The Accidental Smallholder Forum
Livestock => Sheep => Topic started by: manian on July 02, 2011, 06:10:16 pm
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hi
how much should i be charging for my lambs?????
for meat :yum:
Mandie
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Hi sorry no idea either! ::) I suspect it depends on where you are and what you have. I was going to ask too. I~ have 3 eight year old portlands and 2 or 3 portland ram lambs (this years) for the chop also would like to know what to ask and how to ask it?
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What we do is check the local market reports to find what live lambs are going for per kg on average and make that the base price so if the lamb was 30kg live and the market price was £2.00 per kg the lamb would be worth £60 plus slaughter costs.
We do it like that because if people baulk at the price I'll take them to market and sell them live, either way i'm getting the market value.
It does all depend on what your customers are happy to pay.
It gets a bit messy if you start selling it as joints as one part is more expensive per kg than another.
Hope this helps
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thanks for that
i was thinking about £100 for a lamb so should be about right
Mx :sheep: :sheep:
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Blimey I'm getting a lorry and bringing all ours down your way!
Our last batch (last week) averaged £75 per head. These are Charollais crosses, all but two were the weights and conformation required for the supermarkets. (In this case Morrisons.) Our first two lambs of the year, of this same breeding but two of the very best examples, and rather heavier than the supermarkets want, topped our local mart at £127.50 per head. Since then the ppk has dropped by 20%.
I don't know what the marts and market are like down your way, but here you'd get a lot more for your rare breeds selling meat directly at farmers' markets or by the quarter or half a lamb than you would in the ring. The bulk of the buyers who go to the marts are buying for export and supermarkets so there is competition for that kind of animal. There'll probably only be one or two buyers wanting less commercial animals, so less competition and therefore a lower price.
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I agree with sally, selling rare breed at mart is practically useless up north county durham, because you go up against big commerical lambs like charoilias, mules, cheviots, texels beltexs who will almost certainly be prefered at a mart unless its a rare breed mart?
/market.
So in all sell local friends family farmers markets up here people arent always willing to pay that bit extra for rare breed meat
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If they are rare breeds I think my basis for pricing goes out of the window. I don't do rare breeds, my flock is made up of the unwanted and unloved from the mart, brought home and given a new lease of life. None of my flock (apart from my rams) cost me more than £25 original outlay!#
We don't see many rare breeds through our local marts, I think the closest we get are a couple of Balwens or Badger-Faces (of which I have one of each).
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mine aren't commercial either
they are all cade lambs (is that how you spell it?? :dunce:)
got them free from a farmer friend and they are a mixture......
plan to sell to friends / family....... luckily i work in the health service so have a large pool of collegues, that want to know where there meat has come from......
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We also look at the top end of the supermarket prices and charge that per kilo. We sell meat directly to friends and colleagues, no less than half-a-lamb at a time. People seem happy to pay that sort of rate, for what they say is way better meat. Suits us all. I suppose it works out at about £80 per half (we breed Rough Fells - large hill sheep). There's butchering to factor into that, as we send the lambs to the local abattoir and they come back vacuum packed and labelled, which is how townies like them ;)
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I only sell the odd half and only to friends/family, so it's mates rates just to cover costs etc but for our wee scrawny Shetlands I charge them £40 a half for lamb or £45 for hoggett. If I was selling to the public it would be more.
edited to add that covers the meat, slaughter and butchery. Not too much profit but it does mean my half is 'free' :-)
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Interesting topic I live in Brittany i had three lambs to go for meat kept 1 and a half for my freezer sold half to a neighbour and the butcher bought the other,butcher paid 6.50 euros a kilo it weighed in at 23.40 kilos ,neighbour paid 8euros a kilo didn't want to sell to Joe public but OH had other plans.just had own lamb chops the taste was better than super markets so i think I should of kept others for freezer.
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Prices in the South West are the highest they have ever been. £80 - £100 common place at the moment
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I have just sold 4 shetland hoggets butchered at £80 each. I am planning on changing to a faster growing breed as this lot cost a fortune due to having to feed lots of hay during the winter. I think I would rather get them away as lambs, the problem is I don't know what breed to go for.Any suggestions would be welcomed ;D :sheep:
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I have just sold 4 shetland hoggets butchered at £80 each. I am planning on changing to a faster growing breed as this lot cost a fortune due to having to feed lots of hay during the winter. I think I would rather get them away as lambs, the problem is I don't know what breed to go for.Any suggestions would be welcomed ;D :sheep:
Our White Welsh Mountains and Beulah Speckled Faces are ready to go now after being born in Mid March, which I think is a quick turnaround and the lambs have only eaten grass, no concentrates or forage.
