[cambee]

As always, really hoping to get some really interesting views and advice. So we are coming up to 18 months of smallholding. We have the holiday let which is a great success and some diy livery which is fine. We have our small flock of chickens, eat and sell our eggs. Can’t produce enough eggs to meet demand so we have incubated (so far) 3 batches of chicks and are waiting for the first lot to start laying. We also have our small flock of Ryelands and lambed for the first time this year- 7 lambs only. We sold the girls but as we don’t do showing so have no ‘reputation’ we have the 4 boys to get rid of. I genuinely thought that once we put up a sign outside the farm, we would get orders for half lambs which would potentially set us up for next year with a customer base. But no. Even with friends and family made aware on Facebook we only have orders for 4 halves. So that says to me that we shouldn’t lamb again next year as what would it be for? And that just wasn’t in the plan. I thought we’d be growing not stagnating in our first years. What would you do? Is lamb less popular now? Has anyone else had this slow start? Just interested to hear opinions. Thank you.

[bj_cardiff]

I don't want to be a downer but this is my experience..

Its really hard to sell lamb to friends and family, my family are used to buying discounted or New Zealand Lamb, so I would offer them lamb for cost and those members of the family which brought it considered they were doing me a favour by buying it.. You just can't compete with the big producers.. I sell my sheep for more alive to a big local buyer..

You can spend years trying to get top dollar for breeding ram lambs, but your competing agaist people who have been doing it for generations and to be fair, you can't just gain that knowledge and reputation in a few years. Lambs will always have a market at the sales, they will get whatwever they are worth and you quickly learn what the market wants..

For me its lifestyle, I enjoy the sheep, pigs, goats, poultry and horses but they really don't make a lot of money.. I think when I worked it out the sheep were bringing in £5 a week after all the bills had been paid.. 

I'd stick to what your doing, you sould like your on ther right track, if the livery is bringing in money cut back on the sheep and expand that and also maybe concerntrate on the holiday let, maybe think about expanding that?

[Buttermilk]

Your sheep will be great at tidying up the grazing after the horses, while reducing the equine worm population.  This is a non £ making exercise that is a huge benefit to you.  I now sell all my male lambs straight after weaning through the store mart and up to now they have sold well - the same buyer has bought them 3 years running so he must be happy too.

I did try the selling to friends who bought whole lambs but it was such a faff getting them to the abatoir, collecting and delivering that the loss in value was more than made up for in less hassle.

[Rosemary]

It takes a while to build a customer base for meat and we find beef much easier to sell than lamb - even though Ryeland lamb is fantastic. We had six away on Monday (with the last three going end October) and have sold eight halves - the rest will go in the freezer for selling frozen over the year.
It is a hassle selling direct but we just don't fancy putting them through the ring and them ending up who knows where but it's not the easiest option.
You could try a local butcher?

[cambee]

Thanks it’s useful to hear other people’s take on things. Can I ask Buttermilk what is the ‘store mart’? And bj how did you go about finding a local buyer? We have got to know a couple of commercial farmers so I guess we ask them? I’m assuming though that local buyers prefer more commercial sheep and not Ryelands. I think we thought that we would get into showing and then decided that it just wasn’t for us so we will never be in a position to sell breeding stock though our Tup is a champion. We might sell him to get some of our money back and use one of his sons for breeding. But there’s no point breeding if we can’t offload the lambs hence my dilemma!

[Buttermilk]

Livestock auction markets run several sorts of sales.  The fat mart, or red sales are of finished stock that are sold for killing.  Store marts or green sales are for young or breeding animals where they sell on to other farms for either finishing or breeding.  Often a meat man will buy from the store ring if the animals are in the right condition to slaughter but as they are not bidding against other butchers they can pick up a bargain or lose out to private buyers.  They frequently go home without a load.

Then there are the specialist sales, either breed specific or general for breeding sheep and rams.  Dispersal sales where whole herds/flocks get sold etc.

[Fleecewife]

Sticking a sign up at the gate isn't a promising way to go.  Before we kept our own sheep and saw that kind of sign, the questions we asked ourselves were:  How much is half a lamb? What cuts will we get? Will there be burgers, mince and sausages? How much space will it take in the freezer? How long would it take us to eat it?  How does the price compare with lamb from the shop? This must be much cheaper surely?  How do we go about getting the lamb?  Just walk up to the door or will we have to go round the farm and find someone? Is it frozen in joints or do we have to chop it up ourselves? (well, people really don't know)  Is this supplier any good? And so on.


Have you thought about advertising online?  You can answer those sorts of questions and more, and explain to people why your lamb is special.  Did you research the breed for meat sales before you bought them?  We used to sell whole lambs to Mr F's work colleagues and regularly sold half a dozen, but no more.  The rest we ate ourselves or gave to family members, joint by joint, or as burgers and sausages (very popular). Our breed is Hebridean, so a Primitive which is something of a niche market, and sometimes mentioned by celebrity chefs, so that is a good selling point.


