Legacy Soil & Stone — Master Proposal v3 (DRAFT)
Drafted 2026-04-26 PM. Read-through version. Ships to legacy.thebarnetts.info on sign-off. Live financials companion: v3 Financials.
Earlier revisions (4, 3, 2, 1)
Rev 4: "Tangible" added. Cremains acceptance cap (~9 lb). Pearl size honestly described. Schnauzer in §1 only. Line 3 reframed with community-participation tier. Stream A tagline candidates surfaced.
Rev 3: Artisan framing, golf ball reference, Stream A pricing raised to $250-$1,295, Stream B raised to $375-$995, seed packet dropped, Line 3 nonprofit, margin target ≥88%.
Rev 2: Soothe Stone dropped. Stream B paragraph in Mark's wording. Bundle option removed. Western Red Cedar specifics dropped. Bob Ross / pillars / "use everything" preaching removed. Tagline updated.
Rev 1: Initial v3 draft from morning brain dump.
1. The business in one paragraph
Legacy Soil & Stone is a regional memorial business in North Georgia operating two streams that share a single workshop.
Stream A — Memorial Stones is a cremains business. Any cremains, pet or human, are processed through the Pearl Method. A pan-tilted aggregator turns cremains into various-size pearls when a mineral binder is applied. The pearls are then hand-painted with a slurry of cremains and natural pigments, polished, and sealed. This is an artisan line that produces tangible, display-worthy products. Stream A accepts both pet and human cremains; the Pearl Method works the same whether the input is a hamster, a schnauzer, or a human, and pricing is set by cremains weight.
Stream B — Memorial Soil is a pet-only business by choice, licensed under Georgia mortality composting law (O.C.G.A. 4-5). Companion animals up to 40 lbs are processed through Natural Organic Reduction (NOR) in commercial vessels, then cured in hand-built cedar vessels for a 45-day stabilization phase. The cured soil and its vessel are returned to the family as a ready-to-plant memorial. Whole-body human NOR is legal in Georgia (Senate Bill 241, 2025); Legacy Soil & Stone has no plans to enter that market.
2. The Pearl Method
Cremains are loaded into a pan-tilted aggregator with a fine mist of a mineral binder. The pan rotates and the cremains form into pearls 25-40 mm in diameter — between marble-sized and approaching golf-ball-sized.
Pearl yield scales with cremains volume:
- Smallest orders: 1-3 hand-rolled pearls
- Mid-range orders: 20-30 pearls per batch
- Largest orders: up to 90 pearls per batch
Pearls are removed from the aggregator and cured. They are then hand-painted with a slurry of cremains and natural pigments (mica, pearlescent, North Georgia mineral oxides), polished, and finished with a clear sealing coat.
25 mm sits at the upper end of marble sizing. 40 mm is approaching but just under regulation golf-ball (42.67 mm); a 40 mm pearl reads as "small golf ball" to most viewers. Per-tier pearl yield numbers are working ranges from initial bench testing — research will calibrate as production volume builds.
3. Stream A catalog
Five tiers, weight-based. No separate intake fee — granulation, sieving, and chain-of-custody labor is built into the tier price.
| Tier | Cremains | Typical source | Pearls (approx.) | Price |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| XS | < 0.5 lb | Hamster, parakeet, small reptile, partial keepsake portion | 1-3 hand-rolled | $250 |
| S | 0.5-1 lb | Cat, small dog | ~20-30 | $475 |
| M | 1-2 lb | Medium dog, partial-share human | ~40-55 | $695 |
| L | 2-4 lb | Large dog, partial-share human | ~60-75 | $995 |
| XL | 4-9 lb | Full human cremains (typical adult to large adult) | ~75-90 | $1,295 |
Acceptance cap: 9 lb of cremains. A 300-lb adult human cremation typically yields about 9 lb of remains, so this cap covers any normal human or pet cremation. Anything beyond 9 lb is by special arrangement only — keeps Stream A focused on family memorial work and out of livestock or non-mammalian-pet processing.
4. Stream B catalog (private NOR)
Three tiers, weight-based. Pricing scales with vessel cycle complexity. Every tier returns the same standardized 1.5 cu ft of finished memorial soil in the same hand-built cedar planter — the artisan piece is what's consistent, not the volume.
| Tier | Pet weight | Vessel cycle | Return | Price |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Tiny | < 10 lbs | JK270 dual-chamber | 1.5 cu ft + cedar planter | $475 |
| Small-Medium | 10-30 lbs | JK400 dual-chamber | 1.5 cu ft + cedar planter | $675 |
| Large | 30-40 lbs | JK400 full capacity | 1.5 cu ft + cedar planter | $895 |
Every tier delivers the cured soil in a hand-built Western cedar planter — the same standardized design that served as its 45-day curing chamber, returned to the family ready to plant.
