[pct-l] ALDHA Endangered Services Campaign

[jmertes@verizon.net (John Mertes)]

Solar Bear,

    I've no complaint with merchants making a profit on my purchases at their
store or anyone else's purchase.
What I object to is false advertising and merchants NOT keeping their side of
the transaction. The merchant needs to set
his terms and prices to make a profit, otherwise he will not last. Makes
no difference whether his customers are
thru hikers or not.

    I understand and share your concern about the impact of thru hikers on a
community. We also need to be concerned
about the impact of other backpackers on communities. Also those of us use to
relatively low prices in our urban area super stores
need to understand that the small store in the hinterland has to survive on
miniscule sales compared to the super stores, often the small
store pays much higher unit costs for its merchandise, and may have only part of
a year to be open and earn his living for the
whole year.  What this means is that high prices in the small hinterland stores
are usually justified and necessary.

    Years ago I stopped in a small store between Yellowstone and the Grand
Tetons NP. Mentioned to the owner something about
his prices being high and he told me that he had to make his sales and profit
between Memoridal Day and Labor Day, almost no business
the rest of the year.



> In a message dated 6/23/2002 2:49:03 AM Eastern Daylight Time,
> jmertes@verizon.net writes:
>
>
> > Hmmm, sounds like an unfair complaint to me.  If he says "all you can eat"
> > then the hikers are legitimately
> > eating all they can eat even if it is ten times as much of something as
> > "normal guests".  If he wants to limit consumption
> > of fruit then he needs to add that to his advertising.
> >
> > Reminds me of a suit I read about years back in the Bay Area, a man went to
> > an
> > "all you can eat seafood buffet" at a restaurant and
> > the management refused to serve him all the seafood he could eat. The man
> > sued
> > and won. "All you can eat" means that, not just the amount
> > that the restaurant thinks you should eat.
> >
>
> These types of legalistic, and somewhat egotistical, thoughts about
> thruhikers being "entitled" to food or services well beyond the cost of the
> items is at the crux of ALDHA's campaign to educate thruhikers.  When we hike
> through a town, do we care about the impact our visit has on:  the community,
> the merchants we visit and on the thruhikers who come after us?  Should we
> care?
>