My Decision Tree shows my process for deciding which companies to include in this catalog. This page discusses those concepts in narrative form.

I want to avoid wasting time. I spend an inordinate amount of time explaining why certain companies are not in the database. I would like those hours back.

Those questionable companies are in what I call "The Gray Area." The size of the Gray Area is a function of the size of the database. As the universe of listed companies has grown, the number of possible ways to extend the project – The Gray Area – has grown even more.

Many collectors think I should be more inclusive in which companies I include. I respect their contributions and opinions. If I were making a living doing this, I might be more willing to commit more time to the The Gray Area.

However, this is a volunteer effort and nothing more. If it were possible to count all my income from all the catalogs I've sold since 1995, it would probably not equate to more than three or four week's income from my main work. This is a labor of love. This is not a money-making venture.

With reality as a backdrop, I hope you can understand that my experience is very clear. Instead of being more inclusive, I must be more restrictive in the companies I list.

Central logic. This catalog is intended as a guidebook for people who collect railroad certificates. Consequently, one of my secondary tasks is to compile and maintain a complete list of "railroad" and "rail-related" companies.

If company names sounds like they might have been railroad companies, I will probably include them. 70% of the companies listed in my database sound like railroad companies.

Conversely, if companies sounds like they belong in other industries, I will probably exclude them.

Keeping my eye on my target market. I assume average certificate collectors want to learn about pricing, availability, varieties, dates, and so forth. The question I ask, then, is quite simple:

I would hate to think that collectors would think of looking in my catalog for information about certificates from the Moon Motor Car Company. I would hope they would look in Lawrence Falater's American Automotive Stock Certificates.

Similarly, I would hate to think that collectors would search my catalog for information about certificates from brewing companies, steel companies, mining companies, and utilities ...

even though, some of those kinds of companies ran rail operations during their corporate existences.

Let's look at it another way. Imagine there were a catalog for mining certificates from North America. Do you think a railroad certificate collector would look in such a catalog for certificates from the Union Pacific Railroad? I seriously doubt it. Nevertheless, the Union Pacific Railroad owned the Union Pacific Coal Company and that company mined many millions of tons of coal from southern Wyoming.

Practical matters. It already takes thousands of hours per year to describe certificates and record prices for legitimate railroad and railroad-related issues. Every minute I spend on non-railroad certificates is one minute less I have for spend on my core project.

Given the choice, I imagine that collectors of railroad certificates would want me to spend my time describing and pricing stocks and bonds from railroads.