CORONA DEL MAR : Kids Plan to Sell a Better Mousetrap

Sporting black baseball caps with felt mouse ears, Michelle and Bryan Riblett rap on a neighbor’s front door.

When a potential customer answers, the brother-sister duo break into their own version of the “Ghostbusters” theme song: “When the mice invade your neighborhood, who you gonna call? Mousebusters!”

The two young entrepreneurs, Michelle, 11, and Bryan, 8, are smart enough to recognize a lucrative cash crop.

With an infestation sweeping their neighborhood, the two Corona del Mar youngsters are hitting the streets to sell mousetraps door-to-door, armed with a polished sales pitch sure to shame any Fuller brush man.

Selling the traps two for $1.40, the Ribletts collected $20 in the first half-hour of their venture.

“We’re selling them at a 100% markup so it’s really a good deal over the stores,” said Michelle, a Harbor Day School student whose other business experience was selling Girl Scout cookies.

“Most stores sell them $1.50 for two. One store sold them for $3 for two!”

The youngsters got the idea about a week ago from a visiting aunt.

“We were sitting at dinner and heard a trap go off in the living room,” Michelle said. “And then we heard the trap dragging across the floor.

That’s when the Ribletts realized there was money to be made.

Their mother, Debra Riblett, found a store where she could buy the traps in bulk at a discount.

She also helped the kids make uniforms and print flyers to advertise the business.

The Ribletts, who live on Sandcastle Avenue off Buck Gully Canyon, have caught 25 mice in their home.

“They’re mass producing,” Debra Riblett said. “Two mice have 10 babies in three weeks.”

The children said they want to expand their sales territory by venturing into the nearby Cameo Shores and Cameo Highlands communities.

But they plan to keep their work force small, possibly recruiting a friend or two.

The Ribletts might not do so well in other parts of Corona del Mar, though.

“I haven’t seen any mice in my neighborhood,” said Newport Beach Mayor Phil Sansone, who lives on Marguerite Avenue. “But there’s a lot of cats around here--seven in the 200 block alone.”

That doesn’t bother Michelle much. After all, she isn’t planning a career in sales.

“Actually, I dance,” said the young ballerina, who has already performed with the Royal Danish and Joffrey ballets. “I just got my pointe shoes.”

The mouse invasion, first reported in south Orange County, is blamed on both the winter rains and the summer heat.

The rain caused a lush growth of vegetation that attracted the pests while the heat dried up the hillsides and sent the rodents scurrying for shade inside buildings and yards.