Measuring the implementation of the design thinking concept in the creative industry

Bandung is one of the cities with a high culinary appeal. However, there are several problems found such as a decrease in sales due to the Covid-19, not conducting the market surveys, and tight competition in the culinary industry. One of the concepts that can solve these problems is a human-centered approach called Design Thinking. Hence, it is needed to measure whether the concept is already implemented or not. The result of this measurement can define the further plan to solve the problems stated. Design thinking is the rationale in the process of transforming a creative mindset into an innovation. This study measures the implementation of the Design Thinking concept in the culinary subsector in Bandung which includes five stages, namely: empathize, define, ideation, prototype, and test. The data collection is conducted by distributing questionnaires to 92 dine-in and 92 takeaway culinary businesses. The data gathered is then processed by using the descriptive statistical analysis technique and a two-tailed t-test. The result of the study indicates that the culinary business actors in Bandung city have implemented the Design Thinking concept well, although the empathize and define stages are still included in the bad category. There is also a difference in implementing the Design Thinking concept between dine-in and takeaway culinary businesses. Further study is expected to measure the impact of the Design Thinking concept’s implementation on the culinary businesses’ sales performance.