[Editor's Note] Milos Bezanov is a second year student currently studying International Politics at King’s College London.

Your mail has arrived. You open it up and you start eating it. That's not a sentence you'd expect someone to tell you, but if you asked somebody what they did with their Graze box, that pretty much hits the nail on the head.

If you're stuck in the office, hungry, and short for time, people would be willing to try almost anything other than the usual McDonalds or KFC, perhaps in some extremes even their own mail.

It's very simple; Graze is a service that delivers a small package of healthy food anywhere in the UK for £3.79. In fact it's so simple I'm sure many of us have thought of the idea in some way or another. Yet when it passed through Graham Bosher's mind, he saw more, he sensed a business opportunity. People want healthy food, but need quick food; the problem is that quick food generally isn't healthy, Solution; offer quick food that is healthy and reasonably priced. In fact it's so simple it makes you wonder why no one else has done it? The truth is; the simpler the idea, the more difficult the challenges, which makes the need for the solutions to be that much more innovative and ingenious.

Graze was founded in January 2009 by 7 friends. It's small, neatly packaged from recycled material (environment consciousness is always a plus) and is well presented. They deliver at work and home, and are never late. They invested a quarter of a million in research and development; to find a way of ensuring that the food doesn't go bad during delivery. For this entire service they charge £3.79. The Grazebox is small enough to fit through the letterbox; so you don't have to trudge to the post office if you're not in on the delivery day.

However, a professional product and service isn't enough, people have to want it. How did Graze do this? Looking at the idea it seems easy to answer; they marketed what people wanted (healthy food) and provided a professional service. In truth, however, it's much harder.

People have known about healthy food for a long time, they just never wanted to eat it. When people think healthy food, they think “spinach” or “broccoli”, which is not exactly synonymous with good taste. All the investment would be in vain if people don't want the product.

Redefining the image of healthy food is one of the two key parts to Graze's success; the other is the innovative ways they then convinced you to buy it. The innovation comes from the use of technology. Their interactive site lists the various food types that they do (up to a 100 different foods to choose from), next to which you have 5 options; Bin, Like, Try or Love. This is a flexible, user friendly approach because rather than having simply “like” or “dislike” it caters to the various moods people are in. They might not particularly dislike something, but not like it enough to order it regularly; thus they can click “like” which simply means that Graze vary the times they put that particular option in.

With this system they can tailor themselves to not just the specific food they like, but also what food the customer is in the mood for. This flexibility carries on into their service; you can have boxes delivered as often or as little as possible; and cancel the delivery anytime before 6am (although they are seeking to extend this) on the delivery day. In this way, healthy food isn't something that is forced upon you as a child, but rather something that can be enjoyable; almost an indulgence.

The use of technology extends to that of social media in network marketing. They offer deals through Groupon and various other sites where you can get your first box half price. Through this they entice customers, but at the same time they don't devalue their brand. Lets face it, if they put up these deals on their site you'd ask; why are they giving it away? Is it that bad? Better yet, they offer customers free boxes if they recommend their product to their friends, and provide a unique code to reference this. These people then market the product through Youtube and various other social media sites, continuously enhancing their exposure. The scary thing is, the chain of network marketing that is created is potentially endless. What's more, using people to advertise through video media rather than just blogs makes people more likely to trust the reviews as genuine. If they see a person with a Graze box, eating it, people are more likely to give it a go.

It's difficult to gauge exactly how successful graze is, as they don't disclose their profits. However, in it's first half year, Graze shot up to 80,000 orders, and today sends out over 120,000 boxes a month. It is estimated that in the first year they raked in £1.4 million in revenue. Also, if we multiply £120,000 by the price they sell them for (currently at £3.79), and take into account how it uses the internet to generate completely free marketing, reducing costs..well, it doesn't take a maths genius to work out it's a lot. Graze's expansion has not stopped there; they launched their first TV ad back in December 2011; which increased site traffic over 10 times as soon as it was aired.

In fact, the entirety of this article can be summed up with the following words; Graze has hit a winner. Not necessarily with their idea; it's brilliant in it's simplicity although not the most original. The real originality comes through the use the internet. On the customer end; tailoring the final product to the customer's needs, in the process redefining how people look at healthy food. On the marketing end; advertising their product continuously through social media, which costs them almost nothing. The business model, combined with the focus on healthy food and an all round positive image is what, at least in my eyes, make Graze a success.

[Editor's Note] Milos Bezanov is a second year student currently studying International Politics at King’s College London.