The Potty Source

Did you know there’s a magazine out there for the liquid waste industry? You know—porta-potties?

There are magazines for just about every topic known to man—not just for leisure. While there are countless magazines for fashion, sports, recreation, gossip (people read People, I guess), entertainment, etc., there are also countless trade publications for people who need accurate and timely information for their profession.

Name any industry out there, and chances are there’s a trade magazine for it. There are magazines for owners of ice cream shops, magazines for the construction industry, magazines for people IN the magazine industry, and—yes, it’s true—a magazine for the liquid waste industry.

People always laugh when I point that out, but it’s true. It’s called Pumper. Take a look at their website, found at www.pumper.com. Scroll down the page. Does it look like they don’t have much to talk about? You’ll find a lot less—ahem—waste in that magazine than you’ll find in Cosmopolitan. You may actually learn something.

Think about it. People use porta-potties all the time, such as at work sites and at summer events. That means there must be businesses devoted to providing enough porta-potties to accommodate the number of people who have to relieve themselves. That means that, when it’s time for the units to be serviced, something must be done WITH the human waste to put it back into the Circle of Life without spreading disease, contaminating the environment or offending your unfortunate neighbors. People who work in the liquid waste industry must treat the waste. They need to keep up on the latest trends, new products, and government regulations that may affect their livelihood—for better or worse. That’s what trade magazines are for.

To be a writer, you have to have something to write about.

You have to be an expert on something. You can’t just be an expert at writing, you have to also be an expert in a certain field—so that people interested in that topic will turn to your writing as “the source.”

While attending Brigham Young University, I majored in English but didn't know what I enjoyed writing about. At the time, I didn't have to—I just had to write about English and American literature.

My first degree-related job outside of college, as a reporter for a local newspaper, gave me the opportunity to write about agriculture. I had grown up on a potato farm in southeastern Idaho, but now I was going to write about the industry. A few years later, that experience landed me the editor position for the largest and most widely circulated magazine in the potato industry (yes, there are several), called Potato Grower magazine. That position lead to my current position as the editor of four agricultural magazines at a different company—which includes a different potato industry magazine.

In spite of all I know about the potato industry, I've spent many more years—since the late 1980's—obsessed with one thing that very few people pay attention to anymore but is something to which we must return.

But that’s a topic for another blog post.

And no, it’s not porta-potties.