Do you think a weed can get you money?

The business started as a joke.

The lowly Tumbleweed or the Russian thistle is a nuisance for most inhabitants of Western Kansas. They grow everywhere. The create problems by clogging drainage ditches, piling up against fencerows, and leading to traffic accidents.

But this weed is bringing in good fortune and money for Linda Katz of Garden City, Kansas. Her story shows that it is possible to sell almost anything on the Internet.

She was a former real estate agent. Now, she sells tumbleweed over the Web.

Linda’s Prairie Tumbleweed Farm is a business of selling Tumbleweed which was started in 1994. She sells Tumbleweeds for $15 to $25 (three different sizes are available- small, medium, and large).

 ”When I got an order I was just amazed,” she says, sitting on the porch of her home in Garden City, Kansas. “And each order I got, I thought it would probably be the last order. I remember thinking they would probably get them and send them back immediately as soon as they find out what they are.”

According to Katz that was a matter of luck or chance. “It all started as a joke, “says Katz, 49. She requested her son to build her a family Web page so she could communicate with friends. She gave it a tongue-in-cheek name Prairie Tumbleweed Farm (actually she did not live on a farm, but in a subdivision).

Tumbleweed spreads its seed as it tumbles in the wind and it is not possible to cultivate them. However, to make the site look more authentic, she added a price list ($35 for a big weed, $25 for a midsize one, $20 for the small economy model). She also placed a guarantee that each tumbleweed was “Y2K compliant” and quality-tested to tumble in even the gentlest of breezes.

Even though she did not do it for business, however, the orders started to flow in. Individuals from different parts of the country and foreign places Alaska, Austria, Britain, Hong Kong, India started ordering her Tumbleweed. In these places people love Hollywood Westerns.

Japanese customers were far more eager to get Katz’s Tumbleweeds and so she had added a section to her Web site in Japanese. NASA ordered Tumbleweed from her. Movie and TV production companies in Britain, Finland, and the U.S. also got her Tumbleweeds. For example for the children’s show Barney & Friends, they ordered Tumbleweed for $1,000.  Many scientists have got Tumbleweed for research. Individuals buy them to decorate their homes and gardens.  Many people also see Tumbleweed as the replacement of the traditional Christmas tree.

Initially during the first two months on the Web, Katz’s site (www.prairietumbleweedfarm.com) got only 2,000 visitors. By mid-January, number of visitors reached 56,000. Katz says that her revenues reach $40,000 a year.