Ultra Sweet, Ultra Weird, Ultra Nasty...

I had a dream last night, where I was attending a high school graduation 'Fair.' (This is a traditional event in my dream, highly attended, a kind of carnival where the graduating seniors go crazy.)

Anyway, I'm thinking to myself what a lucrative thing this is. There's a 'Carnival Cart' in my dream that is absolutely festooned with three things.

Ultra Sweet -- candy. Not just candy, though, but candied apples covered with not only a sweet coating, but bristling with spangles and nuggets and colorful bits of goodness. All the candy is that way, packed with 10,000 calories.

Ultra Weird -- strange stuff. My last employee became enamored of the idea of a 'bacon' wallet; a wallet that looked like strips of bacon. Never actually got the 'bacon' themed material, though I always meant to. There's a company I buy from that offers all kinds of weird, but cool stuff; gag gifts, funny stuff. Devil duckies, flying cows, that kind of thing.

Ultra Nasty -- I mean, really filthy magazines and books.

From my experience, all these three things sell. Very, very well.

But....

Ultra Sweet:

With the Ultra Sweet you tend to attract lots of kids and otherwise non-customers. God love the little darlings, but that's not the direction my store has been moving lately. I much prefer the adult customers, these days, sprinkled with the occasional kids.

Besides, I end up eating the stuff.

I know it would sell, though. I see enough Powell's and Goodies' bags to know that.


Ultra Weird :

With the Ultra Weird, you tend to attract lots of gothy type teenagers, who exclaim loudly at all the weird stuff, insist on handling it, and making hooting noises.

It would sell, though, not so much to the gothy type kids, who are generally broke, but the 'hip' adults, who also stand there laughing. Sounds like fun? But it gets old, believe me. You start to cringe a little. How much do you really want to listen to people reacting to whoopee cushions and plastic shit (No, really...plastic shit.)

But it's the kind of thing that will sell when nothing else will.

Ultra Nasty :

Ultra Nasty stuff tends to attract.....well, you get the picture.

Not sure I want to tip the store in that direction either. Really, doesn't quite fit with candy thing much, except if I was only dealing with candy eating adults.

Would it sell? Like....well, like candy. It would sell unbelievably well. Porn is an absolute gold mine. But do I really want to become a smut merchant?

The Ultra Sweet, Ultra Weird, Ultra Nasty stuff just proves than it's not all about going for the money...

This dream is like a condensed version of the temptations of going strictly for the bucks....

There's also the little matter of what you can feel good about selling, what you're comfortable with dealing with everyday. What kind of material you want to look at everyday, and what kind of people you want to meet.

And -- if it's not too pretentious -- what kind of Legacy you want to leave.

But -- I'm telling you, that Carnival Cart would make a fortune!!!