How To Get Rich In 2017: Convince A Fearful Public To Hoard Food For The End Times

Presenting our menu for the apocalypse: maple pancake breakfast, hearty tortilla soup, chicken-flavored pot pie. Those are just a few of the dehydrated and Mylar bag-sealed delicacies offered by Wise Co., a survival-food company enjoying a booming business in the precarious anxietyscape that is 2017. Wise Co.'s CEO Aaron Jackson is the subject of this recent Bloomberg profile, which details how hurricanes, flooding, and good ol' fashioned nuclear threats have been a boon to survival-food sales.

He's not the only one cashing in. If you haven't read this New Yorker article from January about the apocalyptic preparations of the über-rich, set aside some time and get ready to have your mind blown like the Bikini Atoll. Silicon Valley execs and venture capital moguls are snapping up islands, generators, ammunition, and of course, food, in the event that our entire global information network suddenly collapses. One tech C.E.O. tells The New Yorker that our food system is dependent on logistics, G.P.S., the internet, etc., all of which could fizzle in a massive emergency. Stocking up on freeze-dried nutrient sludge is obviously the only smart solution. OK, so these are the machinations of conspiracy-prone billionaires, right? No, apocalypse food is for everyone! ABC News reports that the organizers behind this month's RK Prepper Kansas City Survival Expo & Gun Show plan 17 survivalist/disaster prepper conventions this year, up from five in 2015. It's easier than ever to understand that a lot of regular folks truly believe the end times are coming. If they are, we're just hoping for a bunker stocked with something better than powdered beef stroganoff.