I love to give seminars. I had a great time speaking in High Point at the Furniture Market a couple of weeks ago. We had a sell-out crowd of 178 people who were all willing to eat chicken and listen to me talk about home interiors trends.
My talk was titled Nine New Trends: A Vision for the Future™. I came to High Point with nine trends I wanted to talk about but ended up bumping two of them so I could include a couple of topics that felt were more immediate, the textiles mix and the sustainable trend. I bumped Design As A Commodity (but I will likely cover that in a future issue of The Trend Curve™) and an update of the Bell Curve for Trend, which adds on a section called Encountering The Long Tail, named for a book called The Long Tail by Chris Anderson, which I heartily recommend to everyone. Like the Commodity topic, I will find a venue for addressing The Long Tail for trend sometime soon. When the curtain went up in High Point, I had written my Nine New Trends talk, consisting of:
1. Always On/Alone Together (tech driving behavior, which drives furnishings)
2. Sustainable (the eco-trend)
3. All Mixed Up (this is about the fabric mix)
4. Desert Neutrals™ (our newest neutrals forecast)
5. The Trend Curve Colors™ 2008 (our newest color forecast)
6. Lacy (talking about how surface design is changing)
7. Industrial Zeal (the newest contemporary direction)
8. Grow Up! (our update on the juvenile market)
9. Man Made And Proud Of It (a counter-trend to Sustainable)
For years, High Point audiences have been gracious in how they have welcomed me and my home décor color and trend forecasts. This October was no exception. They listened intently for an hour, asked great questions for a few minutes, and crowded around the table of products that we almost always have on-hand at my seminars.
As before, we received requests to make the seminar into a CD-ROM, which we accomplished within two weeks. And I’m so glad we did! Nine New Trends: A Vision for the Future has become an instant bestseller! If you want to know more about it, just click on this live link that will take you to The Trend Curve’s web site, then click on Trend Store to purchase Nine New Trends. Of course, you can always email our Office Manager, Janice Carlson or call toll free: 800.531.6614.
