Farmer verses buisness man

It is becomming clear that there are differnces in the raising of animals and farming by us on the forum. I consider myself a farmer and can see how farming is a way of life and a whole life circle way of living. I could not survive having to buy everything to feed my animals and grow my food. I feed grain to the chickens and pigs that is unsaleable.Let me refrase that. I could sell my poor quality grain to the feed mills for $1 a bushel, they then grind up the weed seeds and grain add a few things and sell it back to me for $12 a bag which is less then 1/2 a bushel. Which then make me try and sell $30 chickens. Someone asked how do I live and be self suficent. Everthing is use on the farm, you grow your own feed useing poor land for grazing, feeding pigs and chickens on leftovers, make compost that will grow unbelievable gardens. Yes and sell to make money but since cost are so low I can make money sell $2 dozen eggs, and I don't care if you eat them hatch them of feed them to your dog, I made money. Yes as farmers lots of time you lose money big time, if you didn't sell at a loss you would be stuck with more costs. I can remember my grandfather taking 40 250 butcher hog into the bush and shooting them as the last batch he sold he got a bill for selling them. Now there are the business people who set their price and stick to it, good for you if you can do that. How many times have you seen on the news where farmers are dumping milk or eggs,potatoes any farm produce becase it didn't pay to haul it to market? Farming is a gamble controlled by big buisness and they force the farmer to take losses. You will also notice the moment the product is delivered to buisness it increases in price. My chickens cost nothing to raise what they use would just go to waste if they didn't use it. You say what about buildings and fences they cost money. Not if you think like me, I buy at auctions and use things others never think of and they are cheap. I also consider my time working on the farm as a money saver, not a cost to be factored into everything I sell, as I don't have to pay monthly membership to a fitness club, then drink over priced health drinks after driving my deprecating truck burning fuel to work out.

Yep. Back in our old life I had a greenhouse nursery, had a small client base, didn't need to many clients cause I only had a small business. At the end of the season, I would be left over with some plants, not many, but some. I recall on many an occasion, people wanted me to tell when when I was done and they would take the left over plants that I did not sell -- FOR NOTHING -- nope, they didn't want to pay for the plants that I had spent months nurturing. Never imagine what I used to say, would ya. I would be honest, totally honest. I told them that what was left over was given to my Sisters. What they did not take, I would put in the compost pile. I had eyebrows raised. I had lovely compost, by they way, betwixt the critters and the beautiful growing mediums the plants had lived in, it was a perfect mixture for my compost. Nope. I did not mind one little bit to give my family all they wanted (and they also got lots of plants with no charge, long before I finished off the nursery season). I was not prepared even in the slightest, to give my plants away to clients that were too cheap to buy them at 50% off. The last few days of business open, there were some very good sales, smiling. They had a choice to pay a small amount for the plants that had probably cost me more to raise than I ever charged for. Yep. Never made much money at the business, but enough to make our farm be a working farm, and my own plants for no charge to me. Good post, by the way, have a wonderful day, CynthiaM.

Some of us have mortgages to pay...and children to feed...

[quote="lazyfarmer"] You will also notice the moment the product is delivered to buisness it increases in price.

This is what bugs me the most, especially in light of "mortgages to pay and children to feed". Most people just accept without question that any legit biz has the right to markup prices in order to stay in biz. Who cares about the producer, who is traditionally paid the least and usually kept in abject poverty for their efforts. I do not accept this tradition. This is in my opinion the economic inequality which gave rise to the Occupy movement, and I know from many years of experience that not one of us Canadian citizens are welcome to occupy anywhere in this country without the blessing of our masters and keepers, you will be moved. We are expected to stay within our economic bindings, chained to the fortunes of corporate interests. How can we be all in our places with sun shining faces if corporate Canada can't make plans that we go along with knowing or unknowing. I spit venom every time I see someone buy a product from the who of who's just because of who they are, go ahead pay the damn store $6 for freerun eggs and offer me $2 for true free range...where's that emoticon with the salute I need to express ??

rennegade, the emoticom you need for that is not allowed on family friendly forums....
And I defitniely agree.


I do fluctuate in price, a little bit. There comes a point in time when for certain things, the animal starts to cost me more than I could get for selling. Once I hit that break even point, I hold on for a little longer, then consider selling for less. At some point that animal can cost me more than jsut what I have already put into it. This is tue for large pet breeds. A few extra chickens dont make a differene, but a couple of extra horses or dogs that I do not want and are not beloved pets, well then I need to think about accepting the loss befor it becomes too great. On the other hand, if someone gets something for less, they are a special home. Peole who contact me looking for a purebred registered husky for $150 are politely sent to Kijiji or the local pound.

