If you sell your farm eggs, how did you settle on a price per dozen? Maybe you compared prices in the grocery store, or called around to other farms, or perhaps your customers told you how much they were willing to spend. Let’s look at it from a cost perspective. How much food did the chicken eat to produce a dozen eggs? To do this, we need to make a few assumptions.
Assumption #1: We’ll calculate on an annual basis. Nearly every chicken lays in the spring, and egg production peaks in early May. But older birds lay less or stop laying completely in winter. So we have to consider the whole year to get an accurate average cost.
Assumption #2: We’ll assume that a chicken lays 200 eggs per year. Before you say that you bought the chickens that lay 250 eggs per year, here’s the rationale. A chicken loses 20% of its laying potential each year. And few owners turn over their flock each year. Most people tend to keep their chickens 3-5 years. And many add new birds each year and cull the old ones. So a flock with new and old layers will lay about 200 eggs per year on average. This is a generous number; it’s probably closer to 180. If all your chickens are old, your numbers will be much worse, like around 150.
Assumption #3: Adult chickens eat 1/2 pound of feed per day. The generally accepted number is 1/3 pound, but backyard farmers don’t have the efficiency of large chicken farms. There is waste. Feed gets spilled or spoiled by weather or perhaps eaten by rodents.
Assumption #4: You sell on a constant basis. If you only sell in spring when eggs are plentiful, then get whatever you can. But these calculations are for year-round sellers.
OK, assumptions in place. Now we calculate. The cost per dozen is calculated by using the cost of the feed, how much they eat, and how many dozen they produce on average each year. The formula looks like this:
Notice that only number we don’t have to calculate the cost per dozen is the cost of a bag of feed. Some of us buy expensive feed, while others buy the cheapest feed they can find. So, let’s calculate all the other numbers so we can simply multiply the cost of a bag of feed by one number to get the cost per dozen. That looks like this:
The cheapest bag of feed we can find is $11.50. Multiply that by .219 and the feed cost to make a dozen eggs is $2.52. Pay $16 for a bag of feed and that number goes to $3.50. $20 per bag makes it $4.38/dozen.
Keep in mind, that’s just the cost of feed needed to fill the carton. You still had to build a coop and furnish it with feeders, waterers, nesting boxes, and roost bars. And none of your time is figured in. There are other factors that will raise the cost too. They include:
- Do you feed your chickens treats, like corn or scratch grains or meal worms? That’s added cost.
- Are you raising chicks and feeding them chick starter for 5 months while waiting for them to lay? That’s more added cost.
- Are you tax free? If not, add tax to the cost of your feed.
- Do you have chickens that eat eggs or routinely break them? Figure those loses into the cost.
- Do you buy cartons? Labels? They add to the cost.
- Has there been a predator in or near the coop scaring your layers? Did a neighbor’s dog terrorize your flock? Chickens that don’t feel safe will slow their laying or stop all together.
- Are all your chickens healthy? Only healthy chickens lay eggs. Older hens tend to lose their immunities and get ill with things like water belly, oviduct infection, coccidiosis, mycoplasma, bumble foot, mites, and worms, just to mention a few. All of these will affect egg production. And even though they’re not laying, they’re still eating!
- Did you leave for a few days and ask the neighbor kid to take care of your chickens, only to find out he forgot to give them feed and water? A chicken without water for a day might not lay for the next 2 weeks.
- Do you have hens that go broody? About 10% of hens will. Broody hens don’t lay for 8 weeks.
- Do you have hens that lay small eggs or soft-shell eggs? If they’re unsellable, it’s the same as them not laying at all.
So what’s the impact of these other factors on cost? It’s hard to say and it’s very dependent on your situation. For us, the treats, chick feed, labeling, broken eggs, small eggs, broody hens, and illness add at least 30%. Now that $2.52 carton is $3.27.
Here in Ohio, we occasionally see people selling eggs for $2/dozen. If you’re only trying to get rid of excess eggs in the spring and you live far away from your customers, then maybe $2 is better than feeding your eggs back to your chickens or dogs. But if you sell eggs all year and only charge $2, it may be costing you $1 or more for every dozen you sell.
For many customers, it’s a matter of education. Explain to them why your eggs are so much better than anything in the store. Talk about freshness, how much happier your chickens are, and how their diet of feed, bugs, and grass make a richer, more nutritious, and tastier egg. In the past, some farmers might have felt that they couldn’t compete with $.59 eggs in the store, but now that egg prices have jumped considerably, your customers will understand if you raise your prices. Besides, feed cost alone has jumped 15-20% in the past year.
Most importantly, don’t arbitrarily put a price on your eggs. Understand the costs that go into creating those delicious eggs, and educate your customers.