Customer research call guide

Recruit these six

Recruit all six, with the listed cancellation-form reason treated as a clue—not a confirmed cause. “Too expensive” was pre-selected, so it is especially unreliable as a standalone explanation. These interviews are for exploring different churn paths, not estimating how common each one is.

1. S-8004 — 11 weeks subscribed; five skips and no recipes cooked in the last four weeks; selected “Too expensive.” A low-engagement case to explore whether price was the trigger, or whether skipped deliveries and unused food came first.
2. S-8008 — 18 weeks; no skips and six recipes cooked; selected “Too expensive,” with “cheaper at the supermarket” in free text. An active subscriber whose account is more consistent with a price comparison worth probing.
3. S-8006 — 29 weeks; no skips and eight recipes cooked; selected “Too expensive,” but wrote “too much food for two.” Tests whether perceived cost may be tied to household fit or waste, even for a frequent cook.
4. S-8013 — 28 weeks; two skips and three recipes cooked; selected “Recipes got repetitive,” but wrote “didn’t have time to cook.” Explore how recipe experience, time, and skipped weeks related to one another.
5. S-8025 — 50 weeks; one skip and no recipes cooked; selected “Recipes got repetitive,” but wrote “too much food for two.” A long-tenure contrast to S-8013: investigate whether repetition was an experienced problem or a label for a broader mismatch.
6. S-8028 — three weeks; two skips and nine recipes cooked; selected “Delivery problems,” with “kept piling up in the fridge.” A distinct early-tenure, high-cooking case to investigate what happened with delivery and whether delivery was connected to the food backlog.

30-minute interview guide

Before the calls: Use the same guide for all six. Don’t tell participants which executive theory you’re testing. One PM moderates and the other takes notes; rotate roles so each new interviewer leads three calls. Record exact examples and the participant’s wording, not just interpretations. Don’t defend Sprig, pitch a save offer, or rush to fill silences.

0–2 min | Welcome > “Thanks for speaking with me. I’d like to understand your experience with Sprig and what led you to cancel. There are no right answers, and we’re not trying to persuade you to come back. Is it okay if I take notes?”

2–8 min | Let them tell the story > “Could you walk me through how Sprig fit into your routine, from when you joined through when you decided to cancel?”

Follow up neutrally: “What happened next?” “Can you give me a specific example?” “When did you first notice that?”

8–15 min | Reconstruct recent behavior > “Think about your last few weeks as a subscriber. What did a typical week look like?”

Ask what arrived, what they cooked, skipped, or didn’t use, and what was happening in their household or schedule. If relevant: “Can you tell me about the last delivery you remember?” Don’t assume a skip, delivery issue, or uneaten food had a particular cause.

15–23 min | Explore the cancellation decision > “When did cancelling first feel like the right choice? What was happening then?”

> “What were the main things that went into that decision?”

After the open account, ask about specifics that have come up naturally: price and alternatives; recipe choice or repetition; delivery timing or condition; cooking time; household size; food left over; and how often they skipped. Ask for concrete examples and how each factor affected the decision.

23–27 min | Check their form response > “The cancellation form shows [selected reason]. How well does that capture what was going on for you? Was anything more important?”

If they selected “Too expensive,” note that it was pre-selected; don’t treat the selection as confirmation. Ask what they compared Sprig with and what “expensive” meant in practice, without suggesting an answer.

27–30 min | Close > “If one thing had been different, might you have made a different choice—or was cancelling still the right decision?” > “What haven’t I asked that would help me understand?”

Thank them. After each call, the PMs should separately note the apparent trigger, contributing factors, and unresolved questions before comparing notes.

Strategic Recruitment Plan

The cancellation form pre-selects "Too expensive", severely skewing quantitative data toward price. Furthermore, while 81% of retained users cook ≥3 recipes/week in month 1, only 34% of churned users do—suggesting retention is fundamentally won or lost on habit formation, pace, and food waste guilt (evident in recurring free-text notes like "kept piling up").

To evaluate exec hypotheses (Price, Recipe Repetition, Delivery) against these underlying behavioral dynamics, we will recruit six subscribers across distinct behavioral archetypes:

Backup recruits: S-8044 (Repetitive), S-8115 (Delivery), S-8038 (Price/High engagement).

---

Interviewer Guide (30 Minutes)

> Interviewer Note (for new PMs): > 1. Never mention their cancel form response. It was pre-selected and biases answers. > 2. Focus on stories, not opinions. Don't ask "Was it too expensive?" Ask "Walk me through the last box you unpacked." > 3. Embrace 3 seconds of silence. Let the participant fill pauses.

#### 1. Welcome & Rapport (3 mins) * "Thanks for taking the time! I’m [Name], a product manager at Sprig. We’re working to make our boxes better, and we learn the most from people who decided Sprig wasn't right for them." * "There are no right or wrong answers, and you won’t hurt my feelings. I’m recording this for notes—is that okay?"

#### 2. The Early Days & Habit Formation (7 mins) Goal: Understand the baseline expectation and initial activation (testing month-1 cooking habit). * "Think back to when you first signed up for Sprig. What was going on in your life that made you want meal kits?" * "Walk me through your first couple of weeks. How often were you cooking the meals?" * "Did you cook with someone else? How did the portion sizes fit your household?"