The whole trick about selling anything is salesmanship (I don't have any!).  I see people selling things for outrageous prices, but because they have the patter people are queuing up to buy. Do some research online looking at what others do to advertise their product - sometimes it's just a load of Blarney, but people buy - I've seen Hebridean meat sold at twice the price for half a lamb that we charged for a whole one, so four times the overall cost (and Heb carcases are quite small) So charge more and let people know you have a specialist, superior product.  Get good packaging and sell through the post/delivery service.


You have been doing this for only 18 months - in this malarkey you don't just walk in and become an instant success.  You will learn so much from experience and from others.  In a few years' time you will be laughing that you thought your progress wasn't quick enough so early on.  So relax, take the time to enjoy what you're doing, and keep your expectations low - then you won't be disappointed 

[Backinwellies]

Selling half lambs isnt easy. Fleecewife sums it up well. It takes work... My OH rings round loads of his old clients every year selling..... Some friends bought in first year but to be honest most just want to pop to Waitrose! Other people are now regular customers who even have a whole one!   

You will of course need at least one whole one in your freezer so that does only leave you 2 halves to sell...... Talk to everyone you know ..... Not so easy if you have not long moved to a new area..... Word of mouth is the best advert!


Just a couple of points on the legal side .... Legally you can't store and then sell,  or even give to family , without environmental health involvement.  We just deliver direct from butcher to customer without unpacking ... So no storage or direct handling.

Rylands are a great fun breed but won't sell well in any market. 

[Anke]

We have found that most urban folk do not have a large freezer, and even if they do they often plan their meals on the way home form work (I know I did!), nowadays pop up a recipe on the phone and go into your local supermarket and pick it up… We found it hard to get people to commit to more than a few cuts/pieces - however I think Xmas birds (geese or turkeys) would be viable if you can get the slaughter sorted.


With the lack of local abattoirs/good butchers to cut it up and pack for a reasonable price we have now given up on selling any meat, I sell my excess (Shetland) sheep as 18 to 24 months old at the mart, and we home slaughter for our private consumption. I only breed my ewes every couple of years (or only a small number every year and give others a rest). I have to admit, it takes the hassle out of hassling people… I am not a saleswoman at all!


The one thing we cannot sell enough of is eggs (to my husband's colleagues in the city of course), but even that doesn't necessarily make a profit, but by my rough calculation means that the eggs we consume and probably the spare cockerels are free.


Probably not the encouragement you were after.... sorry.

[cambee]

No don’t apologise. These replies were exactly the sort of feedback I was looking for and just help to think things through. Since my original post I’ve actually managed to get interest in 6 half lambs and the 4th whole lamb will be for us so no 2018 lambs left after November. Yes Wellies we are simply picking up and delivering locally this time-no handling. However, having read loads of other threads on this forum I have today in advance registered as a food business with High Peak because I got into a panic that I could get in trouble. Apparently I will hear from EHO within 5 days and at that stage I’m going to enquire into what we’d need to do to be able to freezer store and sell as joints next year as I think that may be more of an attractive option. It may be that the capital outlay will be too much but we’ve potentially got another 15 years of smallholding ahead of us, plus we are thinking about weaners. It’s more about having a purpose behind what we do and trying to at least break even really. It’s a big learning curve but we love the challenge.

[SallyintNorth]

I hope you will let us know what EHO say.  I’m always bothered about the length of time it takes to freeze quantities of meat down; most domestic freezers can only manage to freeze around 10kgs in 24 hours, so if a batch of 8 lambs comes back... 

[macgro7]

It depends where you are and who your market is. In our city (Leicester) I could easily sell dozens of whole lambs every month. I would struggle to find market for beef though.
For time being I only sell chickens and can't keep up with the demand.

[Anke]

It depends where you are and who your market is. In our city (Leicester) I could easily sell dozens of whole lambs every month. I would struggle to find market for beef though.
For time being I only sell chickens and can't keep up with the demand.

You could probably sell even more goat wethers where you are… (no market up here though).

[cambee]

Interesting Macgro. Do you sell at market or direct? We are trying to expand our chicken flock but concentrating on that for eggs really. However that will mean lots of no use cockerels so if we could off load those for meat... Also, yes Wellies I’ve come to the conclusion that Ryelands were a great choice for looks and for temperament but probably not for the meat market as they’re quite precious we’ve found. Whereas the Suffolk cross cades we raised never ail a thing and don’t seem to get so fat. So that means gradually changing the flock over ( 2 six year olds, 3 three year olds and one shearling plus our Tup). So another one to think through. As tupping time is imminent we may as well lamb some of them next year then decide how and what to swap to.

[Black Sheep]

We've recently been through the process of registering as a food business too. Was quite straightforward and the EHO that came out to inspect was happy with our approach. At present we only receive back butchered meat in sealed packs and then freeze prior to ultimate sale - so much simpler than having to set up to prepare food. However we were still recommended to get "the right" disinfectants etc for surfaces.

CE marked scales for weighing (our simple kitchen set is ok), a folder for records e.g. of freezer temperatures, appropriate labels that meet the legal requirements, and a food safety management plan are all needed. However this was all pretty easy to sort out using the information and templates available online. Happy to share our plan if it would be helpful to others.

We got a 5 rating.