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Fascinating new economic research shows Opportunity Zones have created far more housing than previously known (313,000 units) and at far cheaper subsidy cost than most people realize ($26k/unit) -- making OZs perhaps the most efficient, effective housing supply creation program in existence. I suggest we double down on what actually works, eh? The groundbreaking research was published yesterday by the Economic Innovation Group. The authors concluded that OZ are "dominating other housing tax incentives" in terms of production and efficiency. OZs provide capital gains tax benefits to incentivize long-term investments (10+ years) in designated lower-income neighborhoods. Among their findings: 1) Prior to the legislation, the neighborhoods that became Opportunity Zones had been "left behind" -- economically challenged areas seeing no housing supply growth for a decade. Since then, we've completed 313,000 new housing units across OZs nationally, with more still under construction. See chart below for an absolutely wild visual of this impact. 2) Opportunity Zone neighborhoods now outpace the national average in creating new housing supply. This is another crazy stat because "these are genuinely distressed communities," as one of the authors, Adam Ozimek, noted. He added that some reporting suggesting otherwise has centered around an "unrepresentative handful of outlier anecdotes." 3) OZs account for 48% of new housing in designated tracts, 16% across all low-income communities, and 4% of all new housing nationally. One of the report's authors, John Lettieri, wrote that "these are astonishingly large results" impacting not only urban areas, but also suburban and rural and in between. 4) At a subsidy cost of just $26k/unit, co-author Benjamin Glasner noted that OZs are "vastly cheaper than traditional housing subsidies" for taxpayers. "The results underscore that flexible, market-driven tax incentives can mobilize private capital, unlocking significant investment potential in distressed communities." 5) Why are Opportunity Zones so effective and efficient? Unlike other programs, OZ projects have a "by-right" qualification with no bureaucratic pre-approvals. It's a federal tax benefit that doesn't require approval from cities to tap into (other than standard permits etc. to build) or special connections to access. It turns out simpler is better and faster. We should incentivize the creation of things we need more of as society. We need more housing. So let's lean heavily on programs that actually work. And OZs clearly work well. Encouraging to see that HUD Secretary Scott Turner -- along with policymakers on both sides of the aisle -- want to extend and expand Opportunity Zones. Perhaps even to include for-sale homes in addition to rental apartments. Bottom line: Opportunity Zones, in Glasner's words, "may be the most effective pro-housing supply policy in America today." Let's double down on what actually works. #housing #apartments

As a brand, the moment that HUGE purchase order from your dream retail partner arrives is one of the best feelings imaginable. But how you respond could be the difference between success or failure for your brand. If you're navigating the risk, reward, and complexity of channel expansion, thinking through how best to find profitable scale in the midst of rising digital customer acquisition costs, or trying to understand if or how brand investments will ever pay off, this post is for you. Here are my lessons around scaling Brand Strength and avoiding the biggest pitfall in retail expansion so you can capture the growth opportunity without getting yourself into the 9th circle of inventory, discounting, and cash-lockup hell. This is how I used to think: - "If we get a P.O., we find a way to make it happen, even if we don’t know exactly HOW” - "We are underdogs. If we don’t take the opportunity in front of us, somebody else will" “We don’t have the power the retailer does. After all, if we push back, they may never talk to us again” ⁃ “Knowingly turning down revenue is as blasphemous as saying “I actually think Nickleback is pretty good'” This is what I learned: - If you take down the whole PO, but cant’t drive full price sales velocity because of inadequate operational capabilities or Brand Stength, the elation turns to terror when those poor sell through reports start coming in ⁃ One of the owners of the most respected and successful retailers taught us, “If there’s one piece of advice I can give, it’s always make sure you have more demand than supply — even if it feels stupid to forego revenue in the short term” ⁃ I also learned that even though this advice is obvious, actually following the advice when growth is directly tied to my ego and net worth is a completely different story ⁃ If you can slow the rollout and break it down into store counts and volume you know you can deliver forecast-beating reg price sell-through on, even if you feel like an idiot for not taking all the revenue immediately, you’ll make more money ⁃ The negative impact on your Brand Strength from having your product heavily discounted by the retailer to move through the inventory, and the crippling impact of having your precious cash locked up in that inventory is far greater than the lost revenue from taking a more methodical rollout approach. Not to mention the hell on earth of potentially having to take the stale inventory back Ultimately, however, inventory mistakes are inevitable: Every brand has done it at some point Therefore, every brand who has survived went through the pain and found their way back If we can heed the advice and prioritize building Brand Strength well beyond your ability to monetize that Strength, AND resist the urge to capture every single last scrap of perceived demand, we will slightly increase the probability we'll start to witness the beauty that is compounding demand from compounding Brand Strength hope this helps ✌️❤️🤘

