Category: industry and markets

The dominos are starting to fall in the U.S. economy.

From NPR’s Morning Edition:

“The dominos are starting to fall in the U.S. economy.

As the Federal Reserve pumps the brakes on the economy, many American companies are retrenching. There is a growing fear that as the central bank aggressively hikes interest rates to fight high inflation, it could tip the U.S. economy into a recession, and executives are cutting back.

A host of companies have announced job cuts or hiring freezes in just the last two weeks. They range from Tesla and JPMorgan Chase to Redfin and Coinbase.

Netflix last week announced a second round of job cuts for the year, this time eliminating around 300 positions. Earlier this year, the entertainment company announced it had lost subscribers for the first time in more than a decade. Since then, Netflix has eliminated roughly 450 positions.“

Read the rest of the article here.

Contact us to find a strategy to weather this upcoming storm and put you in a stronger position.

More Recession-proof Businesses

Is a recession on the horizon? U.S. stocks slumped lower Thursday, giving back all of yesterday’s post-Fed decision gains and pulling the Dow below the 30,000 point mark for the first time since early last year, as investors re-set prices on risk assets around the world in anticipation of faster near-term rate hikes and relentlessly high inflation.

The Federal Reserve delivered its biggest rate hike since 1994 yesterday, boosted its Fed Funds rate by 75 basis points to a range of between 1.25% and 1.5%.

What to do in a Recession?

Adaptability Charles Darwin - Your Startup Guru

As Charles Darwin observed, the most adaptable wins. We’ve been here before, a looming recession and people are worried about losing their jobs. Now is the time to think of the strategy that will help break one free of the whims of cost-cutting management.

Recession-proof / recession-resistant businesses

In a previous post, some recession-proof / resistant businesses were listed. Adding to that list are several more businesses that deserve consideration:

  • Gym / Fitness: Although fitness centers took a massive hit during COVID-19, it wasn’t for the lack of demand. According to the IHRSA, a global health & fitness association, the industry has been long thought to be, if not recession-proof, at least recession-resilient. Revenue from North American fitness clubs in 2009 (during the Great Recession) rose nearly 4 percent in 2008 from the year before, and membership grew by more than 10 percent, according to the IHRSA.
  • Independent contracting / Freelance services: When a recession hits employers turn to independent contractors as an alternative to hiring full-time employees. So, freelancing is a viable alternative to the traditional career path. The great thing is you can diversify your services so you can create multiple revenue streams. Most workers have a diverse set of skills that they can leverage. Also, there are many platforms such as Fiverr where you can easily share your skills.
  • Health and senior services: According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, healthcare and other services for seniors are expected to grow by 23% by 2024. This service sector has already been expanding rapidly over the last decade. In fact, in 2019, there were 71.6 million Boomers making them the second-largest demographic behind Millennials with 72.1 million. As life expectancy continues to increase, the wide range of needs this market demands is large and profitable.

Sell Shovels in a Gold Rush

If you’re saying to yourself, “but I don’t have any experience in these fields.” Keep in mind the saying, “Sell shovels in a gold rush.” What this means is don’t be one of the thousands or millions of competitors jockeying for one goal. The thousands or millions of competitors can now be your customers. Find a product/service that meets their needs. Look to your transferable skill sets and network for inspiration on how to pivot into a career.

Feasibility Study

Once you have an idea of some pivot options you have to do a feasibility study to see which one is the best option for you. A feasibility study is a curtailed business plan-like document where you outline your product/service, the business model, your competitors & your customers, and expected revenues/expenses/startup costs. A well-done feasibility study can save hundreds of hours and thousands of dollars in sunk costs.

Contact us today to create a feasibility study for you.

Doing the research for you

Doing the research for you

The business plans and pitch decks we create for our clients are meticulously researched so that the most crucial and actionable information applicable to their business is found.

Contact us to get started on your document today.

The COVID Small Business Boom

brown wooden framed gold open printed decorative signage

The Commerce Department said on Thursday, July 15, 2021, that business applications reached a seasonally adjusted 448,553 in June, 2021. In total, Americans have started 6,714,318 new businesses since the pandemic began last March, which is an all-time record.

