What business categories are most profitable in America today?
I will have worked in a hospital based diagnostic/medical laboratory
for 30 years come this January. I have been a department director for
23 of those years I am considering the possibility of changing careers
and maybe opening my own business. I would like to begin by
considering what is more profitable so that I might find a niche that
will allow a greater chance of econmic success. I would not be
interested in any business that is highly competitive with multiple
providers chasing the same customers, although I realize that might be
largely subject to my location. In general, I would not want to
compete with doctors or hospitals because of the multiple barriers.
I'm not wedded to healthcare, doing something completely different
could be refreshing. So, I'm looking for a profitable niche with
little competition where I can best apply my aptitudes and abilities.
How hard can that be? (an intended joke)

B0307 --

You have an exciting, challenging opportunity in front of you!  The
key to your success will be the preparation that you do before
committing your time and money to the business.

The "most profitable" business question is difficult to answer:
* service businesses such as consulting have high gross profit
margins.  But if you value the hours put into it you might find the
returns unacceptable.
* web-based retail businesses often have low profit margins but low
investment requirements can still make them attractive.


What I'll try to do is highlight some tools to look at business
profitability so you can continue the research.

One of the best introductory sites to business profitability is
BizStats, a website run by Patrick O'Rourke, a Washington CPA.  On the
site, O'Rourke takes a variety of sources -- from annual reports to
Department of Commerce statistics to assemble numeric outlines of tens
of thousands of businesses:
BizStats
http://www.bizstats.com/

You want the safest businesses -- those with the most-certain profits?
http://www.bizstats.com/sprisk2.htm

Retail sales per square foot?  Inventory turns?  There's a ream of
data at the site.

Lots of the BizStats data is based on U.S. government reports, which
analyze a variety of factors.  In specific industries, such as the
airline industry you can find load reports and traffic from any
airport to any other.

But one general report is the 1997 U.S. Economic Census, hosted on the
U.S. Census Bureau website.  The Economic Census is done every 5 years
and is very detailed.  As an example, you can use it to determine how
many gas stations there are in the U.S. -- and how many pump more than
$1 million in fuel.
The reports are broken into industry sectors (and geographically too);
are available online; and are often 200 pages or more; and usually
have the key profitability measures for businesses:
U.S. Census Bureau
1997 Economic Census Data
http://www.census.gov/epcd/www/econ97.html

Results from this year's economic census will take several years to
publish but will include information on e-commerce for the first time.

As you start to look at particular industries, a good way to examine
profitability and trends in the business is to connect with that
industry's trade association and with the trade publications that
cover it.  Ever wonder where supermarkets make the most money? 
Research on this Google Answers question swept information on gross
margins from both sources to come up with margins on a wide array of
products in the grocery store:
"Published Supermarket Profit Margins"
http://answers.google.com/answers/main?cmd=threadview&id=204979

In the industry that you hope to enter, there will also be research
firms which cover trends, profits and statistics for the business. 
The information technology business has dozens of companies such as
Gartner Group and Meta Group -- each with a slightly different
specialization.  They're valuable in looking at emerging technologies
and markets, often putting together interesting models to forecast
growth.  Here's an example of an emerging disk storage market for
which several companies built different models to guess at growth:
"Telecommunications"
http://answers.google.com/answers/main?cmd=threadview&id=95870


One very good source for information on planning is the Small Business
Administration.  Though sometimes the information is very basic on
running a business, the SBA site has something about everything from
constructing a business plan to contracting with the federal
government:
SBA
Startup Basics
http://www.sba.gov/starting_business/index.html

There is a library of some 200 publications on business topics that
treat many aspects of running a business:
SBA
Publications
http://www.sba.gov/library/pubs.html


This researcher would probably recommend finding a need, then building
a business to fill it.  However, because of your background in medical
care, you may even find unprofitable areas within large institutions
which could benefit from close attention, modernization or innovative
management.

I hope this provides a rich set of resources for looking at
opportunities.

Best regards,

Omnivorous-GA

This is the first time I've used this service and I'm not sure what to
expect. I got a usuful answer that will help point me in a direction
that will hopefully give me something more specific, you know like in
the "Graduate" when Dustin Hoffman was advised to go into "plastics".