For the eggs and chickens and other things, Im pretty solid on my prices. I can eat or feed out what I do not sell. It is never a waste.

I'm not sure I see the validity of suggesting that one can be a farmer OR a businessman. Most farmers are businessmen. Some are better farmers and some are better businessmen. Some are good at both.

I equally don't see how selling eggs for $2 a dozen makes one good at either. We sell our eggs for $5 a dozen at the market and sell out before our competitors who sell for between $4 and $4.50. We also sell more eggs than the others. Why does our consumer base prefer our more expensive eggs? Is it because I'm a good business person or a good farmer?

Last year we were $4 a dozen and always sold out before the market was half over. To not raise prices would make me both a bad farmer and a bad businesman. If I hadn't raised my prices, I would have been leaving a signicant amount of money on the table. Money that could go into improving the farm infrastructure. And I don't care how self sustaining a farm is, there is always room for improvements.

I would also like to point out that low-balling prices does not make one a good farmer.

Good farmers know that they cannot exist in isolation and that farming works better if the farming is part of a healthy farming community. We all have bills to pay. By dragging prices down, one makes it hard for all of us to pay those bills. Bad farming and bad business.

There are many ways for a farmer to gain a competive edge, I believe using quality is one of the better approaches. I equally feel lower prices is one of the worst and constributes to unsustainable agriculture.

As a hobby farmer we have to buy/barter for the grain we feed. I feed whole wheat right now to my older poultry which I get off a farmer friend. We usually trade work for the grain. As a small business owner and both hubby and I growing up on mixed farms, we know the money and effort that goes into growing food for people and the headache, heartache and hassle that can go along with it. We usually give farmers a discount on our oilfield rate when hubby does welding or landscaping/mowing. It sometimes is not much, but we also have to make some money, and some jobs cost more to do than the time it takes to do it is worth. Hubby has been called out to do a 15 min job where he had to drive 15 miles the materials he took for the job cost us close to 200.00 and his bill should have been 40 which is a flat rate got small jobs, but ended up being 260.00 because the job was horrible and he ended up fighting fire because the farmer did not stick around to watch for fire like he said he would. He got a bigger bill then complained we were being crooked. On top of it all, hubby ended up losing an oilfield job so he could do that job.

I guess what I am saying is for us, we give breaks if you treat us well, treat us poorly don't expect a deal. This coming from the small business/hobby farmer

[quote="reneggaide"]

lazyfarmer wrote: You will also notice the moment the product is delivered to buisness it increases in price.

This is what bugs me the most, especially in light of "mortgages to pay and children to feed". Most people just accept without question that any legit biz has the right to markup prices in order to stay in biz. Who cares about the producer, who is traditionally paid the least and usually kept in abject poverty for their efforts. I do not accept this tradition. This is in my opinion the economic inequality which gave rise to the Occupy movement, and I know from many years of experience that not one of us Canadian citizens are welcome to occupy anywhere in this country without the blessing of our masters and keepers, you will be moved. We are expected to stay within our economic bindings, chained to the fortunes of corporate interests. How can we be all in our places with sun shining faces if corporate Canada can't make plans that we go along with knowing or unknowing. I spit venom every time I see someone buy a product from the who of who's just because of who they are, go ahead pay the damn store $6 for freerun eggs and offer me $2 for true free range...where's that emoticon with the salute I need to express ??

Reneggaide, they are right. A legit business has the right to mark-up prices to stay in business. What people forget (and for some reason, alot of the actual farmers forget this too) is that farming is a legit business, so we get to mark-up prices to survive too.

We need to stop letting others dictate prices to us and start setting them ourselves. Two easy ways to gauge your price: if you're selling at a loss, labour included, you aren't selling for enough. And if nobody walks away from your price, you're not selling for enough. Bargain hunters can go to Walmart.

Also, OBF is very right. We do need to be working together as farmers, not trying to do it all alone. Working with the other organic aimed produce farmers in our area (granted there are only about three or four of us!) is the best thing for our business we have ever done. And it's more fun...

Smokyriver here has a point too. It's always worth it to go out on a limb for somebody at least once.

