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When businesses let experienced people go simply because they make more money than newbies, most often they are cutting off their nose to spite their face.
To save a dollar today, they lose ten dollars tomorrow.
I thought about this while I was musing upon my birdfeeder in the backyard the other day. Yes, my birdfeeder...
About six summers ago, I decided I wanted to put bird feeders up in my backyard.
I did. I got big feeders, small feeders, round feeders, square feeders. I had a feeder that was propped on a post. I had feeders that hung from trees. I had a ground feeder too. I got feeders for small birds and feeders for large birds.
And I filled 'em up with every kind of birdseed imaginable.
As a rookie ornithologist, I was ignorant of one important fact, however. That is that squirrels love bird food. I watched these tree rodents overwhelm my feeders and make off with more than their share of bird food.
Who would step up on behalf of the birds? It had to be me. The war commenced.
I read and studied (I even went to a seminar!) and tried many things to keep the squirrels at bay.
I tried feeders that were designed to keep them off, but squirrels outsmarted most of them.
I had heard that if you put food out specifically for the squirrels, like corn cobs, they will leave the birdseed alone. Wrong.
There is one kind of birdseed that squirrels won't eat, so I put that out. But that also limited the types of birds that would come to my yard. Next.
I tried putting a feeder on a shepherd's hook and greasing the pole. Didn't work.
I then discovered the baffle cone which one places above a feeder hanging from a branch to protect it.
I had to play with it.
I had to calibrate the size of the baffle correctly with the size of the feeder, for example, or the feeder would be exploitable.
The baffle also had to be high enough above the feeder to let birds in, but low enough to keep squirrels out.
The feeder, too, needed to be far enough from the trunk of the tree or the squirrel would simply leap from the trunk directly onto the feeder bypassing the baffle completely.
Determined little buggers they are.
Months of trial and error, however, produced triumph. By the end of that summer, I had a feeder that could not be breached. And so it has been for five years.
The squirrels have had to settle for rummaging around on the ground beneath the feeder for anything the birds might inadvertently pitch over the edge.
Now...if someone wanted to set up an inexpensive, simple, easy to use, squirrel proof bird feeder I could show them exactly how to do it. And it would take mere minutes.
Let me say that again: what took me hours upon hours of trial and error, would take only minutes for them.
And that's what experience does for business. Where there is practical experience in the building, the learning curve for a rookie can be relatively short. When experience leaves the rookie must endure the same trials, mistakes and time the one before her endured.
Dismiss that experience and you do, indeed, save money today...but you'll give it away-and then some-tomorrow.
P.S. I watched the other day as a squirrel attempted to breach my feeder. He was obviously new to the area. I watched him gingerly climb onto the baffle. Suddenly his tiny rodent claws skidded out from underneath him; he slid right down the baffle and in a second found himself on the ground looking up...consigned to rummaging with the others.
Ah, that never gets old.
P.S.S. I will not be sending any newsletters out the next two weeks because of the holidays. I'll see you again on January 8th. Happy, happy holidays everyone!
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