Nichepreneur Know-How: Trendwatching

With the arrival of Labor Day, it’s true: the summer movie season has once again come to an end. What does this cinematic climax mean to Nichepreneurs?

It means there’s information out there we can learn from, data we can consider when approaching our own customers. In this AMCTV.cm article by John Scalzi you can see lots of information Nichepreneurs and would-be Nicheprenuers can draw upon.

Particularly this paragraph:

1. Smart is in: What do The Dark Knight and Iron Man have in common, aside from each being based on comic books and each grossing north of $300 million? The answer I’m looking for was that they were both critically lauded for being exceptionally smart films — an accolade unusual enough for summer blockbusters but pretty much unheard of for films in which the hero spends much of his time behind a mask. Both these films had action, adventure and effects up the wazoo, but then, so did Speed Racer, and look where that ended up (on second thought, don’t. It’s too gruesome). Add Wall*E — the best reviewed and most clever major film of the year so far — and its $200 million-plus box office to the mix, and you come to a tantalizing conclusion that yes, actually, intelligence is a value-add to summer sf/f blockbusters. Will Hollywood take this lesson to heart? Almost certainly not. But when three films add up to a billion dollars in domestic box office and the only connecting thread between them is intelligence, it’s more than a sign.

Extrapolate that the trend toward favoring intelligence goes beyond the movies, and you’ve got good news! No longer do you have to promote your products and services by catering to the lowest common denominator: the public is developing a taste for quality, and as ticket sales have shown, they’re willing to pay for it, even in tight economic times!