F aux non-profit.

Or, if you will, F aux profit.

There seem to be two types of these.

#1.) A stated "non-profit" that nonetheless pays the employees wages, it's executives sometimes very high wages, and yet depends on contributions and volunteerism.

I'll never forget the day I learned the Blue Cross executives were being paid in the millions at a time when their 'non-profit' was losing business. Since my experience with Blue Cross was that I would sign up for health insurance at a reasonable level, and five years later I would have to drop the coverage as it went up 30 to 50% EVERY YEAR! This happened twice in my lifetime.

Non-profit my ass.

I've been somewhat skeptical of the words "non-profit" every since.

#2.) A "for-profit" business that nevertheless wraps itself in the banner of being "for the community." Often the owners profess that they aren't Trying to Make Money, or that They are Doing It for the KIDS. (How can you be against doing it for the kids?)

Unfortunately, my experience here has also been somewhat disillusioning. More often than not when you actually observe their practices, they're phonies. They close when it becomes more work than it's worth. Turns out they really were trying to make money after all, and the whole "public" sensitivity was more a public relations ploy than anything.

Before I go any further and start using some harsh words, I'd like to make it clear that I'm not referring to anyone currently or indeed in the recent past in Bend. Most of the examples I'm talking about happened in my first decade of business, when comics and cards and games were "hot" . Many of them were in other towns.

Comics and Cards and Games used to especially attract the Charlatans that were pretending to "Do it for the Public" and "Not Trying to Make a Profit."

Maybe Charlatan is too harsh a word. I do think that many, maybe even most, of these businesses start off with the intention of being about "the collector" or "the kid" but that they quickly find themselves in trouble.

I've often said -- I TRY to make a profit, and half the time don't succeed. If you start off NOT TRYING to make a profit, I can almost guarantee you'll lose money.

Ironically, once they started to struggle, they were often the most lax with their ethical standards. I suppose because they were wrapping themselves in the cloak of virtue, they felt it was O.K. to bend to rules or cut corners.

Let me tell you, no business stays in business very long doing those things. Word gets out. But the "I'm doing it for you, not me" type businesses would often get away with it for far too long.

The more they professed the lack of profits and the more they maintained they were doing it for everyone else, the more I distrusted them. Especially since they would often act all holier than thou. Especially when they drained money from legitimate for-profit businesses that -- in the long run-- by surviving and trying to gain customers -- may actually have provided a larger public service.

I make no bones that I'm trying to earn a profit. Nothing wrong with that. I figure that doing a good job and providing a public service often end up being the same thing. Nothing like the "profit motive" to get things done.

Which brings me to:

#3.) I suppose a third kind of non-profit is the store that tries valiantly to make money but fails.

If you think about it, this third group includes the majority of all businesses that ever existed...