As with all of the business model template's elements, "The Customer" is a choice variable. Executives choose who to sell to.
This choice directly influences the model type that is constructed.
Company DEF is a hypothetical manufacturer of an electronic gadget.
It can sell to individuals (e.g., an online store). In most cases, DEF would create a Locust model. (e.g., Dell (NASDAQ: DELL))
It can sell through a retailer or a distributor. If, as diagramed above, DEF chooses to sell all of its products through retailer XYZ:
XYZ is DEF's customer
DEF will be creating a Black Widow model (unless it finds other distributors to sell to). This is Palm's (NASDAQ: PALM) situation. In 2009, Sprint Nextel (NYSE: S) provided 43% of Palm's revenues.
In 2002, 27% of Nike's (NYSE: NKE) sales went to shoe retailer Foot Locker (NYSE: FL). While NKE thought itself a company that sold to end users, it had let itself slip into a Black Widow situation.
In 2003, NKE and FL got into a serious spat. At issue: who needed whom more.
By 2008, FL had been reduced to less than 10% of NKE sales. NKE had broken out of the Black Widow trap.
The story of Boston Acoustics, now part of Bain Capital LLC, is a fascinating one. Their 10K filings reveal a company that bet heavily on Gateway Computer as a customer, only to see its customer collapse when the tech bubble burst in 2001. Rather than sell to a wider network of customers, Boston Acoustics then turned to Chrysler as a potential Black Widow.
Choice is typically treated as either an element of "value network" design or "marketing channel" design. Of the myriad of articles that can be found on these topics, the one that I find closest to this site's content is Wise and Baumgartner's Go Downstream: The New Profit Imperative in Manufacturing
To improve your mastery of the business model template: Chickens and Pigs - The Book
