I attended a seminar this week about managing a contingent workforce, presented by Gary Campbell, an expert in the field.  “Contingent workforce” is the new buzz phrase for outsourced labor - contract workers, independent contractors, consultants, freelancers, interns, offshore workers, third party contractors – in short, anyone who works for your company who’s not a “regular” employee. 

You see them in every airport in America.  Flying out on Sunday afternoon or Monday morning, heading for work.  Flying back home on Thursday night, ready for a weekend of home and family.  Some live in extended-stay hotels, others have apartments during the week, homes-away-from-homes.  They manage extended and short-term projects, consult for various industries, and provide outsourced labor services that aren’t offered by the companies which they serve.

The industry is growing so quickly, that some large companies are hiring permanent staffers who do nothing but oversee the non-permanent workers. 

There’s even an accreditation to become a Certified Contingent Workforce Professional. 

Competition for top talent is increasing.

In the third quarter of 2012 (and we must assume that the numbers have continued to rise), 2.95 million people were employed by US companies as contingent workers every single business day.  Approximately 16% of the US workforce now comes under this categorization – and that’s expected to rise to 20% (some say as high as 40 – 60%) in the next few years. 

Millennials and Baby Boomers are fueling this growth, with flexibility as the driver.  Millennials expect a flexible work environment, and many aren’t keen about entering the 9 – 5 world.  In addition, their entrepreneurial spirits enjoy the freedom of setting their own career course, moving from one job to another.  Boomers caught between work and aging parents find it increasingly hard to squeeze caretaking into a 40-hour workweek.  Many Boomers are looking for a way to make a living in a world that seems increasingly loathe about hiring older workers.  Others might still have a lot to give – but might not necessarily have the desire to do that giving 40+ hours a week anymore.  Contingent work is the answer.

The IRS is stepping up scrutiny of this group, concerned that employers are trying to shirk taxes by moving their workforces away from the land of the W-2.  And indeed, if the employer is hiring someone to be onsite every day, someone whose workday is directed, who is instructed how to do their job by someone on the employer’s staff, who receives vacation and sick pay – they should most likely receive that W-2.  They’re called an employee.

But if the contractor sets their own hours, is pretty much self-supervised, provides their own direction and expertise, supplies their own working tools, pays their own healthcare and employment taxes – in general, serves as a set-apart part of the team – then you’re talking contingent labor.  The distinction is important – and it’s critical to be ever-mindful of it.  Fines are steep.

I’ve lived in this contract labor world for 3.5 years now.  Sure, keeping your project pipeline full can be stressful – but any of the commissioned salespeople that I coach can tell you the same thing about their desks! 

Buying your own healthcare insurance is incredibly expensive – but since the passage of the ACA, it’s a lot better than it used to be.

After the flexibility, having a variety of work experiences is the best benefit.  As a consultant/coach/outsourced staff – fill in the title blank – I’ve been able to employ literally every skill that I’ve learned through a full career in public broadcasting marketing, development and sales, commercial advertising, ad agency media buying – plus all the writing I’ve done, continuing education courses I’ve taken, and so much more.  In any given day, I might be planning a pledge drive, writing a membership letter, coaching a sales person, crunching numbers for “media math” or planning a generational workshop.  It’s certainly not a recipe for boredom!

And that’s critical for both Boomers and Millennials, the two generations who can’t stand boredom.  As the American workforce makes it ever easier to make your own hours and to create your own job, the numbers of contingent workers will only rise.  And as they do, more companies will discover the benefits of augmenting their full-time workforce with contingent workers who can manage short-term projects, teach new performance skills, and take over outsourced job functions.    

Healthcare has long been a stable and deep underwriting category for public broadcasting.  A recent RAB Radio Sales Today article highlighted three trends that are fueling the healthcare industry’s growth – and they are trends that public stations can take advantage of when seeking sponsorship dollars.  Even better, these sponsorship dollars may have their own budget line for our underwriters, not coming from their general advertising/marketing budget.  

1)  Drug store partnerships – highlighting events, in-store clinics,  community partnerships, more
2)  Hospitals – it’s not just about getting  bodies in beds.  It’s about community involvement, attendance at lecture
series, support groups and more
3)  Health insurers – enrollment begins in October for the 2014 mandatory health insurance plan.  Public broadcasting has scores of listeners who work for themselves, who will be shopping for a more expansive, less expensive form of health insurance.

