A tree takes twenty years to grow.
Unless you buy one that is already twenty years old, load it onto a truck with a crane, and plant it in your yard on Thursday.
That is the entire business of Moon Valley Nurseries, and it is a strange and fascinating one.
Because nobody actually wants a tree. What people want is shade, privacy and a yard that looks finished.
A small tree delivers none of those for a decade.
A large tree delivers all of them immediately, at a price that can run into thousands of dollars for a single specimen.
So what is the customer buying?
Time. Compressed, delivered by truck.
And the price of time is one of the most useful things to understand about money, especially if you are past sixty.
Let me explain.