Cornish Cross Spring 2018 Cost/Profit/Loss or Freezer Meat

[baymule]

The dust has settled, the results are in.

I ordered 30 CX chicks.
We got 25? one week olds at TSC for free 3 days before the 30 arrived.
One of the chicks I ordered was dead when it got here.
Several died along the way, 2 were full grown and just dropped dead.
We slaughtered 44.

Cost of ordered chicks was $1.60 each, total $46.40 with credit given for dead chick.

Feed: 770 pounds
Feed cost: $264

Total pounds of dressed whole chicken 231.1
Average weight of each chicken is 5 pounds, 11 ounces.

3.33 pounds of feed per pound of dressed whole chicken

Cost per pound (for feed) of whole dressed chicken; $1.14

Cost of ice for the ice chest that held the butchered chickens $40

Cost of vacuum seal bags: $8

We sold 10 chickens for $198.72

We bought the chick feed at TSC, one bag at Atwoods. On the last bag, I found cheaper feed by $5 per 50 pound bag at the feed store in Sulphur Springs where we buy the horse feed.

Total costs: $358.40

In summary, from start to finish was 60 days. I went in the hole $159.68, but I only sold 10 out of 44 chickens.....not too bad.
34 chickens weight totaled 175 pounds, 7 ounces for s cost of about 90 cents per pound.

I canned 25 quarts of "dog food" and so far, 17 pints of broth. (I just turned off the pressure canner with the last 5 quarts of dog food and I have a pot of broth to can)

The freezer is stocked with packages of boneless, skinless breast meat, leg quarters and wings. We will supply our DD and family with chicken.

Edited to add, just put 16 pints of broth in the canner for a total of 33 pints of broth.

 

[NH Homesteader]

Woohoo! Not bad at all. Will you raise them again? You're going to have happy people and happy dogs!

 

[BarredBuff]

On this scale, it is difficult to make money on projects like this one. However, nothing beats having a pantry and freezer full of home grown chicken. It makes life easier in that respect.

 

[baymule]

I may do this again in the fall if my "customer" wants more chicken and we and our daughter's family have eaten up all the chicken in the freezer.

 

[Chic Rustler]

Wow! Kinda makes me want to do it.


There's a dairy a few towns over. They opened their own little store to sell raw milk and ice cream. They get $7 for a gallon of milk but they sell other stuff. Like $12 a can jelly and $22 whole chicken. The money is there if you find the customer base

 

[NH Homesteader]

Wow... Not here, that's crazy pricing! Except the milk, for raw that's not terrible.

 

[FarmerJamie]

This looks like the cost per pound of meat was about $1.50 A quick Google search places it at the high end for not organic. I think the cost (and benefit) is good

 

[baymule]

@Chic Rustler you should raise a few CX for your family. Maybe 10. but I would raise them in the fall. It's too hot now.

 

[baymule]

Our customer that bought 10 chickens from us asked for more chicken. She wanted 2 packages of breast, 2 thighs and 2 drumsticks. I packaged the breast 3 pieces, thighs and drumsticks were not cut apart and packaged 4 to a package. It came to 14 pounds, cost $78.

So scrolling up to drag down some numbers...….

Total cost was $358.40

Sales $198.72
New sales $78

Brings our cost down to $81.68

We kept for ourselves 175.7 pounds of chicken, minus the 14 pounds we just sold, brings it down to 161.7 pounds for ourselves. This reduces our cost for the chicken we kept for ourselves to fifty cents a pound!

Not too shabby. We had chicken wings tonight. Delicious!

 

[FarmerJamie]

And "all the math" stuff, too. Lolol

Takes me back. good job