I'm heading into vacation season so I thought I'd talk about one of my favorite topics… travel, this week. When people think about financial posts on travel, they immediately think travel savings. Yes, we'll cover that too, but some of the biggest "wins" from travel come from the revenue side, specifically in new business development (another favorite topic of mine).
Sources Of Ideas
I've gotten some of my best ideas from travel.
For example: Many, many years ago, when I went to England, I saw that character flavored drinking boxes were all the rage. If it was big there, why wouldn't it be big here? So I came home, did more research, and helped launch it (very successfully).
Sources Of Products
Taking it one step further, an entrepreneur could set up an import (or licensing) relationship with the foreign manufacturer.
Sources Of Learning
Whenever I travel, I usually set up meetings or tours with local companies. These could be in my field (when I was in beverage, I toured beverage companies the world over) or outside of it. I'd ask questions of people who if they were local, would be my competition. So if I was working for Coca-Cola, I would talk to the Pepsi people. They were more likely to be open because I was from another country. I would also walk into grocery stores and count facings (the number of product on shelves). I would look at any of the hot toys, products, and trends.
Of course, I'd do my own local research before applying any lessons to my own market but these travel findings helped drive some of my biggest wins.