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We send our Rough Fells in October, having been born in April. Grass only. But a cross or meat breed would grow faster.
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I have just sold 4 shetland hoggets butchered at £80 each. I am planning on changing to a faster growing breed as this lot cost a fortune due to having to feed lots of hay during the winter. I think I would rather get them away as lambs, the problem is I don't know what breed to go for.Any suggestions would be welcomed ;D :sheep:
my vet crosses his shetland ladies with Lleyn. They grow faster (tho dont end up huge) but they lamb easily, are good mothers and they have more lambs per ewe so more ££. Pretty too! so maybe worth considering.
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I sell mine for £125 that includes for delivery (local)killed, butchered, packed and labelled, boxed, for example 4 lamb chops in a freezer bag with a label, all joints are labelled and in seperate freezer bags, ( butcher charges me £25 for the killing, butchering packing) so I make £100 per lamb which they averaged 22-24kg each. I am in Kent
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thanks for all advice :-*
now ........what joints/cuts are the usual...... and what do yoou do with spare bits (eg sausages when i do my pigs)
I never knew how much i didn'tknow!!! :dunce: :dunce:
Mx
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I have just sold 4 shetland hoggets butchered at £80 each. I am planning on changing to a faster growing breed as this lot cost a fortune due to having to feed lots of hay during the winter. I think I would rather get them away as lambs, the problem is I don't know what breed to go for.Any suggestions would be welcomed ;D :sheep:
No reason to compromise on meat quality (partly due to the slower growth rate) of Shetlands by crossing them. Are you expecting to get a quart out of a pint pot? 30kg live wt is an achievable target if they don't go short of grazing through the summer. Their meat has be more expensive because the costs after the farm gate are per head for a lower yield, but its worth every penny.
I am charging £85.00 plus postage on whole lambs ordered for delivery this autumn from www.briggs-shetlandlamb.co.uk (http://www.briggs-shetlandlamb.co.uk)
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If you think at 40kg live weight the market average in about £2 a kilo just now that means the average lamb in the market is worth £80. If selling the lamb "In the box" to friends and family you need to make that £80 per carcass so you'll have to charge enough to cover the costs of slaughter, butchery and transport over and above that £80 to keep the same margins. I think you'll struggle to sell that lamb for less than £130 and keep your margins the same. In the supermarket the lamb is probably sold for an average of £10-12/kg so a 20 kilo carcass, allowing for 3kg of waste in bones and discarded fat, will be sold for £170 to £184 each. Just a rough guide but I hope it helps.
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Oh for a decent price over here, its 300 hvs, :o thats about 30 pounds per goat, no buts ifs or cans, makes no odds whether its 80 kgs or 120 kgs or even a young kid, its all the same price if you sell them to the slaughter lorry, so we sell the dead animal and sell them to locals or family for a better price. :goat:
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If you think at 40kg live weight the market average in about £2 a kilo just now that means the average lamb in the market is worth £80. If selling the lamb "In the box" to friends and family you need to make that £80 per carcass so you'll have to charge enough to cover the costs of slaughter, butchery and transport over and above that £80 to keep the same margins. I think you'll struggle to sell that lamb for less than £130 and keep your margins the same. In the supermarket the lamb is probably sold for an average of £10-12/kg so a 20 kilo carcass, allowing for 3kg of waste in bones and discarded fat, will be sold for £170 to £184 each. Just a rough guide but I hope it helps.
The other thing to bear in mind is what the lambs cost you. eg shetland ewe (unreg) in lamb cost me only £35, or shearling £25. Whereas a more commercial ewe might cost £100, and probably need more hard feed, vet intervention at problem lambings etc. So for me, I can take the lower amount of work and cost and sell the meat at £80-90 per lamb. Since I am only selling 'spare ones' and am going to the slaughterhouse to take my home consumption ones anyway, then only the slaughter and butchery cost is extra, the transport is something I am already paying for. Basically I work on the basis that the half I sell will pay for the half we keep plus a bit. But thats a hobby approach, if it were a business it would be different.