For it will be like a man going on a journey, who called his servants and entrusted to them his property. To one he gave five talents, to another two, to another one, to each according to his ability. Then he went away.
Now, after twenty years the master of those servants came and settled accounts with them.
He who had received the five talents came forward with empty hands. "Master, you delivered to me five talents. I invested them in your name into a Goldman Sachs synthetic CDO. You owe Goldman thirty talents, and they want it now."
The master shrugged. "Sometimes these things happen. Enter into the joy of your master."
He who had received the two talents next approached. "Master, you delivered to me two talents. I purchased 75 percent of a chemical company in your name with them, thinking I had made the deal of a lifetime. A month later I found out why they were willing to let it go so cheap: they never told me the company had buried 300 different hazardous materials in a valley in Pennsylvania, then built a school atop it. When the chemicals dissolved their containers they exploded. The school landed in Illinois. Fortunately for you, our lawyers were able to convince the judge we'd been swindled and we're not going to jail...but they'd really like to be paid for all their work, and the bill is a million talents."
The master said, "It is written. Enter into the joy of your master."
Then came the man who had received the one talent. He was holding a small bota bag. "Master, you kinda screwed me by only giving me one talent, even though you know I know you have thousands of them. You can't really do anything interesting with one talent, but you can buy a lot of these little botas filled with wine. I bought 6000 of them for a bekah (note: 3000 shekels per talent, two bekahs per shekel) apiece, cooled them in a stream, and sold cold wine to passersby on Main Street for a shekel. They sold very well. After I ran out, I put one talent in the bank, bought 6000 more botas, cooled them and sold them the next day. At the end of the month I had 30 talents.
"Three months after you left, I had 45 talents. The wine merchant I was buying them from asked me if I'd like to buy his business for 40 talents. He told me he was manufacturing the filled botas for a half-bekah apiece so I could make a lot more money by controlling the supply. It was a no-brainer to buy his business, keep him on the payroll as Head of Manufacturing, and add a second sales location. My new sales employee was even better at selling wine than I, and business was truly booming.
"A year later, the vineyard owner approached us with a proposal to buy his business for 150 talents. We agreed, and kept him on the payroll as Head of Wine Production. He took the 150 talents we paid him and bought another vineyard producing white wine instead of the red that was our only product. The white turned out to be very popular and the shekels started...well, pouring in. We also found that botas can be cleaned and reused, so we developed a "deposit bota" program that saved us a lot of money. At this point we had 95 sales locations in thirty cities, and the business was starting to become unmanageable. We added another production operation, and started selling franchises.
"The next year, we took advantage of another opportunity. Many people told us they liked to eat falafel while drinking our wine, so we hired a very good falafel chef to add them to our range of products. He developed nine flavors of falafel and six different sauces. Our falafel was so successful we were able to open a chain of restaurants serving a wide variety of delicious foods. There are 580 of them in operation now, generating revenues of over 3 million talents per year. Fifty more are set to open this year, and that growth is sure to continue. We also have 10,000 hectares under cultivation, plus a beef ranch, a milk farm, a sheep ranch which also produces 150 talents' worth of wool per year, and five fruit orchards. We employ 45,000 people at good wages with excellent benefits, and consider them partners rather than mere servants.
"I only came back today to return the talent you loaned me and the half-talent you figured was as much as stupid ol' me could possibly squeeze out by putting the money in the bank. But if you'd like to sell me your entire estate for the 1200 talents my accountant is guarding out in the parking lot and come to work for me in international development, let's talk."
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