I am learning a lot talking to people all over the country and find what works one place is totally foreign someplace else. What I meant as farmer is just the old style that raised everthing so nothing went to waste and you had different ways to make money. You are not tied to just grain or cows or pigs.
Where I am, I grow grain as does everyone else, for the most part you can buy feed grains for 1 to 5 dollars a bushel. It take 40 bushels to grow out a market pig so cost anywhere from 40 to 200 dollars.There is also an abundance of free or next to free grain. I aways have grains that are't worth shipping. I can therefore raise chickens and pig very cheap.
Being generous it might cost 50 cent to get a dozen eggs which I sell for $2, I make $1.50 which I think is a fare profit. Now I realize some people have to buy all their feed at what I consider out rageous prices. What does it cost you to raise a dozen eggs? Do you make $1.50? Now someone suggested that selling underpriced eggs helps no one, I agree. But am I suppose to raise my price to what I consider gouging, Or do you need to get your costs down to mine? I know you can not lower your feed costs as you buy commerial feed.
On the point of everyone working together, that is great all things being equal. I have seen that played out over and over. First we form a co-op and try to set prices, I make more someone else makes less. Then we get the goverment to grant us exclusive right to control our comodity. We then hire a professional to market for us, who just eats up any profit so the farmer really does not make any more. The expert then tells us we need to build a office and hire more poeple so we can exploit the market fully. Again all extra money goes to suport the now large and unwieldy management. Does this sound like anything that is happeneng with every commodity out there. I really don't want to be part of that, been there done that it does not work will never work, but as long as people can exploit the producer they will.
Case in point I could not sell my own grain to a neigbor with out going through the wheat board, that decided it was in my best interest to take a cut for doing absolutly nothing, but they had goverment backing.
I always thought a %20 markup was fair, now it seem that you charge as much as possible because that is what the next guy does, I disagree with that thinking, I want to make money, but it is just not in MY DNA to what I consider over charge..
Again here would be my questions. What is a fair markup percentage? Is there such a thing as over charging?

As you put it, you are not in the egg business, you are in the grain business. On your farm, the eggs are just a value added product of your grain business.

There are farmers who's livlihoods are centered on the egg business, I consider it poor form to hurt them by dragging their market down. So does our government. People undercutting the market as you are simply make it easier for the marketing boards to justify further intrusions into our individual farming efforts. None of us need that.

Here is an alternative outlook:

Rather than bringing a commodity perspective to the situation and only looking at the eggs and their direct costs, consider them as just one component of a larger economic picture. Your poultry costs are directly tied to your grain production costs. This included combines, fuel, tractors, fences, predator/grazing control, storage, etc. Therefore, the true cost of your eggs is far more than the 50 cents you suggest. Add up all sources of income tied to the grain(including eggs, pork, etc), subtract all costs associated with grain, eggs, pork, etc and then ask yourself if you are still gouging.

Such is the nature of the mixed farm. Each year ya win some ya lose some. But at the end of the day, we should still earn a decent wage. It really doesn't matter what the markup on a dozen eggs is, ... what matters is whether we make a decent living, year to year, as farmers.

At any rate, selling for market value can never be considered gouging.

I think the long and the short off it is this is a society where you can sell what you want for the price you want and fairness does not enter into it. If you are overpricing anything, it will not sell. If you are underpricing for the market and the demand you will sell out. It is entirely up to you what you wish to sell your eggs or meat for and it is entirely up to others if they buy from you or not. You have no obligation to anyone as to the prices you chose to place on your products, and others selling the same product have no control over your selling price.

Five years ago I could sell my eggs for $5 a dozen. I worked in Edmonton and sold out quickly to my co-workers. I was making a profit even though I had to buy my own feed.

Today I cannot sell out at $3 a dozen. No one wants the eggs and the price of feed has gone up. I am nowhere near making a profit but my purpose for poultry is not eggs or meat, it has now become a hobby with a nice little bonus of providing chickens for the freezer and eggs for the table.

I eat a lot of eggs.

I am finding this conversation very interesting and insightful. I like all the different perspectives.

A consideration that has not been mentioned, and I"m not sure where it would fit in, is the cost of the land our birds eat and poop upon.

I you buy land at $7000 dollars an acre, your eggs are going to be more affordable than if you've paid $40,000 per acre! Feed costs pale in comparison to the size of the mortgage. Some of us here in some parts of BC pay more than $40,000 PER ACRE for land that will sustain nothing or grow enough grain to make one loaf of bread! Figure out the cost of those eggs! Yikes!

