Customer research call guide

Sprig Churn Research Plan & Interview Guide

Why Our Current Data is Misleading

Before recruiting, we must look at how our exit survey distorts reality: 1. Default Bias: "Too expensive" is pre-selected. Half our cancellers leave it checked, but their free-text responses and behavioral data tell a different story: 79% of cancellers cooked 3 or fewer recipes in their final 4 weeks, and most skipped multiple deliveries. 2. The Value-Perception Trap: When food goes uncooked ("kept piling up in the fridge", "didn't have time to cook", "too much food for two"), the effective cost-per-meal skyrockets. Subscribers aren't necessarily leaving because of sticker price or competitor discounts; they are leaving because paying for food you end up throwing away feels expensive.

Our 6 interviews will test the execs' hypotheses (Price, Recipe Fatigue, Delivery) against this underlying Utilization/Lifestyle Fit problem.

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Recruitment Plan (6 Participants)

Note: Invite 2–3 backups per slot using the backup IDs provided.

1. The "Default Price" Low-Utilizer (Tests CEO Hypothesis vs. Waste) * Recruit: S-8016 (Backup: S-8029) — 14 weeks, "Too expensive (pre-selected)", skipped 4/6, cooked 0, free text: "kept piling up in the fridge". * Why: Represents our largest churn segment. Left the default reason checked, but stopped cooking entirely and threw food away. Tests if "price" actually means "wasted food."

2. The High-Usage Price Chiller (Tests True Price Sensitivity) * Recruit: S-8056 (Backup: S-8096) — 29 weeks, "Too expensive (pre-selected)", skipped 1/6, cooked 12, free text: "cheaper at the supermarket". * Why: Cooked 3 meals/week right up to cancellation (matching our retained user benchmark) with zero waste, yet still felt it was too expensive. Tests the CEO's hypothesis on a user who actually got full utility.

3. The Long-Tenure "Bored" Subscriber (Tests Head of Food Hypothesis) * Recruit: S-8057 (Backup: S-8246) — 53 weeks, "Recipes got repetitive", skipped 4/6, cooked 3, no free text. * Why: Actively changed the dropdown to "Repetitive" after a year of loyalty and recent skipping. Tests genuine menu fatigue vs. seasonal routine changes.

4. The Time-Poor "Repetitive" Subscriber (Tests Menu Fatigue vs. Cooking Effort) * Recruit: S-8022 (Backup: S-8013) — 20 weeks, "Recipes got repetitive", skipped 4/6, cooked 3, free text: "didn't have time to cook". * Why: Selected "repetitive" at 5 months, but wrote they had no time. Did the flavors get boring, or did the 45-minute prep work become a chore?

5. The "Too Much Food" Down-Sizer (Tests Plan Flexibility) * Recruit: S-8006 (Backup: S-8240) — 29 weeks, "Too expensive (pre-selected)", skipped 0/6, cooked 8, free text: "too much food for two". * Why: Consistently cooked 2 meals/week without skipping, but felt overwhelmed by volume. Tests if inflexible portion/box sizes are driving "price" churn.

6. The Early-Tenure Ops Failure (Tests Head of Ops Hypothesis) * Recruit: S-8097 (Backup: S-8152) — 2 weeks, "Delivery problems", skipped 2/6, cooked 10, no free text. * Why: High intent (cooked 10 meals in a very short window) but churned immediately citing delivery. Isolates pure operational failure during the critical first-month habit-building window.

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30-Minute Interview Guide

Golden Rules for New Interviewers

• Don't ask about the future or hypotheticals: Never ask "Would you have stayed if it were 20% cheaper?" (People always say yes). Ask what actually happened.
• Ask for stories, not opinions: Instead of "How were the recipes?", ask "Walk me through the last box you unpacked."
• Don't lead the witness: Do not mention their survey selection ("I see you cancelled because of price"). Let them bring it up.
• Embrace silence: Count to 5 in your head after they finish speaking. They will often fill the silence with the real truth.

1. Intro & Warm-up (3 mins)

• "Hi [Name], thanks for joining. I'm [Name] on the product team at Sprig. We're talking to former subscribers to understand how Sprig fit into your life and where it fell short. There are no right or wrong answers—criticism won't hurt my feelings, it actually helps us improve. Do you mind if I record this just for internal notes?"

2. The Origin & Early Habit (5 mins)

• Goal: Understand the job they hired Sprig to do and their first-month habit.
• "Take me back to when you first signed up for Sprig. What was going on in your life that made you want to try it?"
• "In that first month, what did a typical week with a Sprig box look like?"

3. The Last Box (10 mins) — CRITICAL SECTION

• Goal: Uncover the behavioral reality of food waste, prep time, and portion sizes.
• "Think about the very last Sprig box that arrived at your door. Walk me through what happened to that box from the moment you brought it inside."
• Follow-up: "How many of those meals did you end up cooking?"
• If meals went uncooked: "What got in the way of cooking the others? What ended up happening to those ingredients?" (Listen for: guilt of throwing away food, fridge clutter, unexpectedly busy evenings).
• "Looking back at the last month or two before you cancelled, I noticed you skipped a few weeks. How did you decide whether to get a box or skip?"

