Often
I truly amaze myself with my inventive concepts for making money.
While I don’t profess to be in the same league with say, Bill
Gates, I do think that every once in a while I think up a new and
novel approach to the promotion of free enterprise that might be
of interest to those of you who take the time to read this column.
If I can pass along something which may prove of interest to you
as well as improve your lives, then my job is done and your
success is all the thanks I need to keep on going. The idea for
this week needs to be considered with a completely open mind. You
must think of all of the possibilities before just dismissing this
approach out of hand. Here it is…Texas Gerbil Ranching.
Now, it came to me that there are probably thousands upon
thousands of folks throughout the world who would just jump at the
chance to brag and say they had a ranch in Texas with a 5000 head
spread. Bear with me here….What if we put together some one-acre
lots and sold Gerbil Ranches complete with your own starter herd
of 4500 heifer gerbils and 500 bull gerbils? I think 500 stud
gerbils would be sufficient for 4500 heifers, but if you think
that’s too few or too many, I’d appreciate your input into this. I
may need a couple of gerbil consultants, so get those resumes to
me as quickly as possible since I think this idea is going to
catch on like wildfire.
Just imagine this for some advertising copy…”Picture yourself,
early in the morning, standing on your front porch, having a cup
of hot steaming coffee looking out over your very own herd of
prize Texas Gerbils. Think of the pride you’ll feel as you watch
your spread move from pasture to pasture as they graze throughout
the day.” Gerbils do graze don’t they? I also am in need of
someone who knows how to feed and take care of these critters. The
way I see it a whole new cottage industry could spring up to
provide support for the ranches. You’d need little branding irons.
Can’t afford to let your stock mix in with your neighbors can you,
might provoke a range war. Then folks would be needed to supply
fencing. At this time I foresee fencing might be 1×12-shelving
material, which we enclose around the corral area.
Of course, we have to consider what we would want to do with the
gerbil stock once the herd starts to increase. At this time, we
don’t have any information on the nutritional aspects of gerbil
meat, so we have opted to focus on the wool industry. We estimate
that each gerbil can be sheared at least 2 times each year and the
prime gerbil wool spun into material, which would be used for
sweaters and other pieces of clothing. We anticipate having annual
events tentatively called Gerbil-Fests, which might have shearing
contests as well as crafts and vendor booths selling gerbil
products. These would be patterned along the lines of those sheep
shearing contests you see in Australia. Ours would be somewhat
different, but I think you get the idea. A lot of thought has to
go into the development of the bull-breeding program.
We certainly want to start the program off with our standards as
high as possible. Only prize bull gerbil stock would be eligible
for inclusion in our sales efforts. We certainly would not stoop
to selling or promoting inferior breeding animals. I think it
would be in everyone’s interests to keep the breeding bloodlines
as pure as possible. I expect that we would have about a one-year
window of opportunity in this venture before competition started
in other areas such as hamster farms. My idea is that we offset
some of the expected revenue downturn by training some of our more
ferocious stock into attack gerbils. These would have great
marketability in today’ security conscious environment. The whole
idea just boggles your mind doesn’t it? That’s what my wife said
when I explained this new idea to her…”Sometimes your mind seems
boggled.” Or something to that effect.
