{"id":71,"date":"2006-12-22T09:58:33","date_gmt":"2006-12-22T13:58:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/auchtoon.2gtech.com\/blog\/2006\/12\/22\/pledging-the-cabela%e2%80%99s-fraternity\/"},"modified":"2006-12-22T09:58:33","modified_gmt":"2006-12-22T13:58:33","slug":"pledging-the-cabelas-fraternity","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/auchtoon.com\/?p=71","title":{"rendered":"Pledging the Cabela\u2019s Fraternity…"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"GRBJ0578.gif\"<\/p>\n

Originally published in the Grand Rapids Business Journal<\/em>, December 11, 2006<\/p>\n

As a 16 year-old I went to see “Animal House” with my friends at a drive-in theater. I was underage for an R-rated movie but my parents had given their reluctant consent. (A belated thanks, Mom & Dad! Yeah, there were some things there that I probably should not have seen; but then again, nothing any worse than what I saw on Saginaw Street on the morning school bus ride through Flint.)<\/p>\n

But seeing “Animal House” was educational in that it sold me on the idea of never joining a fraternity. Mostly it was the pledging concept. Why would I take abuse from guys I don’t even know so that I could earn the right to hang out with them? Then what happens if it turns out they are all jerks? It just seemed like a counter-intuitive way to make friends.<\/p>\n

Much in the same way, Cabela’s<\/a> (a retailer of hunting, fishing, camping, outdoorsy stuff) has proposed building a local store in a counter-intuitive way: Give us $15 million or we’ll look elsewhere. Now, to be fair, a Cabela’s is more than just a store. It’s something of a theme park for outdoor sports enthusiasts. They currently have a store in southeast Michigan that attracts millions of visitors a year. But as more of these Cabela’s get built, they are sure to become less and less special. Hunting and fishing are extremely popular in Michigan, but with increased urbanization they are definitely not growth industries. And what about the current outdoor sports stores that would likely be driven out of business?<\/p>\n

So as a Michigan taxpayer, I’m thinkin’, “Why do I need to take this abuse to make a retailing friend?” And for $15 million, at the very least I’d expect a decent toga party….<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Originally published in the Grand Rapids Business Journal, December 11, 2006 As a 16 year-old I went to see “Animal House” with my friends at a drive-in theater. I was underage for an R-rated movie but my parents had given their reluctant consent. (A belated thanks, Mom & Dad! Yeah, there were some things there […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-71","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-grand-rapids-business-journal"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/auchtoon.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/71","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/auchtoon.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/auchtoon.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/auchtoon.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/auchtoon.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=71"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/auchtoon.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/71\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/auchtoon.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=71"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/auchtoon.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=71"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/auchtoon.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=71"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}