Fair trade toys and trends

Recently I went to a seminar on green consumerism and trends. As a soft toy wholesaler we are dedicated to increasing the number of fair trade, organic or ethical toys so we are interested in where the experts see this market moving

The speaker detailed 3 distinct trends that they thought would be important between 2012 - 2015

1. Green is going mainstream. Many of us can remember when green consumers wore beige and the Body Shop was viewed as niche. But now supermarkets have fair trade school uniforms and organic cotton is reasonably common. They categorised consumers attitudes to green choices in the following way

Onlookers - 26%, Conveniently conscious 35%, positive chosers 31%, vocal activists 4% and principled pioneers 4%

Whilst its good that green is available to a wider market  it also means that it is not enough just to say its ethical, there have to be other desirable attributes. Our fair trade cotton crochet toys are desirable in their own right and they are competitively priced. With people watching the pennies ethical products have to almost be more desirable to compete against poorly designed but cheaper alternatives

2. Ubiquitous connectivity. This applies not just to grend products but to the whole market place. Currently 15% of all phones are smart phones but by 2015 it is estimated that the majority of us will own smart phones. Shopping and browsing via your phone will be common place and businesses need to ensure that they leverage this new market. Perhaps not so important for wholesalers but retailers should review their digital plans to ensure they can compete in this new market

3. The middle ground is disappearing. The consumer either wants quick convenience or an experience which is above and beyond the normal (this was called donative by the consultant speaking about it). If people are either constrained by time or money then they will  either shop in large hypermarkets to get everything in one place and competitively priced,  or they will surf the internet to ensure that they get the best price. There is a place for green business even in this niche and currently Nigel's eco store and amazon's 2nd hand book shop are two that are doing well. The donative market has more opportunities for niche businesses and the examples sited were vegan, raw food restaurants and "swishing" which is clothes swopping parties

So there are the 3 trends - Green goes mainstream, Technology makes further in roads on our time and habits and the middle ground disappears to be replaced by 2 polarised way to shop

The question we were asked is what were we going to do about it?!