To Get Rich, You’ve Gotta Be Scrappy: Here’s How It’s Done

Tom Stevens
Jul 20, 2017 · 3 min read

I took the above photo out the front door of a friend’s home in suburban Detroit. It was taken on a trash day and I’d just helped my friend haul a rusted-out old wheelbarrow and some steel barrel stands out to the curb. Not five minutes later, this guy rolls up, grabs the stuff, and stacks it precariously onto the back of his beat up truck. You can read the words “scrap metal” there on the door.

As this “scrapreneur” drove off, I wondered how much money there is in scrap. And then I did a little research.

Ever hear of a lady named Marsha Serlin? Over three decades past in her hometown of Chicago, Marsha started doing the same thing you see the guy in the picture here is doing — in her case, driving around in a rented truck she’d put on her Sears credit card — scavenging scrap metal from alley ways and by knocking on factory doors.

As of 2009, according to this great piece in Forbes magazine, Serlin was doing $225 million in annual volume from her 35-acre yard in Cicero, Illinois (link). Her business is called United Scrap and employees over 200.

But it wasn’t so easy for Serlin. In the beginning, she hauled, sorted and chucked scrap by hand until she was so bruised and gashed up that a drive-thru fast food worker thought she was a victim of domestic abuse and offered to call the police for her.

That’s the very definition of scrappy.

Serlin also had to put up with the mocking and insults by male scrap dealers, more than one of whom she had the satisfaction of watching go out of business while she triumphed and grew.

Others in the scrap trade have turned their obsession with industrial detritus into even greater profits — Anil Argawal, an Indian living in London, UK is worth approximately $3.5 billion and is one of England’s biggest philanthropists (link).

So back to the dude in the photograph. For all we know, he drives a Ferrari on his off hours and has a lake front pad in one of Detroit’s toniest suburbs, such as Grosse Pointe. And if he isn’t rich yet, he’s obviously driven.

How driven are you?

Remember: Nobody cares whether you sit around till your arse is the size of Delaware. Maybe you should chuck some scrap this weekend, just to see if you have the mettle for heavy metal.

You don’t have to re-invent the wheel to become the world’s next big success story, you’ve just got to become — and remain — scrappy.

Nobodycaresbook.org (link) is the definitive self-help book that is designed to protect you from all the evils of the world while showing you how to profit and thrive with mental and action tools that are good for a lifetime. At once a slap in the face and a hopeful how-to guide to the business of life and life beyond business, you’ll find yourself turning to Nobody Cares again and again whenever life kicks you in the ribs. Also available on Amazon (link) and coming soon as an audiobook.

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Written by

Writer, inciter, cartoonist, pilot, poet and preacher. Author of Nobody Cares out on Amazon, Barnes & Noble and on nobodycaresbook.org

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