Hope these items for your prospecting list are great ones – happy selling!
jc


Category Update: Healthcare Companies
 Health Care Reform Has Created New Opportunities for Nearly Every Type of Property

From IEG SR's perspective, few categories represent as much opportunity as the healthcare industry.  Driven by the ongoing rollout of the Affordable Care Act and the aging Baby Boomer population, nearly every segment of the industry is undergoing seismic changes in how they market products and deliver services.  That evolution has created new sponsorship opportunities for nearly every type of property as companies place more focus on taking their messages directly to consumers.  Those messages range from anti-obesity and other health and wellness campaigns to educating consumers about undiagnosed medical conditions and the products that treat them. 

Below, IEG SR provides an overview of three active segments of the healthcare industry and their sponsorship hot buttons: 

Drugstore chains. Walgreen Co., Rite Aid Corp. and other drugstore chains are placing more focus on sponsorship to support their health and wellness positioning and promote front-of-store products.  One growing trend: customer rewards programs. Like other types of retailers, drugstore chains are increasingly using sponsorship to access perks and other
assets that can be used to reward loyalty club members. 

For example, Walgreen uses its partnership with Susan G. Komen Race for the Cure to promote its Balance Rewards loyalty program. The company activates the tie by distributing pedometers to race participants who earn points for every mile walked. Consumers can then use the points to gain discounts on future purchases. 

Like other types of retailers, drugstore chains frequently leverage with vendor partners. For example, Walgreen in January partnered with The Procter & Gamble Co. to activate the CPG company's sponsorship of The People's Choice Awards. Walgreen activated the tie with "Night at the W," an in-store event held the day after the show. The event featured Walgreen beauty advisors who used CoverGirl, Pantene and other P&G products to help customers create their own “red carpet look." 

Another key hot button: community involvement. Walgreen last year partnered with the NFL Detroit Lions in a deal that affords presenting status of the team’s "Living for the City" health and wellness initiative for disadvantaged and at-risk families.  The deal also provides a platform to drive store traffic: Walgreen activated  the sponsorship with in-store flu immunization events that featured both current and former Lions players. 

Sponsorship hot buttons: drive store traffic; demonstrate community involvement; promote customer loyalty programs; promote in-store clinics

Hospitals. Health care reform and industry consolidation continues to drive new sponsorship activity on behalf of hospitals. 
While hospitals previously used sponsorship in large part to promote areas of expertise, they are increasingly using the medium to promote broader health and wellness messages. 

The Hospital for Special Surgery activates the NBA New York Knicks with the "Train like a Knick" contest, around which fans can submit entertaining exercise videos on the team's Facebook page. The contest dangles the opportunity to train with Knicks trainers and alumni at the MSG Training Center in Tarrytown, N.Y. among other prizes.  HSS also uses the sponsorship to discuss the importance of physical fitness through a series of videos that feature Knicks players, doctors and announcers. The hospital shows the videos at home games and on the Knicks’ Facebook page. 
 
Sponsorship hot buttons: promote health and wellness; showcase medical expertise in action; demonstrate community involvement

Health insurers. While they once used sponsorship to build their brands and promote health and wellness, a growing number of insurers are using the medium  to engage consumers and reach new audiences.  That activity is driven in large part by the Affordable Care Act and the  millions of consumers that will soon be required to purchase health insurance. 
And some companies are already expanding their portfolios prior to the Oct. 1 rollout of health insurance exchanges. 

Case in point: Horizon Blue Cross Blue Shield of New Jersey is signing new deals to reach Latinos and other under-insured consumer segments. The company this month announced a $1 million partnership with the New Jersey Performing Arts Center, around which it will sponsor NJPAC’s Sounds of the City summer concert series and the nonprofit's Latin and urban music performances. 

Sponsorship hot buttons: reach uninsured consumers; support CSR initiatives; promote Medicare Advantage programs to senior citizens; promote loyalty wellness programs

 (Source: IEG Sponsorship Report, 04/29/13)

Here’s a great article on marketing to Boomers from today’s RAB e-newsletter.  It contains the best quote I’ve heard in a long while - "Boomers are not a needle in the haystack. They ARE the haystack."   By 2018, they will control 70% of the disposable income in the US.  And they’re not buying Geritol.  46% of Apple’s sales are to people aged  55+.   Public radio  listeners are active, engaged, and willing to try new things – and they have money to spend!
 
Marketing to Boomers Crucial to Bottom Line
Although their children may not agree, the 80-million-strong Baby Boomer population in the United States is hip, willing to change their minds and spends more on consumer packaged goods (CPG) than any other age group. 

"The Boomer market is misunderstood," Beth Brady, global head of marketing effectiveness for Nielsen, said during a recent webinar entitled, "Boomers: Marketers' Most Valuable Generation." She noted that Boomers spend 50 percent of their total spend on CPG, but only 10 percent to 15 percent of advertisements are marketed to them.

