The New Millennium

Set your calendar for August 19th. That is the date for Team Boston's new Millennium Planet. The purpose of the planet is to prepare our Team Boston Dealer for the future by providing expert analysis on consumer trends and how to practically guide your business accordingly. One of our expert presenters will be Larry Moore, Vice- President of NPD Crest, specializing in motor fuels, convenience stores and service bays. Here are several New Millennium trend forecasts, ac-cording to the Trend Letter:      Relative prosperity is propelling a cultural shift that will affect virtually every industry. The puritan work ethic is giving way to an expectation of con-tinuos entertainment. Most evident the retail sector, where "experience shopping" has replaced window shopping as a weekend pastime, the shift also is evident in education where products that educate

and entertain at the same time are rapidly gaining market share, and travel, with adventure travel consuming increasing amounts of leisure dollars. Even the finan-cial services and consumer goods industries offer "lifestyle" products. Our appetite for amusement will force other industries to inject entertainment content into the goods and services they produce.      Michael Wolf, founder and senior partner of the Media and Entertainment Group at consulting firm Booz, Allen & Hamilton, calls the forces underway the "entertainmentization" of the economy. But it's more than that - it's a shift in consumer expectations.      As more of the world enjoys relative prosperity, its citizens will begin to see entertainment as a right, not a privilege. Ultimately, the differentiating factor between all manner of goods and services will be

The Lost World

Are you operating in a Lost World? Mark your calendars for September 16th Team Boston presents the Lost World, a Galaxy Planet designed to provide the consumer trends that will influence those technology choices you need to make in order to survive and flourish.     The following are Lost World Trend Forecasts, according to the Trend and Kiplenger Letters.      "Know your customer" has been the marketing mantra for decades. Then computers made it possible to target potential customers where they live, literally through geodemographic modeling. The Internet lets you target individuals within house-holds. This will transform the gathering, analyzing and dissemination of consumer data from an inexact marketing technique generating millions of dollars in revenues for direct mail specialists to a commod-ity business worth billions for all sorts of "infomediaries." In the future, information brokers will ensure that consumers receive ample regard for any personal data that is shared with others.

Get ready for the freeware era!      Mass customization is elevating direct marketing to a fine are. Companies are getting very personal and are becoming more aggressive in the process. As a result, consumers soon will expect to get something for nothing on many products and services, forcing businesses to price goods so that they factor in the cost of giveaways.      The winners and losers of the coming millen- nium will be separated by their ability to access and effectively exploit technology. Companies, communities and individuals that cannot or will not keep up will be left behind. State governments will pass legislation establishing minimal acceptable access to the information superhighway, requiring telecommunications, computer and internet companies to subsidize rural infrastructure development and classroom technology. By 2003, the federal govern- ment will mandate computer access for public schools - standards that eventually will become global.