Hi Gordon,
Great topic!
One thing is, next year (2012) is an election year, so...
There will be a number of "election-related" opportunities!
Here's an unusual one from the last presidential election season (2008)...
In order to raise money for its business, Air BnB made some cereal...
Based on Obama and McCain!
They created just 500 boxes of "Obama O's" and 500 boxes of "Cap'n McCains"!
They sold for $39 a box, with 5% of the money going to the campaign of the person whose cereal you bought...
(If you're calculating, that means they took in $39,000 with this idea, minus the campaign contributions and costs. They also got a mountain of publicity... And, to my understanding, their "creativity" helped them to attract a lot of venture capital money too.)
http://www.airbnb.com/obamaos
http://www.airbnb.com/capnmccains
http://www.designverb.com/2008/10/15...ccains-cereal/
Pretty "out of the box" thinking!
(I always find "election time" pretty exciting... Even though I'm pretty skeptical about most candidates...)
I'll see if I can suggest any other "trends" we may have for 2012...
Best wishes,
Dien