Hi Greg,
I don’t have much more to offer than if the client is on a tight budget, how can you set aside for consumer market research? Most design trends are pretty well documented on blogs nowadays. Online surveys could work, but need to be well crafted and reach a big enough group to be valuable. Or you might ask them to do the market research part, especially is they have a marketing department.
On another note, I’m pretty stoked to hear from another rhino-using product designer in Malaysia. I’m in JB, you?