4. The Trigger & Executive Probes (9 mins)

• Goal: Pinpoint the exact moment of cancellation and test exec hypotheses without leading.
• "What was the exact moment you decided, 'Okay, I'm going to cancel my subscription today'?"
• Use the relevant probe below based on what they bring up (or their profile):
• If they mention Price / Value: "When you felt it wasn't worth the cost, how were you doing that math? Did you switch to another meal kit, or what are you doing for dinners now?"
• If they mention Recipes / Food: "When you logged in to pick recipes toward the end, what was going through your head? Was it the flavors, the ingredients, or the time/effort to cook them?"
• If they mention Volume / Leftovers: "How did the amount of food in the box match up with what your household actually eats?"
• If they mention Delivery: "Tell me specifically what happened with the delivery. How did that impact your plans for the week?"

5. Wrap-up (3 mins)

• "If a friend asked you today whether they should try Sprig, what would you tell them?"
• "Is there anything else about your experience we didn't cover? Thank you so much for your time!"

Aim and guardrails

Use six interviews to identify how cancellation happens, not vote on which executive is right. Explore price, repetition and delivery alongside an alternative: subscribers stop cooking the meals, food accumulates, and the subscription loses value.

The cancellation form is weak evidence: “Too expensive” is pre-selected, only one reason is allowed, and comments often suggest overlapping problems. The first-month cooking difference—81% of retained subscribers versus 34% of cancellers cooked at least three recipes weekly—is a useful lead, not proof that cooking prevents churn. Last-four-week cooking counts cannot establish first-month habits.

Recruit these six

Purposefully sample contrasting behaviors and mismatches between selected reasons and comments. Counts below are weeks subscribed / skips in last six weeks / recipes cooked in last four weeks.

Backups, in corresponding order: S-8096, S-8122, S-8209, S-8179, S-8259, S-8151. They preserve the main behavioral contrast, though comments differ.

Invite neutrally: “We’re learning about your experience using and stopping Sprig; this is not a sales call.” Book six 30-minute calls plus replacement availability. Do not screen for agreement with an executive theory. Confirm dates and household context; validate unusual counts rather than treating administrative data as ground truth.

Shared 30-minute interview guide

0–2 minutes: Introduction

“Thanks for joining. We want to understand what happened in your experience, including anything that worked or didn’t. There are no right answers, and we won’t try to persuade you to return. May we record for research notes? You can decline any question.”

2–6 minutes: Expectations and first month

• “What was happening in your life when you signed up?”
• “What did you hope Sprig would replace or make easier?”
• “Walk me through a typical week in your first month: receiving, choosing and cooking meals.”
• “What happened to meals you didn’t cook?”

Establish actual routine before asking whether it changed.

6–16 minutes: Reconstruct the cancellation timeline

• “Take me through your last few weeks with Sprig.”
• “When did you first consider stopping? What happened just before that?”
• “Tell me about the last box you received: what arrived, what you cooked, and what happened to the rest.”
• “Tell me about a week you skipped. What led to that?”
• “What happened on the day you cancelled? Why then rather than earlier?”

Probe for dates, examples, actions and consequences. Separate gradual dissatisfaction from the final trigger. Ask what they tried, including changes to orders, skipping or contacting support.

16–21 minutes: Replacement and trade-offs

• “How are you handling dinners now? Tell me about last week.”
• “What alternatives did you actually consider or use?”
• “What did those cost, and what did you get for that?”
• “What made cancelling preferable to continuing or skipping?”

Distinguish actual competitor switching from general perceptions of cheaper options.

21–27 minutes: Cover gaps, then reconcile the form

Only after the unprompted account: - Price: “How did the cost fit your budget? Did anything change?” - Recipes: “How did recipe choices change over time? Any specific examples?” - Delivery: “How did deliveries fit your plans? Describe any problem and what followed.” - Usage: “What made cooking the meals easier or harder?”

Then: “The form recorded [reason]. How well did that capture your situation? Were other reasons missing?” Clarify whether they actively chose it.

27–30 minutes: Close

Summarize the sequence and ask: “What have I misunderstood? What mattered most that we haven’t discussed?”

Support and synthesis

Run a rehearsal for both new interviewers; pair each with an experienced observer. Use silence and neutral probes—“What happened next?”—not “Was it too expensive?” Never defend Sprig.

Debrief immediately using one template: expectations, usage trajectory, incidents, underlying constraints, cancellation trigger, replacement, supporting quotes and uncertainty. Compare confirming and contradicting cases. Report plausible mechanisms and follow-up tests—not prevalence estimates or a causal verdict from six calls.

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).

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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."

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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).