Opportunities are there

We are all aware that COVID-19 has whacked a lot of businesses over the last couple of years. But with changes in our behaviour and changes in our spending habits, new opportunities can arise if we can tune out the gloom for a few moments and consider how we may resurrect our approach. Some industries can be thriving if they acknowledge the opportunity in front of them.

Veterinary Clinics

The RSPCA has reported that animal adoption and ownership during the COVID-19 period is up considerably. Animals need vaccinations and are prone to accidents and issues. These issues are rarely solved by YouTube. Additionally, and given that most of us are brand whores, the acquisition of glamour breeds of dogs in particular has increased and are more prone to physical issues than most multi-breed variants. What this suggests is that the market for veterinary care will increase, and demand will be higher for their services (assuming that owners are looking after their pets beyond custom sweaters and humiliating outfits).

Plant Nursery’s

The adoption rate of greenthumbery was up about 27% in 2021 according to the ABC. Gardens require resources to thrive, and most resources need to be purchased (fertilizer, sprays, tools, receptacles and so on). While Bunnings may have absorbed a lot of this demand, niche style gardening such as specific flora, exotics, herb gardens, and of course, drugs, should be peaking.

Physios

If you tried to purchase any kind of physical training paraphernalia over the last two years, you will have discovered how hard that was. Everything was either out of stock or marked up deluxe to take advantage of the shortage. This tells us that more people than usual were training at home. Throwing weights around and manipulating your body under the watchful eye of a decent coach can lead to injury, so it is a fair prognosis that at-home athletes are more likely to do some damage to themselves as they try to self-educate their way through a kettlebell or plyometric routine. Physios exist because of exercise, and the COVID-19 period has bred a huge increase in bad exercising.

Adult Stores

Given our inability to socialise and interact with our communities during these unprecedented times, our willingness to overwhelm our bodies with intoxicating substances and fornicate in the dark alleys around nightclubs has been greatly inhibited (though not impossible if you are fairdinkum). This has resulted in spending more time with our partner(s) or more time on our own. Normal common application of sexual behaviour is hardly sustainably, so the likelihood of turning to props and good-idea-at-the-time intimate apparatuses will naturally increase in demand (by around 25% according to some retailers).

Family and Marriage Counsellors

One of the potentially confronting consequences of being bound to our homes and immediate surroundings is that we are exposed to concentrated doses of our partners or those we live with. For some, this is a sweet outcome. For others, we may discover that without the distractions of careers, social lives, and other consuming habitual tendencies, the person across the table from us may not quite be the enabler of joy we remember. In a world where, thanks to alerts, notifications, and information and entertainment deluge, it is more natural to not know someone terribly well even if they are a partner or “close” friend. When our social stockholdings are reduced to the attributes a single person can provide, for some, this may be alarming and may require external guidance on how to coexist (though it is probably cheaper and more entertaining to try out the Adult Store solution first).

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There are numerous small businesses within certain industries which will have had, and continue to have, opportunities for growth. This is hardly a comprehensive list, but if you are an operator in any of these industries, your business can be thriving (which in turn supports other businesses in the supply chain, the local economy, employment, etc.)

By nature of the mainstream media where bad is more clickable than good, we are spoon-fed the entire catalogue of bad news on an hourly basis. But for each negative thread we are exposed to, if we look hard enough, there is likely something positive within the mess if we are prepared to embrace it.