Land is very expensive, to me it doesn't make sense to buy it for farming purposes. A corporate citizen of Canada can survive hundreds of years taking advantage of the length of time it takes to pay off assets. We have what, maybe 40 years of good working energy to do this with. My grandfather tells me that when he homesteaded this land I'm on, a man could grow a few crops of wheat and have the land paid for, try that now eh! So this got me thinking about the fellow we rented land to. He is getting, for 1/500 the cost of purchasing this land, the right to rape it for all it is worth. Pretty damn good deal I'd say and no it wasn't my decision nor do I welcome their activities here. On the other hand these boys did in mere hours what I cannot do in weeks with affordable, old, farming equipment. If I ever get my hands on one of those big sexy $500,000 tractors I won't be buying land, I'll be renting.
BTW, I pay here 5x the rent for less than 1/1000 the space this farmer does...WTF!!!??? This sends a bad message to me.

Schipperkesue wrote: You have no obligation to anyone as to the prices you chose to place on your products, and others selling the same product have no control over your selling price.

and it is this perspective that made marketing boards necesary.

we have an ethical obligation to each other to help develop and protect a healthy market.

Omega Blue Farms wrote:

Schipperkesue wrote: You have no obligation to anyone as to the prices you chose to place on your products, and others selling the same product have no control over your selling price.

and it is this perspective that made marketing boards necesary.

we have an ethical obligation to each other to help develop and protect a healthy market.

You forgot this part of my quote:

"If you are overpricing anything, it will not sell. If you are underpricing for the market and the demand you will sell out. "

I am not just talking food or agricultural products here. I am talking all purchasable items. People vote with their pocketbooks.

Case in point. Does anyone own one of those Keurig coffee makers? I have trouble believing that a single cup coffee maker can sell for $250, but it does. And you are married to that thing for life, tied to buying those individual plastic concentrate filled coffee nodules. At least as long as they choose to make them. Obviously I do not speak for the masses because those things have been flying off the shelves since they first came out. I am sure they would still sell if priced higher. I have a kettle, a box of filters, a melita filter holder, a bag of beans, a carton of milk and a coffee grinder (manual). For a fraction of the price I produce superior coffee to the Keurig but the Keurigs still sell. Price does not seem to be the important issue here. Other factors, like convenience seem to play a part.

Now I don't manufacture coffee makers but I do paint and pot. I price my paintings and pottery according to my own personal value of the item. I know the time, skills and resources that went into making a particular item. I also have a feeling for their value. If people want to buy my pieces for the price I set, they may. Otherwise, they can walk away. However, it is my art and I will chose what I sell for....and not sell if I price too high.

Off topic, but Sue brought up the coffee thing.

We have a Tassimo one (got it pretty cheap though, I wouldn't pay $200 for it). I don't drink coffee and hubby will have 1 maybe 2 cups a day. It makes Lattes, Caps and a great Chai Tea Latte and Hot Chocolate. Handy for us with the one Chai Tea and one fancy coffee for hubby a day!

Ok, you can go back to the farming stuff now.

Omega Blue Farms wrote:

Schipperkesue wrote: You have no obligation to anyone as to the prices you chose to place on your products, and others selling the same product have no control over your selling price.

and it is this perspective that made marketing boards necesary.

we have an ethical obligation to each other to help develop and protect a healthy market.

Excellent! Right to the core of a larger problem. Pure freedom within our rights in a capitalist system VS. Social responsibility towards each other within a Community (do not read communism here I do like munny).
Maybe urban oriented people have lost the sense of importance of community. Here in the rural country we trade with each other for what we need, helping each other when in need, this is essential to survival in this setting. We are responsible to each other here within my
community.
In the city, no one has anything really, just a box full of stuff, toys tools comfort, if they are
fortunate. To survive there it is essential to be part of the financial system. The corporations are saddled with responsibility for the welfare of people, which I don't think they want, they function
on munny not social responsibility so everyone NEEDS A JOB. So now with bulging
populations not producing things themselves, just consuming, the corporations have become
bigger than people, more important in some ways than the communities they are supposed to
serve(this sound like politics yet?). Compound this problem with proprietary information, corporations being recognized legally as having citizenship and rights, money influencing recognition of speech.

