Once upon at time in a galaxy far far away I used to work in an office where we sold the chance to have your CEO appear on 'business TV' talking about himself and his vision for the industry or 'market vertical', the vanity and avarice of these people would soon disabuse anyone of the notion that business is a meritocracy. A useful lesson in the skewed world that these clowns inhabit. There was another upside. On my second day in the job and very nice woman came over to my desk to tell me to prepare for the boss' annual shindig at his house. "you've got to come, he's got helicopters, and alpacas" not the kind of invitation I receive everyday so I signed up.
As the coach drove through the countryside towards his spread the trophy homes got bigger and bigger, until they seemed to run out. They hadn't, he just owned so much land that there was a HOOJ gap between his place and his neighbours. As we drove up the drive way he did indeed own both helicopters, and alpacas. Two helicopters, and a small heard of alpacas.
After stuffing our faces at the barbie, with a couple of lads from the team I worked on we wandered down to the helicopters to see if the rides were on. I don't know the name of that kind of helicopter but it was 2+4, pilot and co-pilot in the front and four salesmen in the back. The pilot really looked the part with his adventure wristwatch, epaulettes and aviator sunglasses. Next to him was a lad of about twelve.
From the way the pilot and lad were chatting it seemed like the twelve year old was doing the flying. Well you'd ask wouldn't you? Yes he was.
Nervous salesman: Been flying these things long?
Lad: Every weekend since I was eight
Pilot: He's really very good, and he's got more flying hours than most professional pilots
I'm still here writing this so I guess it was true.
As we came back in to land after our tour of the surrounding countryside, the full herd of Alpacas could be seen and above the cacophony of the rotter blades one of the others said " A man's gotta have a lot of money before he says 'got helicopters, what I need now is Alpacas and lots of 'em'"
It seems he wasn't the only person to think Alpaca herding was a viable pastime in the English countryside, about ten years earlier Phillippa Wills had started breeding them at Great House Farm and if you pop her an email you can go and visit them in sunny Oxfordshire. Or you can can watch the show online as part of a series of documentaries.
Honda are continuing their sponsorship of Channel 4 TV's W+K documentaries this season and to grow their reach into cyberspace have kindly commissioned a few Sponsored Post's which in turn are sponsoring my love of collecting outdoor kit. Result!
Now what should I buy next? Will Honda and C4 team up to make 'SBW the movie'? If you've got any of your marketing budget left and fancy your brand appearing here, Al-pac 'em in.
More soon
SBW
Viral video by ebuzzing
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Please feel free to leave comments. I really enjoy hearing what readers think. The rules are the same as round my dinner table:
You're welcome to disagree, life would be way too boring if we all agreed with each other and we'd never learn anything.
I like to think that we're all grown up enough to argue every last point, right down to the bone, without bearing a grudge afterwards.
Come on in the waters lovely
SBW