According to Julia Pollak, an economist with ZipRecruiter, COVID created a very unique set of circumstances that made ideal conditions for people to start a business.

  • Many people were laid off on furlough and suddenly had time, but they didn’t have time that they needed to use to spend desperately searching for work because they also got a little bit of fiscal support. So there are many people who took that stimulus check and decided to take their $1,000 and use it to start a business.
  • Also, starting a business now is really fast and really cheap. You can register your business for just a few hundred dollars. And a lot of these companies are really little. It’s like a little store on Amazon or on Etsy. The startup costs for these businesses are super-low, so a stimulus check for $1,000 can make it happen in a way that it couldn’t have even 10 years ago.

If you are ready to start your business, contact us and let’s discuss the right path for you.

What Angel Investors Prefer

Halo Angel Investor Report

Not all industries get the same attention, and there is a pattern to what angel investors prefer. For example, according to a recent report based on an analysis of 2,492 transactions across 2,444 companies, all completed in 2019, angel investors are more likely to prefer certain industries and deal structure types (e.g., convertible notes).

Selected portions from the report below:

Industry

The 2019 data revealed a first-time decline in the information technology/software segment as a percentage of total transactions relative to other investment segments (2019/2018) — 29% of the investments (2019) were in information tech, compared with 38.6% (2018). Yet Information Technology still remains the dominant segment for angels.

Angel Investors Prefer: Consumer Products / Services sector saw significant growth, up from 18.2% (2018) to 25.75%.

If Healthcare and Biotech were combined, they would comprise 21% (2019) of transactions versus 18% (2018). We added Biotech as a discreet sector to track in 2019, but for comparison sake, you can observe that even without Biotech, the Healthcare segment continues to be a major category for angels.

We also noted an increase in Financial Services’ Fin Tech in 2019, which was too small in 2018 to warrant its own category. In 2019 companies in this sector participated in 3.55% of all transactions. The Energy sector also rose to over 3%, with a few related Environmental companies included.

And for this year, we found enough companies to warrant adding Ag Tech (1.2%) as a separate category and clearly growing. While Info Tech and Software is still the leading category for angel investing, but by a much smaller margin than in the past, we also acknowledge that Info Tech / Software is often a necessary core component of many other sector investments.

Deal Structure Type

While we continue to see the use of SAFE notes, they are a minor percentage of all Seed transactions at 4.7%. The primary structures were 51% Convertible Notes and almost 41% Priced Preferred. SAFE’s are not reported in our data as frequently as we hear them discussed amongst early-stage entrepreneurs.

Series A transactions were (as expected) Preferred Stock 86% of the time, with 12% standard Convertible Notes associated with a Series A, typically a bridge to Series A, but distinctly beyond the Seed stage.

We did find SAFEs were most frequently used in Mid-Atlantic Region at 12%. The Mid-Atlantic use of SAFEs may be heavily influenced by US Federal DOE, NSF, NIH, and other grant money, which does not permit debt as a liability while grant funds are in use; hence early-stage companies who do not wish to price their round are opting for SAFE notes.

California was #2 in SAFE usage at 10%, influenced by California incubators and possibly by science companies vying for Federal grant funds.

There are considerable pre-money valuation and round size discrepancies when it comes to the various demographics of entrepreneurs. This highlights a disturbing flaw in the angel investment community, but that goes beyond the scope of this blog post.

Launch and Grow Your Business

Your Startup Guru fundraises for clients from a broad spectrum of industries, including restaurants, SaaS, fintech, and more. Capital ranges from $10,000 to over $10 million have been found.

We have solutions for you even if your industry is not what angel investors prefer because capital is sourced from private equity, banks, economic development authorities, grants, and more.

Contact us today for your fundraising needs.

Pandemic led to U.S. housing boom, reduced credit card debt, New York Fed says

low angle photography gray sky

Last month, the Federal Reserve Bank of New York released their quarterly report on Household Debt and Credit for the fourth quarter of 2020.

