Bricktop. You said he was going into business for the wrong reason.... money. I agree with most of what you said but for what other reason would I possibly open a business than for the money to provide for myself and my family?
The driving force of the earliest and the best breeders was the love of the plant, a deep desire to help better it and to create places where others who love the plant would have access to seeds.
Consider what was part of the big breakup of Scott Blakey (AKA Shantibaba) and Arjan (Green House Seeds). By his last Cup win Shantibaba could already see it was turning into a dog and pony show and losing credibility so he said he wasn't going to enter anymore Cup competitions. Arjan said it's great advertisement and a win brings in the big bucks. Shanti sold Arjan his share of the business and took his genetics and opened up Mr. Nice Seeds and has never entered another Cup competition.
He knew a good enough living could be made by breeding the best strains possible and that being part of the circus that the HTCC competition was turning into just to earn a larger income was not the right thing to do, the money was not of utmost importance to him. The plant is of utmost importance to him.
The quest for money was of such great importance that one year he was caught trying to bribe judges at the HTCC and Green House Seeds was banned from the competition that year. That not only got Green House Seeds banned that year but it showed how the money is far more important to Arjan than the plant AND it was the straw that broke the camel's back (or as Kelly Bundy so eloquently stated it, "the squaw that stroked the camel's sack," and his partner in the Green House Coffee Shop, another of the real true lover of the plant breeders, Nevil, said he wanted out and sold his share in the Green House Coffee Shop. So by Arjan putting money first cost him Shantibaba and Nevil and since then Arjan has pushed mostly mid to low grade hermie prone genetics.
But what I find so stunningly hypocritical is the thread started said:
Originally Posted by
Agar Agar
Hi my name is Agar,
i'm sick of getting ripped of by all the seedbanks so am thinking of starting my Own.
So clearly he believes it is wrong for seedbanks to rip people off.
But how is he planning to go into business? By taking other breeders work and renaming it, giving it what he thinks will be a catchier more appealing name, trying to sucker them in by making them believe they are purchasing different and better strains than what they actually are. He would be ripping off other breeders and he would be ripping off the customers.
People like that are the very LAST thing the seed business and seed buyers need. What the seed business and seed buyers need is more breeders with a passion for the plant. Ones that will scan the planet for unique genetics and release unique landrace strains and make new crosses that unlike most released now are not basically redundancies, strains that genetically and in high or stone and in yield are so close together that there is no need for them to ever be marketed.
If overnight one third or more of the existing strains vanished, as long as it was the 'right third or more' not one single grower would lose anything because there would still be several strains for them to pick from that would be virtually the same thing as what vanished.
And this guy isn't planning on initially even breeding more redundant strains, and instead just selling other breeders work under different names, putting the 100% exactly the same strains that other breeders make on the market.
And he had the unmitigated audacity to complain about seedbanks ripping people off?
I have been a partner in three businesses in my life so I fully understand the importance of earning a profit. But how would you like to buy a car that was marketed like it was as good or better than a Mercedes and then find that you just bought a re-badged Kia? How would you like to pay for a strain that is marketed as the closest thing to 'The Holy Grail' and then find out that what you actually spent your money on was Green House Seeds The Church?
And consider this .. if he buys other breeder's gear and renames it and you buy it and the seeds won't pop, or only a couple do, could you honestly believe that he would stand behind someone else's product and send you new beans for free? Is he going to guarantee what someone else makes? People bitch about Attitude's policy about seeds that won't pop, even though they do not stop to think how it is based in legalities and not chosen business policy, so why would anyone think that this guy would go into his own pocket and lose some of the profit that is clearly his driving force to enter the business, since the no ripoff thing was clearly false, and stand behind some breeder's gear that he renamed?
This guy needs to find himself a small lot somewhere, cover it with gravel, put a small prefabricated building on it, buy himself a bunch of suits that look like they were made from old horse blankets and seat covers from 70's era Volkswagens, get some patent leather shoes, some white socks and white belts, splash on some Aqua Velva and be a used up car salesman! That is the level his business ethics are on. While saying ripping people off is wrong, that is precisely what his intentions to do are, regardless of how he might attempt to spin them.