Serendipity in your business
And being ready for it.
ser·en·dip·i·ty (noun)
the occurrence and development of events by chance in a happy or beneficial way. ~ source: Oxford Languages
By its definition, you can't schedule serendipity (aka “happy accidents”). You can’t plan for it.
You can hope for it. And you can create the conditions for it to show up — and build the confidence and systems to act on it when it does.
Serendipity in business often looks like a moment of luck. But most often it’s the result of paying close attention. Being curious and not dismissive of your instincts and ideas. And being willing to move fast when something unexpected shows promise. It’s what happens when preparation meets an open door you didn’t expect to see.
It can come in pretty much any form and in pretty much any set of unforeseen circumstances. And sometimes, it’s just your willingness to try something new.
The question becomes: are you paying enough attention to spot the door opening and then do something about it?
Making protein from waste.
It’s hard to listen to a health-related podcast, read a wellness newsletter, or watch a wellness expert or influencer video on your social platform of choice without getting advice as to the amount of protein you need to eat on a daily basis to build or even maintain muscle mass, and lose fat, especially as you get older.
Over the last year, the recommended amount of protein has jumped to one gram per pound of body weight (these folks finally shifted from kilograms of body weight to pound making it easier for mere mortals to figure out the number without using a calculator).
Not everyone agrees, but the new recommendations have made it into mainstream culture in a way that has cottage cheese and protein powder flying off the shelves, and all manner of products being “protein enriched.”
This past weekend, there was a series of articles published in The New York Times on the increased protein consumption in the U.S. It included an article on the launch of the David protein bar (actually pretty tasty with no sugar and low carbs), one on the amount of protein you need (gift link) and what happens when you eat more than your body can convert to muscle (with a handy age + weight calculator with adjustments for strength training).
And there was this…
“America’s Protein Obsession Is Transforming the Dairy Industry: Whey, the liquid byproduct of cheese making, was once considered waste. Now it is a key ingredient in the protein powders that Ozempic users and weight lifters are downing in ever-greater amounts” (gift link)
Protein powders can be made from a number of basic protein-rich sources. There are plant-based sources like hemp, rice, and pea, and animal-based sources like whey, casein, and egg whites.
Whey is a byproduct of the cheese making product that was traditionally considered waste. Then, starting almost a decade ago, the protein boom hit and has only accelerated since then.
“Popular eating trends like the Keto diet emphasize eating a good amount of protein and fats.
More recently, the demand for whey has been turbocharged by the growing use of GLP-1 drugs like Ozempic. Patients taking those drugs are advised to increase their protein intake to avoid muscle loss.”
What was once thrown away is now keeping dairy farmers and cheese makers in business.
“Whey protein powders, and the increasing number of whey-protein-enhanced products on grocery store shelves, are an expedient way of consuming a lot of protein. Estimates of the size of the whey protein market vary from around $5 billion to $10 billion, but nearly all analysts say the market will double over the next decade. A pound of the highest-protein whey powder that cost about $3 in 2020 costs almost $10 today, according to Ever.Ag insights, an agriculture data company.”
New processes needed to be developed and relationships built to convert this potential revenue stream to real money on the bottom line and these business owners made it happen.
Making money where we sleep.
Every Wednesday, just after 8 a.m., I check my inbox for the weekly Listings Project email.
Founded in 2003 by Stephanie Diamond, I first came across it in 2013. At the time, it was still vanilla email with basic links. There was no fancy website, only a weekly Wednesday email with listings for unique space rentals in New York. At the time, I was helping a client find a space for her small team, one whose name didn’t start with “We” and end with “Work.” I stayed on the list and a couple of years later another client was looking for studio space for his growing design team.
Slowly, the site grew up and more cities were added, including those outside of the U.S. And I found myself looking forward to Wednesday morning to check out the listings in more exotic locations.
It wasn’t until the Spring of 2022 that I found and committed to a 9-week stay at a Paris rental starting in mid-October courtesy of Listings Project. COVID was waning and I was in need of some sustained time in another place. Then somewhere around mid-August it dawned on my that I should try to sublet my place there while I was gone.
The listing price was minimal and the process was smooth. I found myself meeting with a handful of like-minded people on Zoom who had expressed interest within an hour of the email landing in their inbox and then finding the perfect person to live and tend to my place while I was gone (so likeminded in fact, that we’re now friends :).
I repeated the process, albeit for a shorter period of time in October 2023 and planned to do so again in early 2025, but… the game had changed. Where I used to get a dozen email inquiries the same day, I received none for the entire week my place was listed.
I knew that the city had effectively banned most short-term rentals via booking platforms in all five boroughs starting in September 2023. Airbnb being the biggest player in the space, the ban hit the listers there pretty hard. The hotels were (and still are) of course loving as occupancy rates and room prices continue to rise.
But this isn’t a story about the big hotel chains winning because of a change in local law. It’s the story of a small business owner, Stephanie Diamond, doing exactly that. Because Listings Project positions itself as a classified‑ads newsletter, not a booking platform, it falls outside of New York City’s Local Law 18. So, she didn’t need to change a thing — her model has always been to charge a listing fee and Listings Project does not process the transaction or collect booking fees.
To give you an idea of the impact of the city’s new law on her business — when I first listed my apartment for the 9-week sublet (and ditto the 6 weeks the following year), there were 20-30 apartment sublets in all of New York. This past week, there were 262. And the listing fee has doubled since I first posted. I’ll let you do the math.
This change in the law was not something Stephanie Diamond could have predicted for her business even 5 years ago. I don’t know her, but my guess is she started to think about the impact of its passing when the bill was first introduced on May 12, 2021, and then in earnest when it became law on January 9, 2022. It was in September 2023 when the city began enforcing the law, snd when it did, she was ready.
How can you capitalize on unforeseen opportunities?
Not everything can be planned — but you can be more ready than most.
Here are a few ways to do that to get you thinking:
Know your assets, especially those you tend to overlook. Just like dairy producers realized whey had value, ask yourself: what are you throwing away (literally or metaphorically) that could be repurposed, sold, or shared?
Pay attention to culture and policy shifts. Don’t ignore what’s happening outside your industry. From city ordinances to wellness trends, small changes in the outside world can have outsized effects on your business.
Design a flexible business model, but don’t abandon who you are at your core. Listings Project didn’t need to change its business model because it wasn’t built to depend on transactions or bookings. They stayed true to who they were, even as the market shifted and booking sites became the standard.
Be prepared to act, even if imperfectly. You don’t need a fully built system to test an idea. You just need a low-friction way to respond when an opportunity shows up. The simpler the better (simple is one of my watchwords, if you’ve worked with me, you know).
Build relationships before you need them. Whether it’s cheese makers finding new buyers or sub-letters becoming friends :), your network often determines the speed and ease with which you can take advantage of an opportunity.
Trust your instincts — and check your blind spots. The idea you keep coming back to? Don’t ignore it. But pressure-test it with people who will give you honest feedback.
Change is constant.
If COVID taught us anything, it’s not a matter of if, but when change will come.
Here’s hoping that the change comes in the form of some wonderfully unexpected opportunities.
Until next time,
Katherine
p.s. The lovely apartment I stayed at in back in January in the tiny Tuscan hilltop town of Pitigliano? Yup… Listings Project.
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