakeholder was Miho Aoki an ice artist in Japan with the help of her and 14 artists, they
came to North of Sweden and worked the whole weekend long to make ice sculptures. So the
role of various stakeholders in the development of the business was that with the help of them
Nils initiated the ice-sculpturing event in Sweden.

Further a stakeholder is usually an investor in our company whose actions determine the
outcome of our business decisions. Stakeholders don't have to be equity shareholders. They can
also be our employees, who have a stake in our company's success and incentive for our products
to succeed.

Q4) When life gives you lemons, make lemonade, in the context of this phrase,
what shall Nils do after the rain takes place

As this is the first time this tour has been operated, which also propose to have the ice sculpture
art, so it can attract local people beside of tourists. If the ice art could not be shown and just
before few hours without any announcement, the crowd would be angry.

As per my opinion first thing he need to do is arrange snacks and coffee free of cost for the crowd who is
going to come. Besides that now he can teach the crowd and also demonstrate how to build Ice Sculptures
and he can make 1 sculpture in front of them with the help of those artists