How do you set your wholesale price?

[NY_BLUES]

For the original poster,
I looked around at what other local beekeepers were selling their honey for, and set my price at 25% higher than theirs, as i felt that they were to low. The market would bear my price and the other beekeepers raised their prices also. I then raised my price another 25%, and still sell out before the next season, which tells me I could raise my price again. Set a price that you feel is fair and stick to it. If the customer also thinks it is fair, they will buy. Remember you aren't selling the stuff at Walmart, you have a quality product that demands a quality price. If you set it to low, people will compare it to other low cost honey.

[Daniel Y]

Daniel,
Step out of the business owner mindset and use a farmers mentality for a moment. I know many farmers that have gone their whole lives and never used their labor hours with a cost involved. The owner is not an employee that earns an houly wage, but rather the one that deals with profit or loss after the year is over.
Think about it. If i am a small sidleline beekeeper with 100 hives or so, what can I do to make money? Nucs and queen sales, pollination, and honey? Maybe all of them.
Lets say I don't want any more than 100 hives, and I have already established the cost of woodenware on a previous tax return, so i won't be depreciating it. Say I have 30% loss, so i have 70 hives left. I split all hives into 2 and graft my own queens. I have about 25 dollars in queen cages, cups, candy and swarm bow to raise the 70 new cells I need. I replace the 30 deadouts, and now have 40 nucs to sell at 125 each. Lets say I put them in cardboard nucs, so i spend 200 dollars with Mann lake to buy them. Now I run 50 hives to a locale apple grower for pollination at 40 dollars a hive fee, because he is a close friend and he lets me leave them their until harvest time, and I get a good summer flow their. Just in the nucs sales and apple pollination I have made 2000 from the pollination and 4775 from nucs. If that took me a total of 100 hours to do, which is way to long, are you saying that i really didn't make 6775 profit? Now I know that there are other costs involved such as fuel, marketing etc, but isn't there still money in my hand? Not everyone in agriculture collects a paycheck like a 9-5 worker. Sometimes there is money to draw from, sometimes there isn't, but farming isn't like a brick and morter business.

NY Blues, Your post reminds me of the people that come to Reno. they go into a Casino with $50. they come out with $30 and then say they won $30.

[sqkcrk]

I can only imagine how much the people who know something about Business and Accounting and Marketing find beekeepers entertaining. Laughably thinking about how much we don't understand about Price Setting as part of a profit making Business Plan.

How many of you have a Business Plan? I don't have one. I used to do them annually for the FSA, because I had a Loan w/ FSA. But I haven't done one since.

If you are going to sell honey, are you doing so w/ the idea of making profit in mind? How do you know when you are making that Profit?

[The Honey Householder]

Supply and demand.
If you sell out before the end of your honey season you are priced to low or you just want to get rid of your product.
I wholesale 91% of my crop, because at this time I only have time to retail 9%.
With the wholesale price increasing 10% for the last 3 year. I just keep setting more hives.


My accountant keep telling me, bees in a box is better them money in the bank. So now I store all my money in my hives.

[sqkcrk]

My honey is just about the most expensive in my area and it has been my experience that every time I raise my prices I sell more honey.

[camero7]

My honey is just about the most expensive in my area and it has been my experience that every time I raise my prices I sell more honey.

[NY_BLUES]

[QUOTE=sqkcrk;911732].

How many of you have a Business Plan?.

QUOTE]

Written or well thought out? Written, no, I dont have one. Thought out, yes I do. Its not hard to figure out if I made or lost money in a years time, Uncle Sam wants to know annually. My accountant helps with that, and after the year is over, I hope I made enough to cover costs and put some aside for the years that I need to spend a little more.
I agree with you guys about raising your prices and selling more honey, I have seen that also in my area of the world.