I have been thinking about making money off of survivalism. I equate that with something pretty low in my opinion. The person selling the different products instills a fear in his potential customers and makes the removal of the fear dependant on buying his goods and services. This is bullshit. I have checked them out and the stuff they sell is too high. They are attempting to make too much money off of their customers. Do not be fooled by these people. They are doing well by your efforts to support them and their agendas. Last night the Handmaiden made a chuck roast dinner for us. Now, chuck roast is the toughest, cheapest roast you can buy. But my Handmaiden knows a trick or two to help it be tender and juicy. Her number one trick is to roast it in a plastic bag. Those plastic baking bags hold moisture and flavor in like nothing else. Her next trick is to use her little coffee grinder to grind up some of her dehydrated onions, about a sandwich bag of them, and mix them with some flour and salt and pepper and other goodies and pour them into the bag with the roast, along with a little water, but not much water. Makes a perfect gravy and moisturizer for the meat. It comes out flavorful and tender and makes a wonderful supper. And this is how you make a high class pot roast dinner for a small family with very little money. And these are the things that should be told to other preppers. This is how you can make it in pretty good style for very little money. You just watch the stores and when the beef chuck roast comes on sale you grab it and celebrate!
We buy canned meats at Aldi's and Walmart and pay a low-ball price. We have had this meat for almost two years and it is fine. You can get whatever you like. Beef, Pork, Chicken, and Fish. And you have the meat and you don't have the high overhead of buying SURVIVAL food. When it says LONG TERM STORAGE or SURVIVAL FOOD or anything like that you had better be ready to fork over the dollars. Canned vegetables are still pretty cheap, as far as things go, and you can stock up on them for low dollars. Right now I am looking for a recipe to make powdered eggs for our storage. When we find the right recipe we will publish the news and the results, because we are not asking you to support us. But be that as it may, we still have plenty of food in storage that did not cost us an arm and a leg. For those of you in the "low income boat" like we are, there are much cheaper ways to go to in preparing yourself than buying SURVIVAL food. The ingredients are all commercially grown foods anyhow. There is no organic food among the purveyors of these products. It could all be loaded with chemicals and genetically modified foods. It is just NO BIG DEAL. Just a high dollar item to feed on your fears. And you should not be afraid. YOU SHOULD BE PREPARED! If you aren't then you had better get to it.
It takes a certain amount of brain power to be a prepper. If you have good money then it takes a bit less. Money just means you do not have to think about prepping very much. You write the check and the stuff comes to your door via truck and you are good to go. But if you don't have that money and you still want to prep then you have to use the old brain a bit. You have to make room in your budget to buy your canned foods. You have to check prices and availability. Then you have to store the stuff. And most folks don't have much storage room. Pantries were left out of the housing budget many years ago. Gardening is an almost lost art that is making a helluva comeback here in America. A few seeds can make you a lot of food! And if you can get non-hybrid seed you are really on the ball. My wife is becoming a wild food forager of some skill and dedication. That keeps the food bill down to reasonable cost. And all of this stuff takes brains! You can't buy your brain, you have to use it. Whatever you exercise the most will get to be the strongest. If you learn to grow garden and forage then you need to learn to can and dehydrate. That way you can store that food for later eating. But it takes brains and the use of them. America is not used to thinking like it used to be. So you steal a march on the dumbasses and start using your thinking machine up there between your ears. It is your most important prepping and survival tool anyhow. And it is one of the few things that will not run out from being used up. Stay alive.
Michael
mboone@rtccom.net
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7 comments:
I love it that you're emphasizing foraging and home-gardening as a food source! Like you, I read about so many preppers dependent on their freeze-dried, just add water, instant, big-can foods and I don't understand that. What are they going to do when the supply dries up? They've forgotten how to garden and never learned how to can/dry/preserve, so in my humble opinion, they're just delaying the inevitable.
I DO see the wisdom in having a small supply of Survival food for emergencies like bugging out, but aside from that, it makes no sense to me. It seems like OP seeds, canning jars and a pressure canner would be a better investment than hundreds (or thousands?) of dollars of specialty food.