The entire Baby Boomer demographic, defined as individuals born between the years of 1949 and 1964, will be 50 years old or older in 2014. And in five years, the demographic will control 70 percent of the country's disposable income, according to Brady. Baby Boomers spend more money on 119 of Nielsen's 123 defined CPG categories and have the highest average annual basket ring -- $7,233 -- of all demographics, she stressed.

These facts combined mean the Baby Boomer generation is a potential gold mine for marketers, with Brady dubbing the demographic "the most valuable generation in the history of marketing."

 "Boomers are value conscious and seek out information before purchasing items," she explained. "But they don't only shop on price." Addressing where companies should market their products to Baby Boomers, Brady relayed that "TV is still king," considering this demographic watches television an average of 174 hours a month. However, Baby Boomers also frequent
social media websites.

"Usage on social media by Boomers has doubled in the past year," Nielsen's global head of marketing revealed. "Fifty-two percent are now on Facebook." In terms of approach, she said the marketing should be more holistic, give plenty of facts and communicate value beyond price points.
 
"Boomers are not a needle in the haystack. They are the haystack," she stated. "Boomers are easy to target with a mass-media message."

Importantly, Baby Boomers are also willing to change their minds and highly respect loyalty from marketers, Brady concluded. "You don't need to change your brand personality," she said. "Apple is a great example. Forty-six percent of
its sales are to people (aged) 55-plus. That's because the company makes it easy for Boomers and created its Genius Bar."

(Source: Convenience Store News, 04/04/13)

To access the full report, please visit Nielsen's website

Interesting information this morning from the Radio Advertising Bureau that ties in nicely with our “Halo Effect” underwriting talking points.  It seems that responsible purchasing might even serve as something of a stand-in for charitable giving with socially responsible shoppers.  Millennials especially care about a company’s footprint – both in terms of social policies and community impact.  Employee relations (45%) are noted as a driving force, overshadowing the primary emphasis on “green” in recent years.  
 
With this new national trend, underwriting on public radio makes more sense now than ever before.  If a company’s image improves just from being on our air, and if their website backs up the good things that they do as a company – then that should translate into increased sales for that company with this growing sector of our population.
 
Here’s the article – 
Consumers Care About Buying from Socially Responsible Brands Now More Than Ever
How a Company Treats Its Employees and the Environment are Becoming Bigger and Bigger Concerns for Shoppers in the Checkout Aisle -- and They Want That Information to be Easy to Find and Verify

There will always be a segment of consumers who religiously buy products from socially-responsible companies -- toilet paper from Seventh Generation, shoes from Timberland, jackets from Patagonia, ice cream from Ben and Jerry's, and so
on.

But more and more, these socially-responsible shoppers are in the mainstream. A recent survey from marketing agency Good.Must.Grow found that most Americans care about buying products from companies that do good in the world. 
GMG's survey of 1,015 Americans yielded some fascinating, but not entirely surprising, statistics: 30% of respondents said that they expect to increase the amount of goods and services they buy from socially-responsible companies over the next
year (last year, that number was 18%), and 60% of people said that buying goods from socially-responsible companies is important to them.

But just 21% (the same percentage as last year) said that they will increase charitable donations in the coming year -- an indication that responsible purchasing is serving as something of a stand-in for charity. Thirty percent said that they expect to increase the amount of goods and services they buy from socially-responsible companies.

Treatment of employees is the biggest factor (45%) when people decide how responsible a company is. Environmental impact follows close behind (38%). Transparency, corporate oversight, and impact on society are also important factors. 

Companies shouldn't think that the trend towards socially-responsible purchasing means that they can just claim that their products are "green" and call it a day. According to the survey, 63% of people trust company claims about social
responsibility only sometimes -- when they do verify information, it's often by reading product packaging, checking out the news, and doing independent  research.

This skepticism holds true especially for large corporations that own brands that tout their social responsibility (think Kashi and parent brand Kellogg). In a survey conducted by Weber Shandwick and KRC Research last year, 56% of respondents said they would think twice about buying a product if they couldn't find information about the larger corporation behind it. One out of six U.S.consumers claimed that they would avoid a product entirely if they didn't like the parent company.

For most companies, these statistics are incredibly important: They signal a sea change in what consumers care about. In the future, it will become ever more difficult to be a successful company without paying attention to social responsibility. There are exceptions -- ask most people if they'd ditch their iPhone as a result of poor labor practices, and they'll admit that they won't.  Even so, Apple is making strides with its environmental and labor policies. This is a trend that can't be ignored.