The secret to successful ABM? It's not what you think. It starts with thoroughly analyzing your Ideal Customer Profile (ICP).  Forget basic demographics.  We need to understand the motivations and behaviors that drive your ideal customer. And how do you find a truly effective ICP? It's about layering.  Firmographics are the foundation, industry, size, and revenue, and they are important. But to really understand your ideal customer, we need to explore their technographic (tech stake within the company) Knowing this reveals a lot about their needs and how sophisticated they are. Psychographics (lifestyle, interests, and values of individuals) hold the real magic because they give us hints about their buying decisions. This helps us understand their values and what motivates and keeps them up at night. I recently worked with a company whose ICP was basically "any business with over 500 employees." Way too broad!  We dug deeper, analyzing their best customers to uncover surprising patterns in their psychographics and technographics.  The result? A well focused ICP and an increase in #ABM performance. Refining your ICP takes time and effort.  But it's worth it because it lets you focus your ABM efforts on accounts likely to convert. It's about working smarter, not harder. #b2bmarketing #marketingstrategy #demandgeneration

What are the biggest concepts in local economic development to have emerged in recent years? I was curious to find out, and the result is my latest paper, just published in Local Economy. This paper explores and synthesises the biggest key trends and insights from the past decade. Many of the concepts describe the functioning of modern, knowledge-intensive economies (agglomeration, innovation ecosystems, mission-led innovation, global production networks, Industry 4.0, smart cities and institutions) and the uncertainty they are experiencing (economic resilience, gig economy and work from home). Other concepts deal with the opportunity associated with greater inclusion (female entrepreneurship) and the changing nature of rural economies. Finally, a substantial emerging literature tackles the opportunities and challenges associated with the transition to an economy that does not outstrip the planet’s natural resources (clean energy transition, circular economy and degrowth). These ideas do not reconcile easily into a coherent framework! The challenge for local economic development practitioners is to work in partnership with others to integrate these concepts into an approach that makes sense for their communities. The paper is available online at https://lnkd.in/gWau-MYT. For subscribers only at this stage, but hit me up if you'd like me to send you a copy. #EconomicDevelopment #Innovation #LocalEconomy

Jobs up/down in your district? We dont get a lot of granual geographic data, but tax based employment data gives us a look at the Territorial Authority (TA) level. Timely reminder of local government elections are coming up. In Jun-25, there were fewer locally based jobs in 2/3 of TAs. This recession is very broad based in its geographic reach. The map below shows the annual growth rate for each district. There were some surprises in there for me. For example, I had expected really good results in places like Ashburton, becuase its a dairy region and dairy outlook is really positive this season. But jobs there are down from last year. Maybe because of weaker arabale sector, or something else? There isnt further breakdown in the data to understand why this is happening. In the middle of a deep and long recession, widespread job losses is not surprising. Among this there were some bucking the trend. 7 TAs had 2%+ annual employment growth, in ascending order: Hamilton, Matamata-Piako, Otorohanga, Selwyn District, Porirua (bucking trend in the Wellington region), Queenstown-Lakes, and Southland. I can make easy sense of some. Like the well documented tourism boom benefitting Queenstown-Lakes (more Aussies & Americans visiting in particular). In Selwyn (think Rolleston and Lincoln) booming both in terms of population and jobs (lots of new commerical and industrial presmises are getting filled with workers it seems). While mid last year all the jobs growth was for commuters, now nearly 80% of jobs growht are in-district. In the Waikato, recovering from last year's drought amid favourable dairy sector outlook makes sense. No doubt there are other things going on, like population growht fuelled by fleeing Aucklanders. The lift in Porirua jobs is surprising, given job losses across much of the wider region. But nice to see! The overall picture gels with my on the ground experiences. I was in Dunedin yesterday, and the mood was (cautiously) positive. Talking to people up North and Auckland, has generally been much gloomier. Queenstown is just popping. Canterbury - this was a few weeks back - was also quietly confident. Wellington is - to be frank - grim. Even in a recession, not every place experiences the same thing. Local factors matter a lot. Generally reflecting which industries they are exposed to, and whether there are developments that attract people and businesses into the area. With local government elections coming up, which has very low turnout (close to 40%), its a reminder that local policies can be a source of resilience. Please spend a bit of time to check out your local government candidates and make the time to vote. It matters. - Shamubeel @ Simplicity

