6A- Economic and Regulatory Trends

1. For my first economic trend, I found an article on Forbes that states, experts are expecting consumer spending to rise in the near 2nd half of the year. With this, I see an opportunity for companies to grow as more and more people will be spending their money.   This is a very broad opportunity but I see an opportunity for a marketing company that would help get clients products out to the public. With consumers spending more, there will be a need for companies to market their products and even though this is already being done, I think there could be ways to better this process. I believe this leads to an opportunity that exists because smaller companies will want to get their name and products out to the public but with more than just in house advertising. The typical customer I believe would be a small company that does not have the capital to higher a big marketing company, but wants to get their brand recognition up. I think this would be very hard to exploit because you would have to convince a company that marketing their products would increase their sales, at the same time convincing them that consumer spending is going up. When seeing this opportunity, I just thought that smaller businesses would want the same marketing techniques that big companies use but on a smaller scale, as my dad owns a small business and he has always wanted to advertise and market his products, but there isn't a viable way to do so.

2. According the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the unemployment rate is at a very low 4.1% in the US. Right of the bat, I see opportunities that entail doing some job or task for a person because so many people have jobs. This entails walking dogs, babysitting, house cleaning, etc. Just certain jobs that people can't take care of because they are at work. I think the typical customer would be someone who is always on the run because of work and just needs someone or a company to do a task for them that they would not be able to do because of work. I think this idea would be relatively easy to exploit. You would just have to do some research and some testing and see how many people would have a company do a service for them because they don't have time and then try and narrow down what service is the most popular among ideas. I saw this opportunity because I have seen other companies exploit this, like shipted, who deliver groceries to people and everybody is just on the go 24/7 now a days and I just feel like the next big "service" company is out there yet to be discovered.

3.It maybe small, but there is a regulatory change going on right now under the Trump administration that would lift certain fishing regulations in certain areas as stated in a New York Times article. I am a huge fan of fishing so I see an opportunity here to sell better fishing equipment for those fish that are being deregulated. I see an opportunity because it gives people who want to fish a wider range of fish to catch and a wider time of the year to catch these fish. The typical customer would be someone who enjoys the outdoors and likes to fish. I think this idea would be relatively easy to exploit as you would just have to do research into what fish and areas are being deregulated and then figure out what equipment and such would sell best in certain areas. I saw through this opportunity because again I am a fan of fishing and this deregulation could open up more and potentially better fishing for other people who would like to participate.

4.In the same NY times article stated above, there is also a deregulation to stop discouraging plastic water bottles sales in national parks. I see this as a great opportunity to develop or sell reusable water bottles in these parks. The typical customer would be someone who enjoys visiting these national parks and either forgets to bring a reusable bottle or doesn't have one and doesn't want to litter or use plastic in a national park. I think this would be a little harder to exploit because there are already companies that sell really good reusable bottles but getting them into national parks would be a great idea for people who would want to use them. I see through this opportunity because I want to cut down on my waste  and use of plastic bottles and I see a great opportunity to sell them in these national parks.