(Source: Fast Company, 04/04/13)

While spring may have already sprung in the southern tier of the country, the upper half still has some time before outdoor construction projects start!  We’ve long discussed landscapers, gardeners, garden centers, pool/spa contractors and more as being excellent prospects for underwriting partners on our stations.  

Here’s some good prospecting information from today’s RAB e-newsletter for your local landscape architects.  Increasingly popular are outdoor kitchens (perfect for public radio foodies!), along with fire pits/fireplaces and outdoor living/dining rooms.  When you add the uptick in requests for water elements, plus the desire for backyard gardening/farming (don’t forget those
designer chicken coops!), you have a strong prospect for spring/summer business.

Consumers Digging into Bigger Outdoor Projects 
While spring is typically the busiest time of year for gardening and landscaping projects, experts are predicting a particularly abundant sales crop, powered by recovering real-estate sales. 

Outdoor living spaces will be on the top of many lists, according to a trend forecast from the American Society of Landscape Architects, as will designs focused on sustainability and low-maintenance. These outdoor living spaces -- defined as kitchens and entertainment areas -- earned a 94.5% rating, making them just as popular as gardens or landscaped spaces. And people want these rooms filled with such amenities as fire pits and fireplaces, grills, seating and dining areas and lighting. 

"Business definitely seems to be picking up," Ted Cleary, a member of the association and owner of Studio Cleary
Landscape Architecture in Charlotte, N.C., told Marketing Daily, "even over and above the typical spring bump. Over the last few years, we were seeing more customers back out of projects because of financial concerns. There seems to be more equilibrium now."

Water elements are also making a bit of a comeback -- not just as features in landscapes, but also in terms of spas and pools. And in keeping with the local food movement, the survey also reports more people are asking for food and
vegetable gardens, including orchards and vineyards.

Cleary also believes the recent real-estate slump has reset people's relationship with their homes. "There's definitely a lot more thought going into projects, and less of this frantic 'Let's fix this place up and move on.' I'm hearing more people say, 'We could be in this house for a while. Let's make the yard more suitable for what we want long-term.'"

A stronger real-estate market drives gardening and landscaping sales at such stores as Home Depot and Lowe's. In the latest analysis from CoreLogic, January's home sale price index rose 9.7% from the prior year -- the biggest increase since 2006, and the 11th consecutive month of gains.  Last month, Home Depot reported a quarterly gain of 7% in same-store sales, and expects sales for the year ahead to climb 3%. At rival Lowe's, same-store sales rose 1.9%, and it predicts a gain of 3.5% in the coming year.

 (Source: Marketing Daily, 03/18/13

From this week’s RAB e-newsletter, an article that speaks to what we, as  public radio marketers, do.  Purpose marketing, or marketing your company not just by what it sells, but by what the company stands for – is perfect for public radio consumers.  (It’s also a perfect marketing tool for Millennials and Boomers – but that’s another topic!)  

Companies are setting themselves apart from the competition by making their values known.  If there are six companies selling sandwiches, but one company shares your ecological values – then you will buy your sandwiches there.  It’s the Halo Effect in marketing, and public radio stations can help companies achieve that goal – both through their own messaging and by association with public radio.

It’s an interesting read –
jc

Selling Products by Selling Shared Values

The purpose of marketing is to sell products, but there is also a new way, known as purpose, or purpose-based, marketing, to do it.  Purpose marketing, also called pro-social marketing, advertising for good and conscious capitalism, woos consumers with information about the values, behavior and beliefs of the companies that sell the products. The goal is to convince potential customers that the companies operate in a socially responsible manner -- marketing "meaningful brands," to borrow a term from the Havas Media division of Havas -- that goes beyond tactics like making charitable contributions or
selling a product or two in recyclable packaging. 

Purpose marketing is becoming popular on Madison Avenue because of the growing number of shoppers who say that what a company stands for makes a difference in what they do and do not buy.  Consumers are seeking "authentic emotional connections" with brands, said Mandy Levenberg, vice president and consumer strategist for cause and sustainable living at CEB Iconoculture, a consumer research and advisory firm that is part of the Corporate Executive Board Company, and the perception that certain "shared values" can increase loyalty. 

Such consumers, frequently referred to as socially conscious shoppers, are assiduous in their research of corporate policies. That means a company doing something deemed at odds with its purpose-based mission statement or high-minded
advertising campaign runs the risk of eliciting disappointment -- or even a sense of betrayal -- among socially conscious shoppers who consider themselves misled.

