Regulatory change 1: In Florida, hospitals will now be required to post all of their prices online. I found this with the list of new Florida laws, which have been posted on news sites like WTSP and ABC WWSB. Now that hospitals will begin competing with each other in price, I realized there was an opportunity to sort them based on their prices and their standard of care. Just like Trivago includes prices and reviews, there is an opportunity to do the same with healthcare. The customers would be anyone who might need medical care, which is a large market. There is currently no competition, making this a great opportunity and easy to exploit. I decided that this opportunity was there because a few months ago I saw a video about how hard it is to guess how much being hospitalized will cost. I had thought it was weird that patients had no access to this information, especially because it might change their choice in hospital. Now that it is mandatory for them to share this information, I realized it would be more helpful to combine all of the information in one place.
Regulatory change 2: According to AlterNet, New Hampshire lawmakers are considering passing laws to loosen the drinking laws. It would include lowering the drinking age, but still restricting the places where individuals under 21 can buy or consume alcohol. This would be a great opportunity to increase tourism (as most other countries have a lower drinking age than America) and make specialty drinks. I think making a specialty cocktail drink line that is not very expensive would be a great opportunity to sell to this new market. One of the laws would be not allowing those under 20 to buy alcohol in public, so a company that delivered these drinks would be a great opportunity. The target customers would be people currently under 21 and young adults traveling to America. This would have little competition because it does not currently exist, and would provide a service that is especially advantageous with new legislation. In general, I feel that this would be a good concept, as cheap and good alcohol isn’t usually sold at bars; a service that delivered high quality drinks would be helpful. Especially with the new drinking age, it would be appealing to provide a way for people to drink but still make sure it is legal and safe.
Economic Trend 1: The U.S. is currently in an expansion phase. Right now, the economy is good and will likely continue to approve over the next few years before another recession. I read about this on The Balance, and realized that this could allow for business opportunities. People have money to spend now, but there is also no guarantee the economy won’t crash. A saving app that allows users to customize the way they save (a percentage of every transaction, paycheck, etc.) would give users flexibility and be used often as our economy is likely to continue to improve for some time. While people have the income, they are more likely to have excess they can keep in savings, and it benefits users so they have money if they need it. Right now, the target customer could be any middle class, especially young, U.S. citizen interested in starting a savings. There may be some competition as there are already money-managing apps, but I thought this would be a good economic opportunity after hearing friends talk about how they should start a savings. Many thought the accounts would be so small it wouldn’t be worth it and some thought it was daunting to start one, so I thought a good opportunity would be a customizable app would allow users to save as much or little as they prefer.
Economic Trend 2: Florida is set to become a trillion dollar economy, and is very unlikely to suffer from a recession. A good, though ambitious, idea would be to open another theme park. Tourism is one of the reasons Florida has a thriving economy, and many visit Orlando and Tampa for the theme parks. Making a theme park in South Florida would allow those visiting Miami and the beach to also go. The customers for this theme park would be tourists and residents, especially those wanting to stay in the south Florida area but still enjoy theme park attractions. This opportunity has no competition in the area, but it would not be easy to achieve because of the large upfront costs. If it were created, especially with Florida’s current economy, it would likely be a success. Many friends from south Florida complain about the distance they are from their colleges (UF, UCF, USF), which is where the Florida theme parks are. I also would not want to drive hours for a day at a theme park if there was one closer. I believe if there was a theme park similar in size to those in North Florida, it would be a great time to capitalize on profit while the economy is doing so well and residents have disposable income.
Dylan you have some really great ideas! I was extremely impressed with the first one about making a Trivago for healthcare, I feel like this will make the process of finding good care so much easier - especially if you were to include ratings. I also appreciated your ideas about theme parks. Growing up in central Florida I never realized there was a need for more theme parks, but you are correct in explaining that there are really no theme parks down south. Really good job at finding these opportunities, you are on to something!
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