I’m doing some financial planning for next year, figuring out how much it will cost to produce what, and what I can expect to earn from it. I’m breaking it up by operations, assigning to each one a cost in dollars (if I have to buy something) and in the number of hours I expect to spend on it. Then I’m putting that data in a spreadsheet and making all kinds of nifty calculations.
Tonight I was just focusing on eggs. Not counting the time spent actually selling the eggs, nor the cost of gas to run to the feed store, I can expect to make about $8.33 an hour for tending the hens and washing and packing eggs next year if I get 200 new layer chicks and an egg washing machine. But if I figure in all the time and money I’ll have to spend on capital improvements to get there (building another hen house, building predator-proof runs, buying the egg washer, etc.), it brings it down to just $1.94 an hour. Of course, most people amortize those sorts of costs, but the suppliers don’t let me spread out the payments for five years when I buy the stuff.
Once all of that is built, I don’t have to pay for it again until it needs repaired. So if I get another 200 chicks in 2013, giving me a laying flock of 400, I’ll make $12.19/hr at $4.00 a dozen (assuming the price of chicks and feed don’t increase, which, of course, they will). At $3.50/dozen, it works out to $8.63/hr. At $3.00/dozen, I’d make $5.07/hr.–less than minimum wage. At $2.50 a dozen–and I have actually seen someone sell them for that–I’d make a buck-fifty an hour. At $2.00 a dozen–and that’s all some of the high-end stores will pay–I’d actually be $2.06 in the hole for every hour I’d waste caring for chickens and packing eggs. This is after all the improvements are paid for and I’m only counting the cost of new chicks, feed, bedding, cartons, and labels. This doesn’t even take water or electricity into account
Moral of the story: If you see someone selling eggs for less than three bucks a dozen, be suspicious. And the word “Amish” on a carton of eggs says nothing more about the quality of the eggs nor the treatment of the chickens than if they were labeled “Lutheran” or “Pentecostal.”