Thus, a company that pursues purpose marketing must communicate what its "core values" actually are, said Michael Simon senior vice president and chief marketing officer at the Needham, Mass., office of the Panera Bread Company  restaurant chain.   For instance, Panera is "a place to get great soup, salads, sandwiches, but we stand for so much more," he added, citing policies that include donating unsold baked goods, starting the Panera Bread Foundation, working with organizations like Feeding America and opening donation-based community restaurants under the Panera Cares banner.  "We talk about our values internally, but we've been reticent to leverage them," Mr. Simon said. That changed as a result of research that showed that communicating those attributes and actions could be "more compelling to our customers" than conventional pitches about meal deals or how "my sandwich is better than the guy across the street's."

So Panera and its new creative agency, Cramer-Krasselt in Chicago, are introducing a campaign, with a budget estimated at $70 million, that bears the slogan: "Live consciously. Eat deliciously."  The campaign will include television and radio commercials; digital, print and outdoor ads; and a significant presence on social media like Facebook and Twitter. The estimated 13 million customers who belong to the My Panera program will got a preview last Thursday. (The campaign was formally introduced on Monday.)

The effort is intended to convey that "as a successful business, the people at Panera believe it's important to participate in the community beyond pure business," said Marshall Ross, Cramer-Krasselt's executive vice president and chief creative officer.  "Of course, Panera's not the only people to care about these things, deliver these things," he added, but "when people who like the company for the food hear about the kind of company it is, it changes how they feel; they like it even more, for more emotional, more potent, more loyalty-driving reasons."   Mr. Ross acknowledged that purpose marketing "really does need to reflect real sincerity, without making people cynical."    "Sometimes an ad agency's job is to conjure the story and express it in a fascinating way," he said. "This time, our job was to shut up and listen to the real story."

 A television commercial that will help introduce the campaign starts with a narrator who says: "When Panera began, we decided to get up every day and bake fresh bread from fresh dough in every bakery cafe. That decision made us wonder,  what else could we do the right way?" The narrator goes on to ask: "Could we make food that lives up to our bread? And could it be food you can trust, with ingredients like antibiotic-free chicken?"  The commercial continues in a circular style, underlined by a Rube Goldberg machine that mimics the daily routine at a Panera restaurant. "Could we start all this with a humble loaf of bread?" the narrator concludes. "We already have, and every morning we start again."

For Bumble Bee seafood, Bumble Bee Foods is playing down traditional ads focused on products in favor of purpose-based efforts under a rubric, "BeeWell for Life," meant to emphasize health and nutrition. Those efforts involve blogs, e-books, Facebook and a Web site.  "We're figuring out as a company, as people, how we can effect change," said David F. Melbourne Jr., senior vice president for marketing and corporate social responsibility at Bumble Bee Foods in San Diego. "Rather than pushing out brand messaging, we're engaging consumers in a more meaningful way."   In pursuing purpose marketing, initiatives ought to "incorporate realistic goals," he added, to keep the campaigns from seeming too ethereal.

Bumble Bee Foods is primarily working with two agencies, Mr. Melbourne said, Geary Interactive in San Diego and Fleishman-Hillard, part of the Omnicom Group. Spending for the "BeeWell for Life" efforts is estimated at $5 million.

Other brands known for purpose marketing include Kashi, sold by Kellogg, and Whole Foods Market. A newcomer to the trend, Union Bank, is introducing a campaign by Eleven in San Francisco that carries the theme "Doing right, it's just good business." It features Edward James Olmos and Maya Angelou. Ms. Angelou? As in, "I Know Why the Caged Bank Sings?"

 (Source: The New York Times, 02/13/13)

From RAB’s daily e-newsletter – another underwriting suggestion!  Financial groups traditionally do well for public broadcasting stations, and with mortgage firms beefing up their staffing, it stands to reason they will also want to get the word out about their services to qualified buyers.  NPR listeners are in the market to buy homes.  Aging Boomers are downsizing
– or moving to one story homes.  They’re looking at second homes for eventual retirement.  Xers and Millennials are buying first homes – or moving up to a larger family home.

As the article mentions, this also puts a demand on related items, such as landscaping, pools/spas, outdoor furniture/kitchens, remodeling/decorating, home furniture and more.

Lots of good potential for spring, which is when many of these categories do their largest marketing push!
 
Mortgage Firms Betting on Continued Recovery 
Mortgage companies are betting that the nascent housing recovery of 2012 has legs by beefing up their staffs to accommodate the continued expansion in lending, sales and construction that many economists forecast this year. 
Wells Fargo Home Mortgage and other lenders are responding to increasing home  sales and values, and to the Federal Reserve's commitment to keep borrowing rates near historic lows until the unemployment rate improves. That combination
of factors typically spurs both home sales and refinancing activity.

