Thoughtful Food 
  • Pastured Pork
  • Pasture Fed Beef
  • Our Values
  • About Us
  • Farm Blog

Quarter 3 Report

10/18/2012

1 Comment

 
It's that time again: quarterly report time! As before, I'm doing a year-to-date report rather than a specific one for the 3rd quarter. You can check out the previous reports here and here.
Picture
No big surprises here. Just continued expense for turkey feed, pig feed, and pasture rent. A few other small costs (marketing expenses are currently coded as Misc, for instance). Note that we did pay for all the pig butchering costs first, then got reimbursed from our individual customers, so some of that "Pig" cost is not related to feed.
Picture
Yay for revenue! Turkey basket deposits keep trickling in and I was also able to sell 43 extra hay bales at $6/bale. Revenue from pigs and pork are dominating this period. Included are the sale of four finished pigs and 7 weaner pigs (2 more weaners will go on the Quarter 4 report). While the weaners were not part of the original business plan for 2012, they turned out to be a nice source of revenue, bringing in $1325. Even with the revenue, we're still going to lose money on pigs this year. Feeding, a boar a sow, and three new gilts has cut into our chances of turning a profit this year. Check out this post for more info on feed economics.
Picture
No big surprises here, either. Chores are still the dominant time sink on the farm. They are basically a 50:50 split between the turkeys and the pigs at this point. The food plots come in second in terms of time. I spent 122, 127, and 108 hours on farm tasks in July, August, and September respectively (less food plot work in September because there was no more weeding and we were waiting to harvest). For the year, I average somewhere between 20-30 hours/week on farm activities. That may not sound too bad, but I also have a part-time job that requires 20 hours a week, work for my landlord which adds in another 10-20 hours per week, plus house cleaning and cooking duties. I have no desire to work 12 hour days 7 days a week, so there's not much room for time growth. I must either become more efficient or spend less time on my other jobs. Without those other jobs, I would be making no money this year. Thus, it's a careful dance between scaling up the farm operations and ensuring that we have enough income  (and health insurance!) to live comfortably.
1 Comment
Adam link
11/14/2012 06:41:21 am

Great report! Your' hitting the points in that last paragraph that have us staying where we are in size. I tend to call it a hobby farm, as that seems more understandable to folks, but I would guess our goals are similar. Awesome that you are getting $7 per lb for your turkeys!

Reply



Leave a Reply.

    RSS Feed

Powered by Create your own unique website with customizable templates.