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Honey labeling requirements... good enough?

9K views 25 replies 10 participants last post by  gmcharlie 
#1 ·
I've recently read a 500 post thread that was sort of on this subject, though it was based on an article that many found inflammatory and unfair. As a consequence, little light was shed on the subject.

But it did get me to thinking about the subject, which may or may not have been a good thing.

Here's my premise: beekeeping is a kind of farming, and in this country, farming is in trouble, especially the kind of small scale farming that used to be the backbone of the country's agricultural production. For many years, the mantra in farming was Get Big or Get Out. And most small farmers did get out. The industry (and I use that word regretfully) is now dominated by by large-scale farming.

However, it seems to me that beekeeping is a form of agriculture that is poorly suited to large-scale implementation. Unfortunately, the marketing system seems to favor large-scale honey packers over beekeepers. The FDA's labeling requirements make it fairly easy for inexpensive imported honey to depress the prices that American beekeepers get for their product. Because of these lax requirement, it seems more difficult than it should be for beekeepers to market their product as superior to commodity imported honey.

To go back to the small farm analogy, any small farmer these days who tries to compete with agribusiness by raising commodity crops like corn and soybeans is on the road to bankruptcy. He just can't do it; he doesn't have the economies of scale, the capitalization, and the subsidies that make these crops so profitable for agribusiness. The only small farmers these days who seem to be prospering are those who have found ways to market their products as unique and in some way superior to commodity products. Think, for example, of organic farmers, or those who market specialty vegetable to restaurants, or who raise grass-fed beef... and so on.

It sure seems to me that the FDA could do more to help American beekeepers by requiring retail labels to show place of origin, degree of filtration, purity, etc., and devoting resources to enforcing these requirements.

I'm not even a beekeeper, so maybe I should sit down and shut up. But it must be pretty difficult for many smaller commercial beekeepers to make a living from honey production alone, competing head-to-head with cheap imported honey. I really like honey; I've discovered that honey varietals are every bit as interesting as wine varietals. Would it not be a good thing if local beekeepers could market their honey as special, as a product of their unique setting... rather than shipping barrels of honey at commodity prices to honey packers. (And I know that they can market locally, selling in local co-ops and farmer's markets and so forth) But that isn't a reasonable approach for a national market.

In France, many vintners make a very good living from very small vineyards, in part because the French authorities ferociously control the labeling of the product. We seem to be at the other end of the spectrum when it comes to labeling honey.

Anyway, sorry about writing a book, and my apologies in advance for any stupid stuff I've said.
 
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#2 ·
I for one don’t intend to compete with commodity priced honey. A smart entrepreneur could set up a national marketing system for honey, as have many small-scale breweries. Boston lager is the first to come to mind. Look at Starbucks who ever thought selling gourmet coffee in the US could be a multi million-dollar business; they don’t compete with Maxwell House. I think free trade agreements with China and other countries are the reason for cheep-imported honey not labeling. :)
 
#3 ·
>>>To go back to the small farm analogy, any small farmer these days who tries to compete with agribusiness by raising commodity crops like corn and soybeans is on the road to bankruptcy. He just can't do it; he doesn't have the economies of scale, the capitalization,<<<

its has been that way right from the start,
everything is relative

>>>nyway, sorry about writing a book, and my apologies in advance for any stupid stuff I've said.<<<

non sense, if you want to see stupid, refer back to the last thread.
 
#10 ·
Isn't that what you and 499 or so other beekeepers did? I think it's a great idea. Helps to level the playing field.

Maybe beekeepers from the US are more cantankerous than Canadian ones.

I'd just like to see a labeling system here that would differentiate between really good honey, and not-so-good honey. If a consumer walks into a store and sees honey that says "Manitoba Prairie Wildflower honey produced and bottled by independent beekeepers, with minimal filtering and a water content of17.6 percent." and right next to it a bottle of much cheaper honey that says "Manufactured in China" then I think it would turn out to be good for the independent beekeepers. Folks who care a lot about how food tastes are a rapidly growing market, I think.

By the way, I'm not knocking all Chinese beekeepers. I know that in China, good honey is a pretty big deal; you can go into a specialty store devoted to honey and buy it by the capped frame. But industrial honey shouldn't be marketed in a way that competes with better honey, in my opinion. Right now, that seems to be a problem here.

Ray
 
#8 ·
I'm a little confused. There's nothing that prevents me from labeling my honey as, for instance, raw, pure, unfiltered, local or such. And I don't see such claims on the labels of "store honey". I think the implication in that other thread was not to label mine as "good" but to force the other guy to label his as "bad".
 
#9 ·
Charlie,
I think they were calling for fulldisclosure labeling on that other Thread. But, I doubt that anything would satisfy.

Yes, you can label your honey how you wish, as long as it fits the Legal Requirements by doing what is required and not doing what is not allowed. Between those perameters lays freedom to do what you wish.
 