"It should be a very good year for housing," said James Chessen, chief economist of the American Bankers Association. "With house prices rising, it means that there will be more (homeowners) refinancing at low rates because the equity in their house is improving. It also means more people are interested in selling their house to buy larger ones."

Daniel Vessely, president of Iowa Bankers Mortgage Corp., said: "The Fed's commitment to keeping interest rates low has given people in the mortgage industry a little more confidence, because everyone agrees that we won't see the unemployment rate coming down anytime soon."  The U.S. unemployment rate was 7.9 percent in January, versus 8.3 percent a year earlier.

Anika Khan, a senior economist at Wells Fargo Securities LLC, said there's no doubt that home sales, construction and prices have hit bottom and are in recovery mode. The West Des Moines-based bank reported that its mortgage originations rose 4 percent to $125 billion during the fourth quarter.   "It makes sense," Khan said of the mortgage industry hiring spree.
"Inventories are very low, and that's the impetus for builders to get out there and ramp up activity. We're seeing that in every region of the country."

Wells Fargo's housing forecast calls for a 27.7 percent increase this year in housing starts -- a measure of new home construction -- from the 775,000 units begun in 2012. That means more work for idled carpenters and electricians, and an increase in demand for related products, such as barbecue grills, refrigerators and living room furniture.

Wells Fargo Home Mortgage, which handles about 30 percent of all U.S. mortgages, is adding staff and facilities across the nation. It's proposing to build a structure at its West Des Moines campus to accommodate 1,800 additional workers. It also announced plans in January to add more than 900 workers in Arizona, 100 in Georgia, and 90 in Alabama. The home mortgage division expanded its headcount by 18 percent to 17,945 full-time employees during the 12-month period ended July 1, according to Fitch Ratings.  The largest bank in the U.S. by market value increased its staff in Chicago by 10 percent last year to more than 800 workers, and has explored development of a four-block area of downtown Minneapolis.

Wells Fargo Home Mortgage is one of the nation's top mortgage servicers, which accept and record mortgage payments, pay taxes and insurance, and handle the foreclosure process. As of Aug. 30, 2012, it was servicing 9.5 million loans with a combined value of $1.66 trillion, according to Fitch Ratings.

"As demand increases and decreases, we respond," said Wells Fargo Home Mortgage spokeswoman Vickee Adams.

 (Source: USA Today, 02/12/13)

From today’s RAB enewsletter – a whole new underwriting category for us!  It’s a $200 billion retail sales category aimed at affluent urban/suburban homeowners.  Think “shabby chic” in the chicken coop!  

This locavore category can be expanded to farmer’s markets (this spring), restaurants/groceries that offer locally-grown foods, community garden groups, farming co-ops, real estate brokers, local retailers that offer backyard livestock, environmentally friendly pesticides/household products, architects/home remodeling, landscapers, classes on beer making, beekeeping, etc  – and more!

Spring is coming, and they will be thinking about marketing.  This is perfect for our listeners!!  

Backyard Farming Gets Fancy 

Can chicken feed, canning jars and garden hoses feel chic?

Absolutely, say retailers cashing in on the "modern homesteader" craze. As more urban and suburban homeowners take up backyard farming, items like chicken coops, beehives, gardening tools and pickling and canning supplies are getting more stylish and pricey. 

A $58 garden hose, anyone? Or a $258 bronze-and-lime-wood spade? Such are the offerings at Terrain, Urban Outfitters Inc.'s fledgling retail concept that caters to the older, higher-income consumers adopting a well-appointed homesteader lifestyle. Last April, Williams-Sonoma launched its Agrarian line, which features a $1,300 chicken coop and a $500 beehive.

"We've definitely seen the shift," says Rob Ludlow, owner of BackYardChickens.com, an online community of about 170,000 chicken enthusiasts. "People wanting to be self-sufficient and eating locally grown food is synonymous with people who are affluent."

Homesteaders say their back-to-the-land activities go beyond mere hobbies and provide emotional nourishment and a certain inner peace. Eliza Zimmerman, 55, and her husband, Peter, a 57-year-old architect, tend vegetable and herb gardens
and three beehives on their 10-acre property with an 1890s farmhouse in Chester Springs, Pa., outside Philadelphia. On the agenda for spring: chickens.  "It's what I did with my grandmother -- the chickens, the gardening, the canning, the bees," Ms. Zimmerman says. "It is my Zen -- a memory of what made me feel safe and good and warm." And jars of homemade honey make great gifts, she adds.

