“Cracker falls through the cracks again!”
The ever-popular musings of a narrowboat horse on the Montgomery Canal
I AM well known for the odd wisecrack, but I’m becoming increasingly frustrated with wide cracks. Those in question are the ones I continually fall through when applying for financial support to get us through this perishing coronavirus situation.
I apologise in advance if this chat reflects our financial predicaments rather than the horse-boating banter that I prefer to regale you with, but hay, needs must.
While not pretending to be in such perilous straits as so many other businesses, if I don’t continually flag this up, then people will think that everything is hunky-dory (as opposed to John Dory, which is a fish), so please forgive me this indulgence.
On the positive side, when I explain the machinations of trying to keep our little enterprise afloat, I hope I’m highlighting similar problems to those encountered by other boating traders and thus flying the flag for all of us.
My approach to any problem has always been KISS – Keep It Simple Stupid, so let’s do that. Once income disappears completely, especially overnight, the first step is to make your outgoings do similar. Overheads, or hidden costs as I prefer to call them, constitute the major outgoings and are the first ones to target.
If we were land based, this would include business rates, rent, mortgages etc. and we would, depending on rateable value, qualify for some sort of government grant, bridging loan or payment holiday. This first big crack becomes a sizeable fissure that we fall through, because we’re ineligible due to the stringent and building-oriented qualifying criteria.
Second step, contact the major creditors and ask for lenient terms, i.e. Canal & River Trust boat licences and mooring fees. To be fair to CRT, they have pushed back demands for licence payments by three months from April to July; however, this falls short of actually reducing any annual fees in the long run.
Blogs, vlogs or clogs
Why don’t you diversify? You could put together some short video blogs, vlogs or clogs and charge people to watch them. This idea, like me, has got legs, I thought.
We could market them under the catchy strapline of Cracker’s Original Videos and number them accordingly, e.g. 19. We could then publicise them as COVID-19, to save on advertising costs, because I see it everywhere already!
Our boat Countess herself has suffered from a long, wet, closed season and is in need of some new doors (see photo).
Normally, these would have been repaired or replaced prior to our first outing, but due to the imposed isolation of our odd-job man, things have been neglected. If anyone knows a good doorto-door salesman with some surplus stock, please let me know.
In all seriousness, anyone with a desire to help out in this enforced closed season with repairs, maintenance or financial support, please do get in touch.
We’ve also been racking our brains as to how to make Countess Covid-secure. We held an online ZooMeeting, which didn’t go too well because all zoos were closed, so I was the only animal there!
The conversation revolved around Personal Protective Equipment (PPE), social distancing and saving the NHS (National Horse Society).
I quite like m new face mask as it hides a mul of sins, such as pony nuts (again see photo). Most of my suggestions were poo-pooed, so I ended up washing my hands of the whole affair and isolated back in my home field, which apparently is in line with current government guidance anyway!
See what I mean about keeping it simple?
We hope and trust that you and yours remain safe and well during these troubling times. And we look forward to the day we can ply our trade anew.
Until next time, may your bucket have more carrots in than mine currently has.