I was discussing the future of certain companies and markets with a client recently and we were discussing some interesting details. Business, like humans, have a certain type of evolution. Believe it or not, we’ve reached peak markets in some areas-like big oil, and other industries that have been broken up. The problem with COVID has exacerbated some industries, and a lot of retailers are going out of business. Amazon is eating their lunch, with the ability to have a wide variety of products shipped quickly and easily.

But Amazon lacks a few things, and it too, will grow too big to survive. The ability to be small and be mobile is just as important as the ability to scale. People have had to “pivot” with COVID-19, and that has created a lot of chaos and destruction. But out of that destruction typically comes opportunities that would have never happened in the first place. I like to think of it as a law of physics-every action has an equal and opposite reaction. For every business/item, every profit has an equal loss. If you got a deal on an item, someone lost out on that profit. Over the whole system-it seems to equal out, but there are plenty of profits to be made, and they are a lot easier to find when you’re small and mobile.

This is a lot more encouraging to think about-especially for small businesses who feel like they can’t compete with the big A. It’s true that they are a behemoth, and are capable of crushing many a main street in the process of their growth. But that just means that if you’re in the path, you haven’t thought about our ability to turn into something that competes on a different plane. Amazon still cannot compete with live, in person items. It cannot compete with services. It is often too big to deal with specifics, or takes a long time to find certain specifics. The ability to find these gaps and exploit them for your advantage takes some effort, but still leads to worthwhile opportunities for those small businesses. And it will continue even after Amazon hits a tipping point.