Modern homesteading style shares some of the spirit of the shabby chic interiors of the 1990s, when chipped-paint furniture and tea-stained fabrics conveyed a desirable aged patina. The homestead aesthetic is more than visual, though, encompassing a range of do-it-yourself activity, like brewing beer, pickling vegetables and making cheese.

Beekeeping clubs are getting lots of buzz and new members. Hundreds of local restrictions on backyard chickens have been lifted in the past five years as a result of public pressure, says Barak Orbach, a law professor at the University of Arizona, who has studied the phenomenon. More people aren't just growing their own vegetables, but canning and preserving them, too.

Broadly defined, it is a consumer segment with an estimated $200 billion in retail sales, which also includes annual spending on organic-labeled food and environmentally-friendly household products, says Charlie Hall, horticultural economist at Texas A&M University. This consumer is typically a 30- or 40-something homeowner motivated largely by the desire to live more simply and healthily, he says. These people "have a willingness and ability to pay," Dr. Hall says, whether it's $70 for Williams-Sonoma's "vintage" watering can ("scuffs, scratches and other signs of use add to the character," the retailer says) or $40 for a bag of soy-free chicken feed at Fifth Season Gardening Co., a regional chain based in Carrboro, N.C.


The Agrarian line from Williams-Sonoma -- part do-it-yourself supply cabinet, part collection of rustic accent pieces -- zeroes in on an artfully weather-beaten look. A pine-and-metal "vintage Biergarten table" sells for $600; a "found" enamel pail for $50. (The company says these items aren't copies but rather actual pieces it found by scouring European villages. Items may not be identical and may be available in limited quantities, the company says.)

The Agrarian line is meant for people "who want to embrace the homegrown and the homemade into their everyday lives," says Allison O'Connor, vice president of merchandising. There is an intentional mix of price points, she says, such as an $11.95 herb-garden kit. The company says it plans to double the number of products in its Agrarian line and publish a stand-alone catalog.

Fifth Season's five stores in the Carolinas and Virginia sell gardening supplies and chicken feed, as well as kits for making sake wine and chevre cheese and cultures for yogurt, kefir, sour cream and buttermilk. The shopping floor is appointed with terra cotta planters and stone statuary; classes have ranged from home-brewing to bonsai.

Elizabeth Galindo Roberts, a film costume designer in her 50s, moved to a new home in Carmichael, Calif., about a year ago. She and her husband installed a vegetable and edible-flower garden, including nasturtiums and violas. She keeps
five chickens in two custom-built coops.

The couple hired interior designer Kerrie Kelly, from nearby Sacramento, to design the interior of the four-bedroom ranch. The look "feels perfect, but it's so imperfect," Ms. Kelly says. Dining-room chairs are upholstered with mismatched fabrics; wall art hangs in frames of assorted styles. Furniture leathers are distressed, and windows are framed with open-weave linens.  "Ten years ago, people were opening up Architectural Digest and saying, 'We want that.' " Ms. Kelly says. "Now there is such an authenticity to everything we are designing."

Urban Outfitters says its Terrain garden centers target women ranging from their mid-40s to mid-60s. "One of the things we'd been discussing is the boomer lifestyle," says Richard Hayne, chief executive of the Philadelphia-based company, whose Urban Outfitters chain caters to college-age hipsters and Anthropologie stores targets fashionable young homeowners.   "We realized there's another leg to this story," Mr. Hayne says, referring to the spending potential of well-heeled women whose children are grown. "Their demand and desire for apparel wanes," he says. It's "a lifestyle concept.

Terrain inventory ranges from a $228 metal-roof birdhouse and a $148 woolen throw to a $269 tailored gardening jacket. A section of the store is devoted to beauty and bath products, including a $38 scrub presented as a "hot toddy for the body."

Terrain's store in Glen Mills, Pa., features a restaurant, in an antique greenhouse brimming with ferns, that specializes in locally-sourced food. It has a following with groups of women who meet for lunch and shop. Mr. Hayne says he is looking to add a spa. The store provides workshops on things like terrarium gardening and Japanese "kokedama," hanging plants that appear to float, free of containers, from the ceiling. "We'll open more stores," Mr. Hayne says. "We're taking our time growing the concept and learning it."

 (Source: The Wall Street Journal, 01/30/13)

From today’s “All Access” commercial radio enewsletter – not such good news for local radio revenue projections this year.  If the radio budgets are smaller, then we will have to work harder to get our fair share!  In addition, it’s time to position ourselves as “more than radio” – B2B, community relations, image/branding, etc.  Businesses will look to spend more in
local online ads – something that every public radio station should be utilizing.  Online is ONE-FOURTH of all local ad budgets for 2013 – even bigger than newspaper budgets - it’s now too big to ignore.  As you will read, the commercial guys don’t have a handle on it – in fact, many public radio stations are doing a whole lot better job of monetizing our websites than they are.  We need to continue to grow that – and to utilize the dollars that are in our clients’ budgets!  Social media and mobile are part of the increased budget lines.