#13 ·
Ray,
SoiuxBee Co-op members have done just that. Banned together to market their own honey. Being a cooperative of course they can buy and sell as much hyoney as their members produce. That's how Co-ops work in the US.

Who establishes "good" and "not so good" standards? We can't even get an Identity Standard in this Country, a Standard which says what HONEY is, regardless of quality or qualities.

I'm not sure what "industrial honey" is. If we really want to get into that conversation here in this Thread, which is about Labeling.
 
#17 ·
Who establishes "good" and "not so good" standards? We can't even get an Identity Standard in this Country, a Standard which says what HONEY is, regardless of quality or qualities.
You're right, of course. In the other thread, I tried to get some foreign beekeepers to chime in on what problems the more stringent standards in, say, the EU, have affected their business. Apparently the EU standards don't allow filtering out all pollen, for example, and even specify the mesh size of permitted screens. I can see where these regulations could become pretty aggravating, in the hands of petty bureaucrats, and in fact, there was a case where a court ruled that GMO pollen made honey unfit for sale; they classified pollen as a honey "additive". This opened a really ferocious can of worms, since the ruling might have led to mandatory testing for GMO pollen. But eventually cooler heads prevailed, as I understand it, and new regulations defined pollen as an integral part of the product.

I know it's not a simple matter. I'm about as ignorant about bees as they come, but I know that there's lots of sentiment among even the biggest outfits that a standard is needed to protect the integrity of the product.
 
#15 ·
I think the implication in that other thread was not to label mine as "good" but to force the other guy to label his as "bad". -cg3
Yeah, although it was more than implied by a few on that other thread. They flat-out stated that they believed everyone should be required to label beyond the current standards.

You know, "marketing through legislation."

I wonder how many labs would have to open to run all the pollen analyses if labels were required to disclose floral sources? Think of the math: more than 300 million pounds of honey consumed annually in the U. S. Let's say 300 million for simplicity, and let's say that it's sampled at a rate of 1/2 percent. That's 1.5 million samples for pollen analysis each year. Spread among the, what, 5? labs that currently can do that kind of work? That's 300,000 samples per lab per year, or more than 1000 per work day per lab each year.
 
#16 ·
Not being a genius does have a price. (That goes for consumers, too.)

Savannah Honey just showed up in our local Krogers. If I recall correctly, it was $10 for a 12oz bottle. Not too shabby. But they also carry 2 local beekeepers raw honey for something like $5-6. It will be interesting to see how it shakes out.
 
#18 · (Edited)
I think the government should mind its own business and not ours.
if we do a good job of it, we don't need their protection.

Let them tax the foreigner by tariff and excise rather than take our income.
That's what was done in the 18th & 19th centuries, and there were times that they didn't know what to do about the budget surplus.

Some of the scariest words a small businessman (or any citizen, for that matter) can hear are,

"I'm from the government and I'm here to help."
 
#23 ·
>>>Isn't that what you and 499 or so other beekeepers did? I think it's a great idea. Helps to level the playing field.<<<
>>> "Manitoba Prairie Wildflower honey produced and bottled by independent beekeepers, with minimal filtering and a water content of17.6 percent." and right next to it a bottle of much cheaper honey that says "Manufactured in China" then I think it would turn out to be good for the independent beekeepers. Folks who care a lot about how food tastes are a rapidly growing market, I think.<<<

EXACTLY RIGHT !!! yay for rhaldridge !!

Its so nice not having to talk to nuts in this topic ,
 
#25 ·
I've been in the Savannah Bee Company store in Charleston, SC. It is a marketing masterpeice. It makes honey look beautiful, with bottles and backlighting. Then they hit you with the romance of the "We love the Honey Bee and want to protect it" story. They have all their honey types in a row and let you taste each one and let you decide which one you like. I have more than I need at home and somehow I ended up with some of theirs. Now that's how to sell honey! It's all in the way you present it. You can put it on a shelf next to the other guys and say "pick a jar", or you can make it a multi sensory experience. Most people I know don't buy a ton of honey every year so making it more personal the few times they buy gets your story out better than any label ever could.
 
#26 ·
Lots of interesting thoughts. Let me add a cpl. First off as a local beek, normally you can bottle and sell your honey from the kitchen. IL where I live allows up to 500lbs a year and your exempt from Health Dept laws. After that you need to have a State certified extracting room and bottling, although the extracting room is debatable as there are no real standards in IL. So when you "band together" you need to have a "legal location" and a marketing and distribution system, whos going to manage that?? Price and quality are important, but don't run down the Sioux bee and others that do a good job of distributing a LOT of honey done by many members here. Just step up and sell you local stuff for any amount you seem fit and fair!. if you can get 20 a lb and still sleep well, more power to you..... I am starting now to handle non local honey in addition to local supplies and glad to let the customers choose which they like. We get 5.00 a lb, no matter what and our distibitors mark it up from there.

But PLEASE PLEASE PLEAS< don't ask for more goverment regulations.... to help you sell you product.
 
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