#### 3. The Turning Point & Kitchen Reality (12 mins) Goal: Neutral deep dive to evaluate price, delivery, repetition, and food waste without leading. * "Think about the last box you received before canceling. Walk me through what happened from the moment it arrived to when you decided to cancel." * If Ops signal: "Did it arrive when and how you expected? How did that affect your week?" * If Food signal: "How did picking your meals feel toward the end compared to the beginning? Did you feel excited by the menu?" * If Fridge/Time signal: "Did you ever have ingredients left over when the next box arrived? How did you handle that?" * "I noticed you skipped a few deliveries [or never skipped]. How did skipping fit into your routine?" * "Tell me about the specific moment you went to the website to hit 'Cancel'. What tipped you over the edge that day?"

#### 4. The Alternative & True Cost (5 mins) Goal: Test CEO hypothesis (competitors vs. grocery vs. takeout). * "Now that you aren't using Sprig, what are you doing for dinner on busy weeknights?" * "Did you try or consider any other meal kits or services? Why or why not?" * "When you think about the total cost of Sprig, what felt like the biggest driver of whether it was 'worth it'?"

#### 5. Wrap-Up (3 mins) * "If you had a magic wand and could change one thing about Sprig so that it fit your life perfectly, what would it be?" * "Thank you so much for your candor. We’ll send your $30 gift card within 24 hours."

---

Post-Interview Debrief Checklist (Immediately after call)

Capture within 10 minutes in Slack/Notion: 1. Primary root cause: (e.g., Recipe boredom, Food waste guilt, Box delivery timing, Absolute price, Household mismatch). 2. True competitor: (e.g., Trader Joe’s, HelloFresh, Takeout, Cooking from pantry). 3. Exec hypothesis validation: Did this support CEO, Food, or Ops? (Yes/No/Partial + 1-sentence quote).

Aim and guardrails

Understand the sequence leading to cancellation, not ask subscribers to vote on executives’ theories. Test price, repetition, and delivery alongside an alternative: subscribers never established—or lost—a workable cooking routine, making unused food feel expensive.

The cancellation form is weak evidence: price is first and preselected, only one answer is allowed, and comments sometimes conflict with selections. The first-month cooking gap—81% of retained subscribers versus 34% of cancellers cooking at least three recipes weekly—is an important association, not proof of causation. Last-four-week cooking counts cannot identify first-month activation.

Recruit these six

Use purposive contrasts, not a representative sample. Counts below mean weeks subscribed / skips in last six weeks / recipes cooked in last four weeks.

Contact primaries immediately; approach backups if unavailable or declining. Offer the same fixed incentive regardless of feedback. Invite them to discuss “your experience using and stopping Sprig,” without naming hypotheses. Confirm they managed the subscription or cooking; do not screen for agreement with a theory.

Before calls, verify metric definitions, subscription dates, and available delivery history. Skipping reduces opportunities to cook; raw cooking counts are not cooking rates. Schedule three calls Tuesday, three Thursday, with debrief time.

Shared 30-minute interview guide

0–2 minutes: introduction

“We’re learning how Sprig fitted into your life and what led you to stop. This isn’t a sales call; honest criticism is useful. You can skip questions or stop. May we record for research notes?”

2–6: expectations and early use

• “What was happening in your life when you signed up?”
• “What did you hope Sprig would replace or make easier?”
• “Walk me through an early delivery: who cooked, what got cooked, and what happened to the rest?”
• “How typical was that during your first month?”

6–15: reconstruct the change

• “Walk me through your last few weeks with Sprig.”
• “Tell me about the last box you received—from arrival to what happened to each meal.”
• “When did you first consider stopping? What happened just before that?”
• “Was there a time it worked better? What changed?”
• “Tell me about a week you skipped, if any. What drove that decision?”

Anchor memories to deliveries or calendar events; accept “I don’t remember.”

15–20: cancellation and alternatives

• “Tell me about the day you cancelled. Why then?”
• “What had you already tried?”
• “What options did you consider, including skipping?”
• “What have you actually done for meals since?”

20–27: test explanations, only after the unaided story

Ask everyone: - “How did the cost fit your budget and what you got from it?” Probe actual alternatives, prices or discounts used—not hypothetical willingness to pay. - “How did recipe choice change over time?” Request specific examples and timing. - “How did deliveries fit your plans?” If problems arose: promised versus actual arrival, consequences, frequency, and attempted resolution. - Then show their selected reason/comment: “How well does this capture what happened? What’s missing?”

27–30: confirm

Summarize the sequence, separating ongoing frustrations from the final trigger. “What have I misunderstood? What else mattered?”

Support and synthesis

Pair each novice with an experienced observer; rehearse Monday. Use silence and “Tell me about a specific time,” not suggested answers. Never defend Sprig or pitch fixes.

After each call, record timeline, supporting examples, contradictions, and unknowns separately from interpretation. Friday, compare cases across all explanations, explicitly noting disconfirming evidence. Report mechanisms and next validation steps—not churn percentages or causal conclusions from six interviews.