Tumbleweeds for $25? Dumb Business Ideas You Wish You’d Thought of

By Anastacia Mott Austin

Cabbage Patch Kids are back. In honor of the 25th anniversary of their "birth," Play Along Toys is reissuing the original collection of the ugly dolls this year, complete with "nostalgic" anniversary packaging.

I will admit that my first job was working at a Children’s Palace store (think Toys R Us, but more low-rent) at Christmas-time no less, in 1980-something. Everyone wanted one of those homely little dolls with the birth certificates and sad, adopt-me stories. And boy, were they willing to do anything to get one. Working in a toy store, I was used to seeing drooling tantrums, wild-eyed whining, unreasonable begging, and the like. And that was the parents.

I’ll admit, I got caught up in the madness. I used my employee discount and bought, excuse me, adopted a Cabbage Patch Kid. Jimmy Raymond was his name. Somehow over the years I lost track of ol’ Jimmy Raymond, and he’s probably sitting up in my dad’s attic, along with my old dance trophies and middle-school yearbooks, crying his ugly little eyes out. Don’t feel bad for his creator, Xavier Roberts, though. Jimmy Raymond and his millions of unsightly adopted siblings made Roberts a billionaire.

But why did this craze take off? What makes one idea a dud and another a brilliant marketing ploy?

Remember pet rocks? Well, neither do I, I’m not that old, thank you very much. But if I were that old, I’d tell you how entrepreneur Gary Dahl was sitting in a bar with his buddies one night in 1975 and came up with the idea of selling rocks as pets. It was mostly a joke, but he sold the idea as the lowest-maintenance pet ever. The pet rock cost Gary Dahl less than 50 cents apiece to create and package, and they sold for $3.95 a pop. Dahl sold over five million of the obedient little pebbles and…you do the math.

Dahl hit on something, but to this day no one knows quite what. Some ideas that seem smart never quite catch on, and then you’ve got people like the tumbleweed lady.

Linda Katz might be loathe to admit it now but the idea for her business, the Prairie Tumbleweed Farm, started out as a joke, too.

Katz needed to learn html and how create a website, so she made up the idea of selling tumbleweeds, which were everywhere outside her Kansas home, just as a practice tool. But then people started trying to buy them. She didn’t really think it would last long. "When I got an order I was just amazed," said Katz to reporters. "And each order I got, I thought it would probably be the last order. I remember thinking they would probably get them and send them back immediately as soon as they find out what they are."

Nope. Katz today operates a thriving business selling…tumbleweeds. Twenty-five dollars for a large one, $20 for medium, and $15 for a small one. The Prairie Tumbleweed Farm is especially popular in Japan.

Suggestions on the site for how to use a tumbleweed include making a tumbleweed Christmas tree or table ornament. There is a section on tumbleweed history, and information on how each tumbleweed is quality tested. In fact, the site states that NASA orders its tumbleweeds ("To test the Mars Tumbleweed Rover!") exclusively from the Prairie Tumbleweed Farm.

Why, oh why, you’re thinking right now, didn’t I think of that? Maybe because ideas like this have to be thought of as a joke as first for it to fly. No one would do it otherwise.

Other wacky business ideas that somebody, somewhere had the spare time to think of:

• Wigs for dogs: Why should Britney Spears get to have all the fun with her crazy wigs? Check out "Wiggles," the premier wigs-for-dogs website. Wigglesdogwigs.com/products.

• Perhaps inspired by Linda Katz’s tumbleweed emporium, Curious Country Crafts sells, among other things, bags of dirt ($11.95 each), dried ornamental grass ($12.95, marked down from $22!), bags of skipping stones ($9.99 each, also marked down – but a bargain when considering pet rock prices), and yep, tumbleweeds. Their tumbleweed prices range from $15.99 for a Baby Tumbleweed, to $42.99 Gigantic Tumbleweed.

• Roadkill Teddy: If you’re bored with the standard teddy bear, then what about purchasing your very own plush roadkill animal? Twitch the Raccoon is the first spawn from the weird minds of the folks at Roadkill Toys (roadkilltoys.com). Twitch is an adorable stuffed plush raccoon, just like so many others, except that his eyeball is coming out of his head and he’s got plush intestines splayed about him. Complete with sense of humor, the site lists Twitch’s obituary, including his date of birth (and unfortunate death by road squishing), and other interesting facts.

• What about the guy who charges parents $10 to write a letter "from Santa" to their child? For ten bucks, Santa’s "helpers" will mail the request to Santa at the North Pole (where he has an actual address!), and he’ll stamp them and send them to your precious angels. Even better, there’s a page on the site (complete with a photo of Santa clutching a fistful of cash, I kid you not) where you can become an affiliate of Santa’s and make money bilking stupid people, too!

So how can you capitalize on your own zany sense of humor and lack of a day job to make zillions selling stupid stuff?

All kidding aside, marketing experts will tell you that anyone can launch a successful business, keeping a few points in mind: don’t invest too much to begin with, make sure the product costs a lot less to produce that what you’re selling it for, scope out a niche market of people who will really go crazy over your product, and it never hurts to have a sense of humor. Often people are actually buying the joke you’re telling with silly products, like the pet rock.

Think of what you have a lot of in your area that other people around the world might be deprived of. At my house it’d be dandelions, crab grass, and those sharp, spiked balls that fall off of my neighbor’s trees and hurt like bejesus when you step on them.

I’d never thought of them as marketable products before, but I’m sure someone, somewhere would be willing to pay for them. Right?