‘profit; a an n honest profit that at least, allows for the o iegular 1 maintenance of snachinery.. something
Jimmy was not capable of doing at the time. |
This. promise of an honest. profit for an honest day's work netted Jovial a number of-local .
contractors, including Jimmy Widget. The promise came with a name, of course. It was called a
. Split Price Contract, which simply meant the contractor got a better price for saw logs than pulp.
logs and that was the gimmick. that would help stabilize profits. . .

The deal-didn’t bear any. sweeter fruit than the purchase of the grapple yarder did in the’
first place, though. Jovial-had represented his timber holdings as averaging 60% saw logs. In —
truth, the average was closer to 40% saw logs, and that made a big difference. _.

_. " Profits were much smaller than had been anticipated, and Jimmy found himself
driving many, many miles up mountainsides close to alpine meadows'to retrieve the _
questionable logs. He was worse off than he had been before and his options were few. —
-. “[have two choices, dad,” Jimmy told his father. “Give up or go broke. I’m .
60 years old and not about to'start over, so I think I would prefer the first toption co
over the second.” - . noe
“Why didn’t you come to me with this earlier son...” ae
“I don’t know... Pride I guess.” , Ce
Jimmy shuffled uncomfortably in his chair, ae et
“But now, if things continue the way they are, I need some > advice dad,” "he “i
continued. “Thanks to you.and your foresight i in the 1980's I think there just
might be a way out of this.”
“Naturally,” Lars stated with pride. But he wasn't certain just exactly”
where Jimmy’s thinking was headed.

“T can put everything on the block. Phoné Ritchie 3 and auction off all my
assets. That'would net atidy sum.” :
ok. “But you'd pay a tidy sum in, capital ge gains ‘tax,’ Lars pointed out the obvi-
ous.

| “Right,” Jimmy agreed. “Unless I reinvest it in the industry.”
“Jimmy,” Lars returned somewhat impatiently. “You’ve just consumed
my entire morning explaining your belief there’s little hope. Nc ow you ©
want to invest?”
“Not in the status quo, dad. In the future. I want my kids to have a oe
future, and I would like that future to be right here in Widget Woods.” 7
“Naturally,” Lars said ‘again. ——
“My idea is to auction my assets and reinvest the money in your ——
forest as well as in Vincent’s value-added opera- oe
tion. No capital
gain... No loss... A future for my kids.”
“That’s exactly what I’ve been trying to .
tell everyone for the past 60 years Jimmy,”
Lars beamed. “Welcome aboard.” . —
He wasn’t certain, though, if
Jimmy would .
really follow
through