| Topic: |
Religions > Atheism |
| User: |
"stoney" |
| Date: |
27 Oct 2006 12:12:22 PM |
| Object: |
Irishmen hit paydirt selling soil to the New World |
http://today.reuters.co.uk/news/articlenews.aspx?type=oddlyEnoughNews&storyID=2006-10-27T124625Z_01_L26190257_RTRIDST_0_OUKOE-UK-LIFE-IRELAND-DIRT.XML&WTmodLoc=Oddly+Enough-C1-Headline-5
Irishmen hit paydirt selling soil to the New World
Fri Oct 27, 2006 1:46 PM BST
By Kevin Smith
DUBLIN (Reuters) - Two down-to-earth Irishmen have set up a business
selling soil to nostalgic Irish Americans who want a handful of "the
mother country" on their graves.
Pat Burke, 27, and Alan Jenkins, 65, have just shipped their first $1
million (about 528,000 pounds) load of "official" Irish soil to New York
-- at $15 per 0.75 lb bag -- and confidently expect it will be followed
by many more.
"The demand has been absolutely phenomenal," Burke, an agricultural
scientist from County Tipperary, said on Friday.
"We knew it would take off but not in our wildest dreams did we expect
the reaction we've had so far."
Burke, who has patented a way of processing the soil so it passes strict
U.S. import regulations, said the pair were in talks with "one of the
world's largest retailers" and with a U.S. shopping channel.
"We're looking at going worldwide," he added.
For more than a century Irish people were forced by famine, poverty and
unemployment to abandon their home country, the majority of them
settling in North America with the result that today some 40 million
Americans claim Irish ancestry.
Globally, the Irish diaspora is estimated at more than 70 million
people.
Burke said the idea for the business -- whose website
www.officialirishdirt.com will go live shortly -- came about after
Jenkins attended an Irish association meeting in Florida.
"He found that all that these second, third and fourth generation Irish
wanted was a drop of the old sod -- a true piece of old Ireland -- to
place on their caskets," he said.
Burke and Jenkins, who is from County Antrim in British-ruled Northern
Ireland, formed their partnership after a chance conversation at a
dinner party earlier this year and set up a processing plant last month
in southern Ireland.
To enter the United States the soil must be free both of diseases such
as foot-and-mouth and non-indigenous insects.
The firm has already received an order from an elderly New York
businessman, originally from the west of Ireland, for $100,000 worth of
dirt.
"He was in two minds about his final resting place, but now he's decided
to be totally immersed in a full grave of Irish soil -- in Manhattan,"
Burke said.
Official Irish Dirt has pledged to donate 80 percent of its profits to
charities in Ireland and the United States.
/end
--
Fundies and trolls are cordially invited to
shove a wooden cross up their arses and rotate
at a high rate of speed. I trust you'll
be 'blessed' with a plethora of splinters.
.
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| User: "Sean C" |
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| Title: Re: Irishmen hit paydirt selling soil to the New World |
27 Oct 2006 07:12:01 PM |
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In article <9ef4k2p8104god9pjdouvvcbnvrv5k445i@4ax.com>, stoney
<stoney@the.net> wrote:
http://today.reuters.co.uk/news/articlenews.aspx?type=oddlyEnoughNews&storyID=
2006-10-27T124625Z_01_L26190257_RTRIDST_0_OUKOE-UK-LIFE-IRELAND-DIRT.XML&WTmod
Loc=Oddly+Enough-C1-Headline-5
Irishmen hit paydirt selling soil to the New World
Fri Oct 27, 2006 1:46 PM BST
In a related story, Alaskans make a "cool million" selling ice to
Eskimo expatriates.
--Sean C
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| User: "stoney" |
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| Title: Re: Irishmen hit paydirt selling soil to the New World |
30 Oct 2006 04:46:02 PM |
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On Fri, 27 Oct 2006 20:12:01 -0400, Sean C
<redhawk@burnspammersalive.com> wrote in alt.atheism
In article <9ef4k2p8104god9pjdouvvcbnvrv5k445i@4ax.com>, stoney
<stoney@the.net> wrote:
http://today.reuters.co.uk/news/articlenews.aspx?type=oddlyEnoughNews&storyID=
2006-10-27T124625Z_01_L26190257_RTRIDST_0_OUKOE-UK-LIFE-IRELAND-DIRT.XML&WTmod
Loc=Oddly+Enough-C1-Headline-5
Irishmen hit paydirt selling soil to the New World
Fri Oct 27, 2006 1:46 PM BST
In a related story, Alaskans make a "cool million" selling ice to
Eskimo expatriates.
Yes. Ig Loo's.
--
Fundies and trolls are cordially invited to
shove a wooden cross up their arses and rotate
at a high rate of speed. I trust you'll
be 'blessed' with a plethora of splinters.
.
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