Category communication is a crucial link between browsing and buying. At the Marks and Spencer Liverpool store there is a great example of simple, clear category messaging in the Denim category. The use of colour coding is often employed by retailers, but too often, it isn't followed through properly. Here M&S uses a tall screen to introduce the types of jeans. Each type has an image, title and colour way. Combining all three ensures that information is absorbed. Colour coding is a great way to embed differentiation sub consciously with shoppers. Many retailers create a big graphic, much like this screen, but they don't follow the system through. At M&S the colour system is then applied to signage fitted to each freestanding display unit. It is then further emphasised with shelf blocks that help with navigation. The final touch is the colour coded labels on each pair of jeans. This helps shoppers understand the options, browse and then select the desired product. This isn't rocket science, but so many retailers fail to implement this all the way through the shopping journey. #LiverpoolRetail #VisualMerchandising #ISRC

Five years ago, Warburg Pincus LLC invested in BetterCloud and urged us to work on a project to narrow our ideal customer profile (ICP). It's the most impactful thing I've ever done to improve conversion rates, shorten sales cycles, increase deal size and ultimately transform the company. A big mistake many CEOs make is believing their product is for everyone. It’s tempting. More potential customers should mean more sales, right? But in reality, chasing too broad a market drains resources, distracts your team, muddles messaging, confuses your product roadmap, and kills go-to-market efficiency. Being laser-focused on your ICP drives alignment across product, messaging, and the go-to-market motion. When the right prospect engages, they’ll feel like you built it just for them. Anyone who has built a product or service knows that the things a small business needs are very different than what a huge enterprise needs. A company is different from a school. An IT buyer is different from a security buyer, a sales buyer is different from a marketing buyer, a director level decision maker is different than a C level decision maker… but we still believe we can sell to different segments and personas as the same time. The process to define and use your ICP is relatively straightforward but does take time. The larger your business, the more data you have, the more resources you have to crunch that data the more time you should spend to do it as scientifically as possible. The high level steps are: 1. Build a Customer Dataset: Gather all your customer data. Current and churned customers, won and lost opportunities. Enrich it with firmographic, business-specific, and buyer demographic data. 2. Engage Your Team: Your best sales and customer success people hold invaluable insights about your most successful (and worst) customers. 3. Analyze & Identify Pockets of Gold: Identify common attributes of high-performing accounts and avoid the traps of poor-fit customers. 4. Communicate the ICP to the entire company with the “why” behind the attributes that make up an ideal customer.  5. Rework your messaging to appeal to your newly defined ICP and narrow your growth initiatives to be focused only on the accounts that matter.  6. Assign the right ICP accounts to your reps and ensure they’re focused on the right buyer personas. 7. Product Development: Reassess your roadmap to align with the needs of your ICP. You should see impact fast. GTM funnel metrics will improve. Conversion rates should rise, with better leads turning into stronger opportunities. You may not get more leads, but their quality will increase. I’ve been discussing this with many Not Another CEO Podcast guests, so don’t just take my word for it. I wrote a deep dive on how to “Narrow Your ICP and Transform your Company”, with real examples from other companies. You can read the full article here https://lnkd.in/e5EN3XSR

