I Went To A Green Conference The Other Day . . .

Let me jump to the chase.  The city of Waco has made changes to its waste water treatment facility that is saving $400,000 in gas, an additional $600,000 in electricity and they are dumping the water back into the Brazos river CLEANER than the water that's already there.  Not bad.  According to Kristy Wolter, the presenter, the Waco treatment plant is number 2 in the United States.   San Francisco has a plant that is even more efficient.  And this is supposed to be a bureaucracy!

So what does this have to do with irrigation in Texas?  

Is it an attitude?

The Waco treatment plant may not be saving water, but, if I am understanding them, they are taking  effluent, treating it so it turns back into an asset (soil amendments and clean water) and spending $1,000,000 less than the old way of doing it.   

It all seems so big.  Maybe you're selling and servicing sprinkler systems that costs a few thousand dollars.  If you can design a system and put a controller on it that has a brain,  you can coax, say, $350 a year in water savings.  If you multiply that savings to everyone in your town that has a sprinkler system, now you're talking about some cash. 

Forgetting the Purpose--So Easy

May I tell you about a distaseful conversation I had Thursday with a yellow pages salesman? The conversation was completely amicable, but, at least for me, tense.

We had tried this new phone book for two years. Last year we even put in a different phone number so we could really test the book's effectiveness. It wasn't. I was dropping our investment from about $2,000 for the year to $300--and would have gone lower if I could have.

When the salesman asked about what I wanted to do in the white pages, I said I wanted just a regular listing. He said that would be an extra $10 per month. I didn't think he understood so I clarified by saying, "No, I don't want bold or anything--just a plain, regular listing." He understood all along and reiterated that it would be $10. "You mean I have to pay just to get my name in the book?" I said incredulously. He said I could take my chances, but if I wanted to be sure it was there, I'd have to pay. I told him I'd take my chances.

Now understand, our day job is sprinkler repair and about 70% of our business comes from the yellow pages. I need the yellow pages. The yellow pages represent a form of advertising that works for us. I have no ax to grind with the yellow pages. But . . .

The yellow pages are only good as an advertisement for me if the book is seen as a valuable and complete reference book for our prospects. The reason I don't use this new telephone book is because I could not consistently and reliably find the phone numbers I was looking for. I have to assume ditto for the rest of Waco.

Somehow the management of this new phone book has lost sight of the purpose their book absolutely must nail with perfect precision. There's really just two points:

1. They must have a book that has every person and every business in alphabetical order with their correct phone number.

2. They must make sure that book is in everyone's hands that lives or works in the area they intend to serve.


If they don't do that, they have no reason to expect advertisers to patronize them. I don't hope they go out of business. I hope they change.

We believe that our purpose is to repair sprinkler systems as quickly and painlessly as possible. May we never loose or confuse that purpose with anything else.