Business Plans that Work: A Guide for Small Business 2/E, 2nd Edition

4 INDUSTRY: ZOOM LENS ON OPPORTUNITY

The goal of this section is to illustrate the opportunity, the size of the market, and why there is a significant market to capture. Figure 4.1 provides the typical structure for this section. We start with the industry definition. What is the broader industry in which your venture will participate? We try to be expansive about our industry definition to keep clear the vastness of the opportunity, even if we will attack a specific niche. For instance, Lazybones operates in the laundry industry. We can use the opportunity component from the Timmons Model described in Chapter 1 to articulate the opportunity. Detail the industry size, growth rate, and major industry players (sometimes called market structure). ...