Retail’s inconvenient truth: physical stores are no longer the growth driver The latest data from Stratably highlights a clear pattern: digital channels are no longer just a complement to physical retail - they are the growth engine. Across 30 major CPG companies (Stratably CPG Index), representing a combined $675 billion in annual sales, the digital channel was the only growth contributor in 2024: - Digital: +11% - Physical retail: –0.3% For context: - In 2023, digital grew +15%, physical stores still grew +3.3% - In 2025, forecasts indicate the same trend: digital will continue to outperform Even traditional omnichannel players like Target, Kroger, and The Home Depot show declines in physical store sales while their digital businesses are expanding. One of the clearest indicators: 68% of Walmart’s growth in 2024 came from digital channels. Not new stores. Not bigger baskets in physical locations. But e-commerce. This is not just about technology. This is about consumer demand: frictionless, on-demand access to products - anywhere, anytime. E-commerce is not the future. It’s the core of today’s growth—across the entire FMCG and retail value chain. Data and insights courtesy of Stratably. For more in-depth research, visit their Knowledge Hub: https://lnkd.in/dWBJzNFV #retail #fmcg #ecommerce #omnichannel #consumerinsights #digitaltransformation #salesstrategy #retailtech #cpg #growth #digitalsales #consumertrends #omnichannelstrategy #d2c #retailinnovation #retailanalytics #grocery #digitalgrowth #onlineshopping #shoppermarketing #marketingstrategy #walmart #target #kroger #usa #northamerica #homeimprovement #foodretail #retailsales #stratably #retaildata

Why Developers Should Think Like Neighbors Last week on Substack, I started unpacking a simple but powerful idea: There’s a difference between building in a community and building with one. Too often, the development process starts and ends at the spreadsheet. We analyze zoning overlays, calculate cost per square foot, forecast IRR. And yes, all of that matters. But if that’s the only lens you’re using, you’re not seeing the neighborhood. You’re just seeing the parcel. What would it look like if developers thought like neighbors? From Transactional to Relational Neighbors ask: Who lives here now, and who’s being left out? -Neighbors think: Will this make the block better for the people already here? -Neighbors care: Not just about what’s being built, but how it fits into the daily rhythm of a place. That’s the mindset shift we need. When you think like a neighbor, your design decisions change. -Your community engagement isn’t just a checkbox. It becomes foundational. - Your material choices aren't just about cost. They reflect dignity. -Your vision expands from buildings to ecosystems. The Cost of Disconnection When developers don’t think like neighbors, we get: Cookie-cutter buildings that don’t reflect the people who live there Pushback and protest instead of collaboration and trust Missed opportunities to invest in the culture, history, and future of a place And we wonder why projects stall. Why communities resist. Why policies harden. It’s not just about aesthetics or politics. It’s about power. Development has the power to uplift or to extract. When developers show up without context, without curiosity, or without humility, people feel that. And they respond accordingly. The Call: Build With, Not For Thinking like a neighbor doesn’t mean abandoning your business model. It means anchoring your work in relationship, not just return. It means asking: -Who will this serve? -Who will this displace? -How does this development connect to the culture, economy, and values of this block? It means building places where people don’t just survive. They belong. Let’s reframe development as civic stewardship. Not just a real estate play. Let’s build like we plan to live next door. #AffordableHousing #CommunityDevelopment #urbandesign #Collaboration #PeopleFocusedDevelopment #EmergingDeveloper #MoralObligation #LIHTC

𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐓𝐀𝐗 𝐑𝐄𝐅𝐎𝐑𝐌 𝐁𝐈𝐋𝐋𝐒 𝐖𝐈𝐋𝐋 𝐁𝐄𝐍𝐄𝐅𝐈𝐓 𝐍𝐈𝐆𝐄𝐑𝐈𝐀𝐍 𝐖𝐎𝐑𝐊𝐄𝐑𝐒   We outline below some of the key provisions of the tax bills aimed at improving the welfare of workers:   𝑳𝒐𝒘𝒆𝒓 𝒕𝒂𝒙𝒆𝒔 𝒕𝒐 𝒆𝒏𝒉𝒂𝒏𝒄𝒆 𝒕𝒉𝒆 𝒅𝒊𝒔𝒑𝒐𝒔𝒂𝒃𝒍𝒆 𝒊𝒏𝒄𝒐𝒎𝒆 𝒐𝒇 𝒘𝒐𝒓𝒌𝒆𝒓𝒔 -   1) Full exemption for workers earning up to N1.3m p.a. (over N100k per month) representing not less than 35% of all workers in the private and public sectors from PAYE tax   2) Reduced PAYE tax for workers earning up to N20m p.a. (about N1.7m per month) benefiting additional 60% of all workers   3) Full PAYE tax exemption for members of the armed forces 𝑴𝒆𝒂𝒔𝒖𝒓𝒆𝒔 𝒕𝒐 𝒓𝒆𝒅𝒖𝒄𝒆 𝒕𝒉𝒆 𝒄𝒐𝒔𝒕 𝒐𝒇 𝒆𝒔𝒔𝒆𝒏𝒕𝒊𝒂𝒍 𝒊𝒕𝒆𝒎𝒔 -   4) Zero (0%) VAT on food, healthcare, and education representing about 60% of all consumptions   5) VAT exemption on rent, transportation, renewable energy, CNG, baby products, sanitary towels, and fuel products representing over 20% of all consumptions   These items constitute an average of 82% of household consumption and nearly 100% for low income earners to cushion the impact of rising cost of living for workers.   𝑰𝒏𝒄𝒆𝒏𝒕𝒊𝒗𝒆𝒔 𝒕𝒐 𝒇𝒂𝒄𝒊𝒍𝒊𝒕𝒂𝒕𝒆 𝒉𝒊𝒈𝒉𝒆𝒓 𝒄𝒐𝒎𝒑𝒆𝒏𝒔𝒂𝒕𝒊𝒐𝒏 𝒇𝒐𝒓 𝒘𝒐𝒓𝒌𝒆𝒓𝒔 - 6) Tax break for wage awards and transport subsidy to low-income earners   7) Removal of restrictions and bureaucratic approvals for wage awards   8) Introduction of a cap on the amount that may be taxed as benefit in kind granted to workers   𝑻𝒂𝒙 𝒘𝒂𝒊𝒗𝒆𝒓𝒔 𝒕𝒐 𝒑𝒓𝒐𝒎𝒐𝒕𝒆 𝒂𝒇𝒇𝒐𝒓𝒅𝒂𝒃𝒍𝒆 𝒉𝒐𝒖𝒔𝒊𝒏𝒈 - 9) VAT exemption on rent and acquisition of real property   10) Exemption of stamp duties on rent below N1m   𝑰𝒏𝒄𝒆𝒏𝒕𝒊𝒗𝒆𝒔 𝒕𝒐 𝒔𝒕𝒊𝒎𝒖𝒍𝒂𝒕𝒆 𝒆𝒎𝒑𝒍𝒐𝒚𝒎𝒆𝒏𝒕 𝒐𝒑𝒑𝒐𝒓𝒕𝒖𝒏𝒊𝒕𝒊𝒆𝒔 𝒇𝒐𝒓 𝒘𝒐𝒓𝒌𝒆𝒓𝒔 -   11) Tax incentives for employers to hire more workers   12) Friendly tax rules to attract international remote work opportunities for Nigerians   13) Tax exemption for 97% of SMEs earning annual turnover of N100m or less, harmonisation and reduction of corporate tax burden for large businesses to stimulate growth and create more employment opportunities for workers.   These changes deserve to be supported by everyone who seeks the well-being of Nigerian workers. We believe that the NLC and the TUC will not intentionally work against the interest of their members.   Happy belated workers’ day! -- 𝘗𝘳𝘦𝘴𝘪𝘥𝘦𝘯𝘵𝘪𝘢𝘭 𝘍𝘪𝘴𝘤𝘢𝘭 𝘗𝘰𝘭𝘪𝘤𝘺 & 𝘛𝘢𝘹 𝘙𝘦𝘧𝘰𝘳𝘮𝘴 𝘊𝘰𝘮𝘮𝘪𝘵𝘵𝘦𝘦