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!"

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).

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.