Trends creating business opportunities (apologies Faith Popcorn)

Faith Popcorn is one smart lady. She is futurist, author and founder and CEO of marketing consulting firm BrainReserve. Prior to founding her consultancy, Popcorn was an advertising agency creative director. Faith has coined various terms and phrases in her publications. For example “Brailling the culture” is her term for analyzing a range of cultural developments. Popcorn has identified a number of trends that she argued determine consumer behaviour.

Although Mrs Popcorn has raised the bar to almost unreachable heights, I will try to provide a number of trends that I believe should be considered as it may inspire us to find business opportunities that may suit our interests and abilities.

1. More and more people want to leave full-time employment.Sub-trends: Forget corporates, entrepreneurship is becoming the number one profession. Contract work, interim positions, agents and labour broking growing. (Before you want to inform me about the politically motivated drive by labour unions to get rid of these, the trend is still growing, and will continue, even if in another guise.)Possible opportunities due to this trend: Create part-time employment. Set up and sell running concerns to those not capable of doing so themselves. Entrepreneurship training, seminars, mentoring and coaching. Sell contracts and/or manage contract workers. Start a personnel agency focusing on contract work. The list goes on, and on…

2. Forget rocket science, satisfy needs simply. Consumers have many needs, and even those that are satisfied by different suppliers, can be satisfied much more simpler. Technology is great, but sometimes overrated. Go back to old ways that worked well. Do not change or adapt just to change or adapt. Only do so when it is really necessary.

Sub-trends: Getting back to basics. Business 101.

Possible opportunities due to this trend: Consulting – if you really understand the basics and good business practices (I know an excellent person – he calls himself Prof Gary, and I think you can reach him on profgary.co.za. Oh, and please remember the www infront). Training, practical seminars, etc. Creative product development.

3. People are pretty depressed.

Possible opportunities due to this trend: The obvious one would be depression medication, but I think that one is pretty well covered by the fat cat Pharma companies. Cater for more entertainment, parks, tours and other things to do over weekends. Provide services and products that will leave the customer “feeling good”.

4. Lock-up and go lifestyle.

Maybe I have included this one due to my personal love for travel. But maybe, just maybe there are more of me out there.

Sub-trends: Smaller houses. High security complexes and villages. First world individuals have less children. Need to escape from reality. Cheaper travel. Families living across the world. Work opportunities on the Internet, making location irrelevant. Unrealistic labour laws providing incentives not to employ staff at home.

Possible opportunities due to this trend: Simple – develop safe and small housing facilities with service and product suppliers in close vicinity. Consider that many people are single and need less space. Furniture and accessories that occupies less space (just visit Europe to understand how we have no respect for space). Provide cleaning services, laundries, etc.

5. Shorter, more practical courses.

Sub-trends: Online training (e-learning) is becoming more and more popular. Back to on-the-job training and internships.

Possible opportunities due to this trend: Just like banks, traditional universities will have to change their ways to remain in business. No prices for guessing if this will ever happen. Short courses and seminars are becoming more-and-more popular. Long winded theoretical training will not stay with us in the long-run. Just take note of all the many private colleges and training institutions setting up business in our country. Looking at the ques of potential students at the start of every academic year is evidence that demand far outstrips supply of education services. The only thing holding back the wave of change to e-learning is the lack of bandwidth (and its cost) in SA. Brace yourself – the tsunami is coming. The focus in future will be on practical courses – is it not sad that all the old style Technikons were converted into universities? Can we identify the bright sparks who led this change and forever punish them?

6. Traditional banking on their last legs.

Sub-trends: Corporates charging excessive fees for simple services find it more difficult to survive. Are we not all fed-up with banking obscene banking fees? The highest in the world. Put cash into your account and you are charged a fee, withdraw that same money and you are again charged a fee, even if you pay someone electronically, you are again charged a fee.

Possible opportunities due to this trend: Simpler “bank” services. Bank cards not directly tied to a dinosaur bank. Debit cards instead of credit cards. Why, oh why do we still have cheque accounts? Are there really anyone still out there writing cheques? Please tell me it is not true! Peer-to-peer lending will become the future. We do NOT need a bank anymore. ABSA, FNB, Standard and that green bank, are you listening and taking notes? At least Capitec is providing some relief with their creative way of addressing our needs. But, they will unfortunately also fall short in future, especially if they become arrogant, like their predecessors.

7. Voters becoming more sophisticated, demand more.

Sub-trend: More and more uprising against poor service delivery. Services traditionally provided by government are supplied by private companies. Tax avoidance increasing due to dissatisfaction from taxpayers not getting any (or very little) for their money. Increasingly we are paying double for our services – we are firstly paying the government through taxes, levies, municipal accounts, etc. and then we pay a private company to do exactly the same. Do you really need examples? Ok, think schooling, security, electricity, water, refuse removal …..

Possible opportunities due to this trend: Major opportunities exist to provide services previously provided (but still charged for) by the municipality and government. Alternative committees and structures run by residents to provide community services. More and more adults are sending their kids to private schools. Yes and wait for it, this trend is led by Previously Disadvantaged Individuals. Yes, schools are BIG business.  The spin-offs to this national crisis are huge – tutoring, learning aids, therapists (occupational, psychologists), educational camps, transport of kids, sporting venues, home schooling, etc. Provision of alternative sources of energy, solar, wind, water, diesel or petrol generators.

8. Excessive executive pay thing of the past. Nobody EARNS R5 million or more a year. They may GET these excessive salaries, but they do not EARN it. Now I am a capitalist, and believe that your income should have no limit. But this is not true if you work for a big corporate or government department. If you are the owner, the entrepreneur, the creator of your OWN company, then by all means, take as much as you like for yourself. If you feel like inducing nausea to yourself, take a look at the salaries of the top men (and few women) at the Banks, Insurance companies and the state-run utility companies. To add insult to injury, check out their bonuses they pay themselves, especially in times when the company is NOT performing well (or to be blunt – when the company’s losses are increasing). Remember the good old days when a bonus, meant …. well a bonus – meaning you received one if the company did exceptionally well.

Possible opportunities due to this trend: Stop paying execs high salaries? This will lead to more profitable companies, allow better pay for the real workers, allow a company to decrease their selling prices, put more money into social responsibility and so improve the lives of more people. Appoint people on low basic salary and allow them them to earn (yes EARN) a very descent income if they, and thus the company provide good financial results.

Faith Popcorn, I apologise if you think these trends are so obvious that they are not worth mentioning, or that they are not real trends, or that I have “copied” some that you have already mentioned many moons ago. But maybe, just maybe, you have picked up a new trend that you have not thought of.  Please do not wake me up, please let me dream on. Thanks Faith.