Yep this post is spot on. I am amazed at how much money is being sent to the survival foods sites. I have always promoted that skills to provide for self are monumental.
jennifer
For long-term, "Bug In" preparations, I agree with you 100%. But as Andrea noted, you won't always be able to stay in your home. We had a fire in our general vicinity a couple of months ago, and I put our Bug Out plan into effect.
We have our prep foods in numbered plastic tubs - the 60 quart sized ones. Tub #1 has food and gear to feed 4 of us for 11 days. Everyone in the family knows that if we need to get out, the FIRST thing grabbed is that box, and to go to our meeting point. Each successive box contains more of our "normal" prep foods, and makes our lives incrementally easy.
Box 1 consists of a dozen MREs and those 3600 calorie survival food bricks. It's not living "the high life" but it keeps us from being refugees and ending up in some FEMA camp.
I think I understand your bigger point, though. People become too dependent on buying these high-cost, high-tech solutions for their very lives. If someone throws them a curve ball, they're in a world of hurt.
Personally, I don't hold a grudge against the people selling this stuff. The market determines what goods are worth - at least until the fedgov changes that law as well...
Michael if you can make some money off survivalism then do it, but don't make your money off the fear. I make slinky antennas for survival and I tell people that it will help your AM/FM or shortwave radio receive better. But at the same time I don’t sell on fear. If you have something that you can make and sell to help people survive then do it, and if you make a little bit of money at the same time then good for you. I remember right before Y2K how all you saw was food and emergency kits in every magazine with the promise of how it would save your life and the life of your family, and very soon we will start to see a big push for #10 caned foods and kits all over again because of 2012. I think it will be just like Y2K with a big push for you to stock up on food and water with the fear pushed into the ad. I use my money made from my antennas to help build my preps and I sell them for a fair price. I don’t think it bad to sell something for survivalism as long as you are not trying to sell the fear with your item. So my point to this Michael is if you can build or make something to help you make money that is geared toward survivalism then do it, because not only are you helping yourself but you are helping the people who buy your item to prep.
I know the people you are talking about; the ones at the flea-markets with the cheap shake flashlight that cost them $1.00 and they are selling it for $15.00 and telling you that you must have one or sit in the dark. It just like the snake oil salesmen of older days, they fill your head with the need for their item and then sell it to you. I see a lot of fine Patriots with items they sell for survival and I have bought a few. And on the other hand I see the rip-off items to and it’s sad to say there are a lot of rip-offs around.
Michael you have made a very good point with this post, but I do hope if you have something that would help others survive you would make it and sell it at a fair price.
And just something I would like to add, I miss Aldi's they have the best canned vegetables and at a very fair price.
Once again, you've touched on topic that we should address more often!
Gardening should become another hobby, as it can be done with almost no room and without a lot of expense.
Folks need to pay attention to what they are doing, for sure!
Thanks for a great post!
Great post. Our stores sometimes have the canned vegs for 10 for a $1.00. Great savings, and as long as the cans are not rusted, bulging,or dented they can last long after the exp date on the can.
Checking sales, and just buying a couple of extra cans can add up quick.
Gardening can be done with very little room. Think 5 gallon buckets and the front porch.
See Ya
A lot of the problem with today's society is that they do not know how to cook. They know drive-thru, frozen pizza, just add water, but not truly how to cook (let alone grow something themselves). People think that they have a can of "survival seeds" and if they need them they will be there to plant. What they don't understand is that gardening (cooking, canning, dehydrating etc.) is a skill. It requires knowledge and not just from a book. I am in my 40s and we have had a garden for years (we always had a garden growing up too)--yet, this year our garden produced maybe 1/10th that it usually does. We had a very wet, cold summer (global warming?). This year we added milk goats (and I have taught myself how to make cheese, butter, ice cream); a pressure canner and wheat grinder. Unfortunately everyone in my family who had the skills to do these things have passed away, so we've been teaching ourselves (trial and error). But, it's better to do it now while things are somewhat "comfortable". Keep up the good work. If you need easy long-term recipes, let me know. I have lots! The other thing we need to think about is how to make our own cleaners, etc.
On a $400 / month budget for a family of 4, we have been able prepare well. We could probably go about a year without buying anything at the grocery, drug store or department store. And our stores get bigger daily.
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