Although the ravages of the pandemic are still massive and widespread, there were some glimmers of a silver lining. Some takeaways being:

  • The coronavirus pandemic changed the way U.S. consumers use credit, as lower interest rates spurred a boom in home buying and refinancing and virus-related shutdowns led to a drop in credit card use and an increase in paying off debt, according to a report released on Wednesday by the New York Federal Reserve.
  • Home buying and refinancing took off last year after the Federal Reserve slashed its key overnight interest rate to near zero to fight the economic fallout from the pandemic, leading to lower mortgage rates. A massive shift to working and learning from home also bolstered the housing market, as some families searched for properties with more living space.
  • Credit card balances increased by $12 billion in the fourth quarter but balances were still $108 billion lower from a year earlier – the largest yearly decline since the report was launched in 1999.
  • In total, all household debt not related to housing – including credit card debt, auto loans, student loans, and other debts – increased by $37 billion during the fourth quarter but was still below pre-pandemic levels seen at the end of 2019.

Read the full report here.

Economics of Valentine’s Day

The economics of Valentine’s Day is significant. In 2021, about half of  U.S. adults plan to celebrate Valentine’s Day and spend a total of $21.8 billion, down from $27.4 billion in 2020, according to the National Retail Federation (NRF).23 But 2020 was a record year, and the 2021 anticipated spend is still the second highest since the NRF first published its annual Valentine’s Day spending survey in 2009. 

Read more about the economics of Valentine’s Day here.

Psychographics of Hipsters

Psychographics explains Pabst Blue Ribbon's popularity with hipsters
Hipster and Pabst Blue Ribbon

Psychographics of hipsters explains how Pabst Blue Ribbon’s (or PBR) rise and fall is a story of a market finding a product. PBR has been around for 170 years but only in 2008, enjoyed a 6-year boom in popularity (outside of a brief moment in the 1970s).

It is better to find an under-served market and create a product/service for them than wait for a market to find your product/service.

Q: How to Find an Under-Served Market? A: Market Research

There are many sources at your disposal to gain a deeper insight into who your customers are and segments within that market.

  • Ask potential customers: Surveying is a form of primary market research. Ask them how they use their product, and what they like/dislike about it. How long have they used it, is it expensive, how does it make them feel, etc. These questions will give you valuable insight into the psychology of the user.
  • Pose as a customer and visit your competitor’s store/website. Learn how they do what they do. See what they do well, and what they can improve on. Sometimes employees are very happy to share details you cannot find anywhere else.
  • Industry and market research companies such as IBISWorld, Pew Research Center, Audience Overlap Tool, and Statista are loaded with great information. The downside is that they can be expensive. Less expensive options include the SBA’s Office of Entrepreneurship, US Census data, and older reports/white papers.
  • Industry and trade publications for your particular sector are also great sources of information. Some are free, while some require memberships.

So, going back to Hipsters:

Hipsters are known for following the latest trends and fashions while eschewing things regarded as being within the cultural mainstream. Hence the term, “I was into __________ before it was cool.”

So why did hipsters like PBR? To put it simply, it was “retro chic,” and anti-mainstream, and with many people still trying to recover from an economic recession, Pabst Blue Ribbon’s low price point was an attractive option. This brings us to a tool in marketing used to find customer groups: psychographics.

What are Psychographics?

Psychographics are metrics used in market research as a way to divide consumers into sub-groups based on shared psychological characteristics, including subconscious or conscious beliefs, motivations, and priorities, to explain and predict consumer behavior. Any dimension can be used to segment a group of consumers, such as style, variety, availability, price, etc.

Hipsters avoided things that were popular, and some of them were not price-sensitive, so they were willing to consider a range of beers that occupied a certain psychographic zone.

Psychographics of hipster beer consumption - Your Startup Guru
Psychographic of hipster beer consumption

As PBR’s popularity grew, it was departing from the zone of consideration – the region of price and popularity where hipsters were willing to purchase from. Also, as hipsterism became more mainstream, the association of PBR with hipsters caused a self-fueling downward cycle.

A shift in Pabst Blue Ribbon's popularity caused hipster abandonment due to the psychology of the hipster
An increase in Pabst Blue Ribbon’s popularity caused hipster abandonment
PBR sales increase by volume from 2005 to 2013
PBR case sales growth rate in convenience stores leveling off and decreasing from 2011 to 2014
Slumping PBR sales. Images property of their respective publishers

How to Use Psychographics for Business?

