Rewarded for stupidity. Bank of the Cascades.

I don't have anything against Bank of the Cascades personally.

I just didn't like how they played the game.  Trumpeting success when they were really setting themselves up for failure.  That bugged me.  Has bugged me since I first started writing this blog in November of 2006.  (Hey -- six years!!!)

Because it was pretty clear the Emperor had no clothes.  Over investing in commercial real estate during a bubble is a boneheaded thing to do; even if it makes you look good in the short run.  Assets do not equal profits.

It also somewhat bugged me that it seemed like the management at the time got out with their reputation and finances intact.  Maybe they didn't.  I don't know.  Give credit where it is due. Somehow, the current management of the bank has kept them alive -- which is impressive, considering how far off the road they wandered.

It has always bugged me when someone is doing short-sighted things and getting rewarded for it.  I'm in business for the long haul. It's my career.  I intend to see it through to the end.

So when I watch competitors go trotting by doing stupid things and have customers tell me how great the other guy is doing, I just shrug it off these days.  I have to look at the internal dynamics and figure I'll come out the other side, no matter what happens to the other guy.

Hey, the other guy may just continue to overperform, because he's just so damn good and smart and hard working and lucky.  Good for him.

But more likely, he'll trend back toward average, or whatever he was doing that was making him look so good wasn't real.  Even worse, whatever he was doing that made him look like he was doing so well was actually a negative.

This goes for the big boys too.  I think the big boxes are bound to collapse eventually.  I think Amazon has a stupid business model -- and is hurting everyone else because of it.

Again, I go back to sports cards.  I had tons of competitors succeed in taking my market share away, and it looked like they were doing great.  I knew what they were doing wasn't possible.  I mean, how long can you sell for under cost?

They are all gone.  The industry is in tatters. Not only didn't do me any good, but it didn't do anyone any good to go for short term profits and market share, without using a lick of sense in building a viable business model.

But hey, as long as they look like everything is great, it's all good, right?