Today I was with colleague Luke Waldren who said wanted to stop at Cash Converters quickly to have a look. I ask him what he wanted to buy and he said “Nothing”. He then went on to tell me this;
“I go to cash converters every now and again to do some consumer and economic research. It’s a great barometer of the state of the economy at a grass roots level. To see things like what people are off loading, and how much inventory they have in certain categories. To ask the staff members what’s hot and not. If they’re busy or quiet.”
I thought it was a terrific idea, because it represents the buying and selling of the community, in a way that business to consumer trading just can’t.
By the way of example here’s a a couple of simple insights: TV’s are almost non existent in Cash Converters now. They’re too cheap new to have a good resale value when second hand. The case of mobile phones with filled with Blackberrys and Nokias and there wasn’t one iPhone for sale – They sales guy told me they get bought too quick.
Startup Blog says: Real research opportunities are all around us.
Talking direct to the human aggregators. This is a great one.