It is better to find an under-served market and create a product/service for them than wait for a market to find your product/service since you don’t have over one hundred fifty years for your product or service to be found by a market. You can read about more businesses that found a need and filled that need.

Your Startup Guru used psychographic analysis to differentiate our client’s brand from that of their competitors yet stay true to their envisioned identity. Psychographics are used in market research as a way to divide consumers into sub-groups based on shared psychological characteristics. Age (Young vs. Established), Popularity (Unique vs. Mainstream), Price (Expensive vs. Inexpensive), and Style (Function vs. Fashion) was used to find the spaces their competitors occupy, and there might be an opportunity for our client to find an under-served market. In the case of our client, they wanted to stay within a fairly competitive zone of youthful, unique, pricey, and fashionable. However, if a brand wants to target an older, fashion-forward market, then research into the type of prints they like, how and where they wear the product, how the product makes them feel, etc., through surveys, focus groups, and informational interviews will be invaluable.

Swimsuit brand psychographics
Swimsuit brand psychographics

Launch and Grow Your Business

Contact us today to get started on market research and strategies that will help take your business to the next level.

Make the right choice

Make the right choice

Money is extraordinarily tight for most people right now so starting a business is a pipe dream that has been put on hold indefinitely. However, you can make the choice and do the many things you can do with little or no money to continue to make incremental progress.

One of the most important yet least expensive things you can do is gain knowledge. Research into who your customers are, who your competitors are, what it costs to launch, who can supply raw materials for your product, etc. is relatively inexpensive with a simple online search but a critical. Research is an important task because it also tells you if your idea is feasible. A feasibility study is done to consider the various aspects of a business to see if it is a viable undertaking. Very briefly, feasibility studies are curtailed business plan-like documents where you outline your product/service, the business model, your competitors and your customers, expected revenues/expenses/startup costs. A well done feasibility study can save hundreds of hours and thousands of dollars in sunk costs.

Your Startup Guru offers price matching, discounted fees, and revenue sharing options to work with tight budgets. Contact us to get started on your feasibility study.

Make the right choice — do not go back to sleep and just dream.

Old school business model

Old school business model

I just saw a commercial for Rent-A-Center and thought to myself that their old-school business model is nearly a half-century ahead of the times.

Founded in 1974, Rent-A-Center is an American public furniture and electronics rent-to-own company based in Plano, Texas. The company was incorporated in 1986 and, as of 2014, operates approximately 2,972 company-owned stores in the United States, Canada, Puerto Rico, and Mexico, accounting for approximately 35% of the rent-to-own market in the United States based on store count.

“A convergence of trends—including the Mari Kondo-sparked enthusiasm for cleaning out closets, increased concern over the impact of climate change, and a movement toward smaller, urban apartments—has made millennial consumers more conscious of how many items they’re accumulating.“

Rent the Runway CEO Jennifer Hyman.

As you may know, companies are taking a similar business model and expanding it to other consumer sectors, such as clothing and jewelry. This model has already been applied to transportation with Lyft/taxis/vehicle leasing and with housing with Airbnb/hotels/apartments and intellectual property with game rentals/public libraries. Entering into the fray are companies like Rent the Runway, which rents unlimited designer styles to subscribers, and Fat Llama, which rents electronics (in the UK).

A convergence of trends—including the Mari Kondo-sparked enthusiasm for cleaning out closets, increased concern over the impact of climate change, and a movement toward smaller, urban apartments—has made millennial consumers more conscious of how many items they’re accumulating, according to Rent the Runway CEO Jennifer Hyman.

The spending habits of millennials, the largest single consumer group out there with 83.1 million (a full quarter of the U.S. population), was surveyed. The survey found that the main reason why they rent is to “test things before purchasing” at 57%. This makes sense with money being tight and space being limited, every purchase has to be scrutinized. The results of the survey are shown in the infographic below:

World Economic Forum: This is how millennials are fueling the rental economy

Old-school brands such as Play it Again Sports and Rent-A-Center are riding the boom of the change in consumer sentiment and behavior. Rent-A-Center’s revenue grew $9M between 2018 and 2019 to $2.6B, operating income ballooned an astounding $197M between 2018 and 2019 to $253M, helping net income to increase by $165M to $173M.

Up ↑