NPR has presented a “state of the system” report for online underwriting for the past many years at the PMDMC.  Past reports can be found on the NPR station website, along with tons of great ideas that stations are using in terms of their online ad strategies.

ARTICLE:  Borrell's Local Advertising Outlook Sees A 5.9% Drop For Radio
BORRELL has released their 2013 Local Advertising Outlook, and finds "ad spending nationwide should rebound by a healthy 7.5% this year, but the real story is in the local space, which is forecast to grow 8.2%, from $88.9 billion in 2012 to $96.2 billion in 2013. The headline isn't that 'local' is growing mildly faster, but that small and medium-size businesses(SMBs) are choosing to spend their marketing dollars in dramatically different ways. Their spending on local online media this year promises to be nothing short of phenomenal. Our surveys and trend analysis indicate potential growth of 31%, from $18.7 billion to $24.5 billion, or one-fourth of all local advertising. That outstrips 2012, when we saw local online advertising grow 20%."

But there's bad news for radio in the report, with BORRELL forcasting a 5.9% drop for local radio. BORRELL sees radio's national ad revenues at $2,910.2million, for 1.7% of the spending. Local radio is expected to see $11,013.7 million, for 11.4% of revenues, for a total of $13,923.9 million or 5.3% of ad revenues.

Among the other findings in this report:
 *  Online media will likely hold the #1 spot in terms of local ad share, beating out newspapers -- the centuries-long leader -- in all but four U.S. markets.
 *  Cinema advertising is growing faster than online, at a healthy 42%.
 *  Along with radio, local magazines, shoppers and alternative newsweeklies are expected to drop 2.5%.
 *  Only 20% of advertisers in the year-end survey of 1,756 SMBs said that they planned to increase online advertising, while 52% said they planned to spend the same. This indicates that the growth in online advertising might come from newcomers and high-rollers.
 *  Top areas of spending increases for SMBs this year are online, mobile and direct mail. Under the "online" category, social media and "my company's website" are being earmarked for the largest increases.
 *  SMBs show high interest in mobile, and the few who have tried mobile campaigns seem hooked. Some 83% of SMBs who’ve used mobile said they’re likely to continue.

 Is Your Digital Strategy Brilliant?  Less Than 5% Say Yes
RAB and BORRELL ASSOCIATES are taking a peek at how radio's digital ventures are shaping up.  The survey is intended to gauge the "real" amount of online ad revenue stations are generating.   BORRELL shared some of the preliminary findings.  Among them:
 *   More than 40% of respondents thus far say their digital strategy is bad, or don't know if they even have one.  Percentage who said their station's strategy was "brilliant":  less than 5%.
 *   More than half of the estimated 400 stations responding thus far say their sales reps have no specific goals for selling digital products.
 *  More than two-thirds of respondents say they believe online ventures hold "significant potential" for radio stations.  Yet 54% of respondents rate their sales reps' ability to sell digital products as "poor."

I live in Sugar Land, TX, home to a population that’s 35% Asian-American.  From Millennial high school students to Boomer business professionals, I am continually amazed at the level of support for public broadcasting and NPR programming that I find in anecdotal conversations.   With their passion for education (the common denominator that ties together public broadcasting lovers) and their higher-than-average incomes, this demographic group is an important constituent for our stations.  We find a large potential for individual giving, but there's also opportunity for underwriting.  The report states that Asian-American businesses (with a gross revenue of over $506 billion) generate more revenue than any other
demographic group except non-Hispanic Whites.  

Seminars I’ve attended on Asian-American giving patterns indicate that they don’t need (or desire) donor approaches in language other than English.  Unlike some other demographic groups, there is a high desire for assimilation.   61% of new immigrants speak English very well.  However, 77% speak a language other than English at home.  To effectively reach this market through advertising, the use of Asian-language media is encouraged – Asian media outlets increased a staggering 1115% from 1999 to 2010 – primarily print outlets.   You might wish to consider adding your local Asian newspaper/website to your station’s marketing mix.

Asian-Americans  are prime targets for your station’s website, viewing more pages each month than any other demographic group.  Reach them via your mobile apps – with a 70% smartphone penetration, they have the highest usage of any demographic group.  80% have broadband at home, 74% own a laptop, 77% have wireless connectivity.    

The summary of this Nielsen report is here, with a link to the entire report here.  It’s an interesting report about a very important group of our listeners.