Why standardized: a 40-lb dog can yield 2.5-3 cu ft of soil, which would push shipping into freight territory and create wildly variable customer cost. Standardizing the return at 1.5 cu ft (a large bag of premium garden soil, ~45-55 lbs in a standard FedEx box) keeps shipping predictable, simplifies the workshop's packaging line, and makes the product visually consistent regardless of pet size. Surplus from larger pets goes to the Unconditional Forest at the workshop — a permanent, photographable mother pile that becomes part of the brand story. No remains are ever discarded; the surplus has a home.
Stream B is pets only by choice. Whole-body human NOR is legal in Georgia under SB 241 but is not a Legacy Soil & Stone offering. The Pearl Method (Stream A) carries the human cremains use-case.
For families who don't want a private NOR vessel, see Line 3 — Community Composting below: pets can be composted communally with shelter animals at $150, with all net proceeds donated to shelter partners.
5. The four service lines
Two money-making lines and two community-aligned lines.
| Line | What | Type |
|---|---|---|
| Line 1 — Memorial Stones | Stream A: Pearl Method, hand-painted pearls. Direct retail, weight-tiered $250-$1,295. | Money-making |
| Line 2 — Memorial Soil | Stream B: pet-only private NOR, standardized 1.5 cu ft return + cedar planter. Direct retail, weight-tiered $475-$895. Surplus from larger pets goes to the Unconditional Forest at the workshop. | Money-making |
| Line 3 — Community Composting | Two-part program: (a) zero-revenue mortality intake from rural-shelter partners (shelter animals composted in bulk for free). (b) Community participation: pet owners who don't want a private NOR vessel can opt into a communal composting batch with shelter animals for $150, receiving back a labeled bag of finished soil. All net proceeds donate directly to participating shelter partners. Operated as a community-service program inside the for-profit. | Service / pass-through to shelters |
| Line 4 — Academic Outreach | Pure outreach to university partners (UGA Extension, Auburn, Appalachian State, Berry College). Pairs naturally with Line 3 — Line 2's controlled curing environment plus Line 3's volume gives institutional partners real-world data they cannot replicate in a lab. Not a revenue line. | Service |
6. Unit economics
Stream A blended margin lands at ~90% across the five tiers. Stream B blended margin lands at ~87.6%; the standardized hand-built cedar planter is the cost driver. Operator labor sits in the $54K operator draw, not COGS.
Year 1 = 120 Stream A + 36 Stream B orders (10/month + 3/month). Year 2 ramps to maturity at 2.5× Year 1 volume. Year 3+ holds at Year 2 steady-state — the brand is built around a workshop pace, not a growth pace. Revenue: $111K Year 1 → $278K Year 2 → $278K Year 3+. Net income (after $54K operator draw + marketing + insurance + misc opex): ~$34K → ~$177K → ~$177K.
Detailed COGS, projected volumes, capital paths, and the per-tier breakdown are in the companion financials report: Legacy Soil v3 — Financials.
7. Capital — two paths
Solid path: $33,000 - $40,000. Self-funded launch. Aggregator pan + painting station + cedar workshop tools + initial inventory + Year 1 marketing budget. Equipment is rented or owned, the workshop runs out of existing space, and Year 2 ramp is funded entirely by Year 1 net income (~$33K) plus the operator's continued draw. No external capital needed.
Dream path: $120,000 - $130,000
The dream is not bigger margin or faster ramp. The dream is the land. Twenty to forty acres in the North Georgia foothills — pasture for the soil program, forest the soil itself feeds back into, a creek the workshop sits beside, a pond. A purpose-built workshop with the aggregator pan, the painting bench, the curing room, the cedar build station. Soil from the Community Composting line goes into the field. Cremains-fed pearls cure in a room that smells like cedar and wood polish.
Customers visit if they want to. Most never need to — the land does its work whether anyone watches or not.
What the Dream path buys: a permanent home for the workshop, the land asset itself as long-horizon collateral, and the time and quiet to build at the artisan pace this work asks for. Same product, same pricing, same lines — on the right ground.
8. Brand
Stream B + Line 3 (community composting) tagline: "Unconditional love regrown."
Stream A tagline: "Memory you can hold."
One-line description: Hand-painted memorial pearls from cremains, and living memorial soil for the pets we loved unconditionally. Made in the North Georgia mountains.