There was a time when people used to say “make way for the young,” and so Mark Up has decided to dedicate the first issue of 2022 to newcomers to start the year off with the best young entrepreneurial ideas in retail, digital retail, retail real estate, and industry.
Below is the editorial of Mark Up No. 305 edited by Cristina Lazzati
Some time ago, while talking to a young female entrepreneur, I asked her if being a woman had ever hindered her in her career, she replied, “Nothing compared to being young,” a sentence that made me reflect and so I began to observe how often we talk about young people and how rare it is to talk “with” young people, especially in “mature” business contexts.
So we decided to devote the usual issue of Mark Up, with the forecast for the new year, to the new generation, giving them the floor, talking about them from a marketing perspective, giving them the space they should have, putting them on the cover.
The “young people” meanwhile, who are they? Young people are the forty-somethings who have made it to the top, they are the new players in generational change, they are the statuppers of technology and the key players in the world of eCommerce. We asked them what products, services, marketing, retail … will look like in the near future.
So we met the “evolutionaries,” those who have an important center of gravity in history, aware of how relevant it is not to forget the legacy they have received, and to read the past as a driving force to evolve the future.
Next to the evolutionaries are the “disruptors,” those who have invented something completely new, we find them mostly in the service area; today driving innovation in both manufacturing and retail. Many of them are looking at new economic and social models, more inclusive, greener, with a look at value that takes on a broader meaning than mere turnover, knowing that it is the only possible way.
Consumption is also taking new forms, the Netflix model is becoming an inspiration for all sectors, “possession,” on the other hand, is now very “old economy” and use is taking over; so we talk about experiences: retail experience, user experience to arrive at the user economy… an evolution that increasingly shifts purchasing from material -I buy a thing-, to immaterial -I pay to live an experience, I buy a service-. Even the approach to the market, to business, is “lightening up” and becoming more agile, faster. Funds and stock exchange listings are catching on even among small and medium-sized companies, aware that the strength today lies in the working capital and that the meaning of “asset” has evolved to the point that what was security in the past, the possession precisely of real estate and facilities, today, is likely to be limitation in the financial evaluation of a company.
Evolution and change, are the fuel for the country, let us not miss the opportunity: young people, women are an opportunity to arrive in the future renewed and successful.