Just thinking about the depth of this conflict makes me appreciate our community hall so much
more.
www.glenparkhall.com/

The idea that it's MY right to set MY prices where I want and I don't owe anyone else a fig of consideration...this makes for bad neighours. We have all lost the skill of discerning how our actions impact another. Obviously, our actions are ruining the very earth we stand upon. Yet we forge ahead because it's our turn to get rich doing whatever, causing devastation and pollution as we do. Rugged individualism sounds good in books, but in practice, it can be destructive in insidious ways.

However, when everyone in a neighbourhood decides to sell their eggs for one set price, so everyone makes a fair living, then that decision is just the same as a marketing board. Whether it happens 'officially' in a boardroom or unofficially over coffee at Bob's house, the outcome is the same. Loss of competition is bad for consumers! I am both a producer AND a consumer and have a very hard time deciding where I stand on this issue.

SO let's say all the egg producers in a 50 mile radius decide to price fix their eggs, so no one is getting the short end of the stick and everyone is happy. What do you do with Elmer, that organic weirdo, who feeds his birds yogurt and tofu and claims he has a different and superior product? Whacky old Elmer wants MORE for his eggs because he claims they are not like our common eggs, so he doesn't want to play in the sandbox with the rest of us regular egg kids?

I find that cartels, marketing boards or informal farmer groups have very little room or tolerance for the Elmer's of the world. Once they have agreed that eggs should sell for X, they have also decided that all eggs are created equal and cannot or will not tolerate any deviations. So they try to crush Elmer by demanding that he shut the hell up and play with them in their sandbox.

So is Elmer allowed and encouraged to sell his eggs for more than everyone around him? Is Elmer good or bad for doing what he's doing? Is he being a grandstanding show-off, making everyone else look bad? Or is he an innovative thinker producing a product to fill a niche?

While Omega has a point, that we have an obligation to not take each other out at the knees, Sue also has a point, that the individual is and must be free to set their price for their product as they see fit? Is there room for both to exist side by side, peacefully?

IMO it's not Elmer who wants to charge more who is the problem, it's Wilberforce the well-off pretend-farmer who raises chickens just for fun and doesn't even think about whether they break even. He undercuts, and suddenly everyone else gets a bad name.

This is a commom complaint among woodworkers and potters as well; a guy retires with a good pension and takes up woodworking in his spare time; then sells beautiful things for next to nothing.

ipf wrote:IMO it's not Elmer who wants to charge more who is the problem, it's Wilberforce the well-off pretend-farmer who raises chickens just for fun and doesn't even think about whether they break even. He undercuts, and suddenly everyone else gets a bad name.

This is a commom complaint among woodworkers and potters as well; a guy retires with a good pension and takes up woodworking in his spare time; then sells beautiful things for next to nothing.

Right on the nose.

Canada is an odd duck because we have a capitalist system for most merchandise including art and coffee makers. However, when it comes to agriculture, we lean more to the socialist side.

To correct Uno's assumption, I would never have a problem with Elmer wanting to charge more. If he can make more money by doing a better job, all he does is drive the market in a positive direction. This conforms to the spirit of free enterprise.

Establishing a minimum fair market price really does not interfere with the concept of free enterprise and is very consistent with Canadian values. Right at the core, it meshes with our minimum wage laws. Minimum market price should be able to support minimum wage in the region the food is produced. Those good at producing the food should be able to earn substantially more than minimum wage. One organic manual I read suggested $18/hour was a reasonable expectation for a market grower.

Simply put, the local food movement that many of us are enjoying should be enhancing our overall local economies, not dragging them down.

Omega, didn't intend to imply that you would have a problem with organic Elmer. But I have seen where egg marketing boards are VERY protectionist, or terrorist, pick your term, when it comes to protecting their turf.

It has always been my belief that the kids who want to play in the sandbox together and sell their eggs for price X, should be able to. If you want to enter the sandbox, climb on in. But those kids should not assume they are the end all and be all of the egg world. They should recognize that Elmer is doing something different, (organic) raising his birds to a different set of standards to produce a different end product. He is not even marketing to the run-of-the-mill customers that the others are. He poses no threat to their tidy little sandbox universe. So they should keep their stinky fingers out of his business.

Elmer doing his own organic thing and promoting to the upscale market is NOT the same as someone undercutting his neighbour because he doesn't need $3 a dozen, is happy with $2. Too much of that sort of thing chips away the foundation we're all trying to stand on.

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