Please help me price our eggs. Tell me where you are located, the size of your eggs, the color of your eggs and the price you charge per dozen.

-- Ann Markson (tngreenacres@hotmail.com), September 14, 2001

Answers

Central Wisconsin, medium to large eggs, brown, used to get $1.00/dozen but as soon as this batch of hens starts laying I will be selling for $1.50/dozen, selling as organically raised eggs. People tell me they'd pay $2.00/dozen, but I think $1.50 is enough. They come to the house to pick up or if I'm going their way, I drop off. They save the cartons for me. When they come to the house, they also usually buy garden produce if I've got extra to sell. Check the archives also, I think there are several old threads on this topic. (sure hope the IRS isn't reading this!)

-- Rose Marie Wild (wintersongfarm@yahoo.com), September 14, 2001.

Mine are also med to large brown and greenish (araucana) eggs. I am in CA. on the central coast, and sell them for $1.50 a doz. I don't sell alot of them, end up providing extended family with free eggs alot more, but can always sell any extras I have no problem. I hope this helps!! Good luck!

-- Jenny Pipes (Auntjenny6@aol.com), September 14, 2001.

Here in N.E. Okla. most people are not really into organic. They are more worried about price than the health of it. I sell mine for $1.00 per dozen regardless of size or color. I usually have the same customers which usually keeps me bought out. Most of them are elders who grew up eating fresh farm eggs. The only time I have had an unusual amount of customers is last winter when we had a big ice storms and delivery trucks couldn't deliver in our area. I usually sell just enough eggs to be able to buy their next bag of feed.

-- r.h. in okla. (rhays@sstelco.com), September 14, 2001.

Located in SE Ohio, hens lay medium size brown eggs, I sell them at a 1.00 a dozen regardless of size, in used cartons. Folks bring me their old cartons. I sell enough to pay for their costs to keep them, the only farm animal that I have that can make that claim!

Right now, the young pullets are just starting to lay, they lay small size eggs for a month or so till they get a bit older, these eggs I give away, or sell for 75 cents, depending on the buyer, friends get them free.

-- Annie Miller in SE OH (annie@1st.net), September 14, 2001.

I'm planning on putting in a small grass-raised free-range layer operation myself after we get moved onto our new place and have been reading a number of poultry groups these last several months to get a feel for the business. I've raised hens for years but never hundreds and have never sold more than a few casual dozen eggs.

What I'm going to do is study the offerings in my local supermarkets who sell the kinds of eggs that I'll be competing against. Fortunately, the largest town in my area is a major university town and there's a market for something other than the cheapest possible dozen eggs. Ordinary, confinement operation brown eggs go for about $1.10-$1.30 and the "free-range", "free-roaming" and "free-range organic eggs" run from about $1.90-$2.50 a dozen. My operation won't be organic (simply can't find organic feed) but I'll be emphasizing the *grass-raised*, free-range, fresh, *local* aspects of my eggs and intend to price them just above their nearest competitors starting at $2.00 a dozen and maybe going to $2.25-$2.50 a dozen when I finally do get eggs out the door.

If you're in a market that really appreciates quality, fresh locally raised eggs then price yours at least 25 cents a dozen higher than your nearest competitor and emphasize the positive aspects of your eggs and your operation. It's much easier to drop your prices than to raise them but I don't think you'll have to.

={(Oak)-

-- Live Oak (oneliveoak@yahoo.com), September 14, 2001.

i too am in N.Fl. although I give most of my eggs away..I am offered 1.50-1.75 a dozen. I just don't have enough to be able to supply people regularly and have mine for personal use only..all brown, large eggs

-- sandi (msjazt@aol.com), September 14, 2001.

Our local grocery chain in SW Virginia is selling mediums at 3 doz. for a $1.00!! They have had them at that price for the last 4 weeks. I can't raise them that cheap...well, acutally, I can't raise them at all. I had chicks ordered that would be hatched this week and to arrive on Wednesday. Yep, thier shipping day was the day all the airlines were closed down. McMurray Hatchery called to say they could not ship and no hatchings of my breeds until the week of October 6. So here I am all set up with the brooder in dining room and now either have to take it all down or leave it up until next month. Oh well, better no chicks than a another downed plane!

-- Karen (db0421@yahoo.com), September 14, 2001.

I bring my eggs into work in Madison WI and charge $1.50 per doz. Out in SW Wisconsin they will only pay $.75 and it costs more than that to raise them (and they are plentiful) I've had one or two folks 'comment' that eggs are $.65 a doz at the grocery store, but the taste, freshness and quality of my eggs sell themselves.

-- Dianne (yankeeterrier@hotmail.com), September 15, 2001.

In rural central Maryland I'm getting $2/doz mixed size (some so large the carton won't hardly close) and mixed color: brown and green.

I can sell all my eggs and could probably get more per doz. If I don't have enough for the 2 ladies that buy regularly they understand and just go without or buy at the grocery.

If feed prices go up, I will seriously consider raising the price of the doz. 25-50 cents. I don't really make back what they eat but it helps.

This past week I sold 13 barred rock roosters (one was auracana) from my McMurray straight run I got in April. Before commission the total was $52 which means each bird averaged $4. I know they would be worth more to me to eat them myself but I'm not up to the job of cleaning them. Besides that no one would really want to eat them.

-- LBD (lavendebluedilly@hotmail.com), September 15, 2001.

We sell an average of 5-6 dozen eggs per week, sometimes more or less depending on the "ladies" out in their coop. I get $1.00 per dozen for the eggs which are usually medium, large and jumbo sized brown eggs. The customers bring back the cartons to me which means I don't have to buy any! Although the price is low, it generally helps me keep the girls in feed and gives us enough to eat ourselves. I am thinking of raising the price though as supermarket prices are now at $1.30 per dozen for medium brown eggs. I have been selling eggs now for about four years and have never made a profit, but have been able to keep the girls in feed and have some eggs for myself. I would probably have to charge close to $2.50 per dozen to actually make a profit as the feed prices have gone up and of course, my time is worth a little bit. Good luck on your poultry operation - one thing to consider, your sales will decrease if you use any of the eggs to hatch to replenish your stock. We are fixing to fill two incubators, which means no egg sales for a couple of weeks. The old hens that are now going on three will have to be culled (either sold or put in the freezer as stew birds) so we will have less hens to lay decreasing our output until the new birds get old enough to lay. This happens about every 2.5 years. I would prefer to keep the old hens but they eat just as much as the young stock and you don't get nearly as many eggs (just bigger ones about every other day or two).

Cindy

-- Cindy (colawson@mindspring.com), September 15, 2001.

Grocery sale fliers aside, eggs around here usually run from $.89 to $1.29 in our area (we're a reasonable distance from Wichita, KS) at the grocery stores, depending on size and color. A lot of times, brown eggs cost at least 10 to 20 cents more per dozen. At some of the local farm markets I've been to, when I've seen them available (they're ususally either sold out or did't have any to bring that week), farm eggs that were promoted as eggs from range chickens sometimes go for as much as $2.50 a dozen, again depending on size and color. Some people won't buy white, others won't buy brown. Also, I have some friends who have sold eggs from their homesteads in the past & say all they have to do is put a sign at the road by the end of the driveway or advertise their availability on a message board in town & they don't last very long at all. They can generally get 50 cents to a dollar more than the grocery price if people know they're getting really fresh eggs. The same is true of a chicken farmer I know of near here who raises his flock for meat purposes. He will sell range-fed roasters of 5 to 8 pounds for about $2.00 to $2.50 per pound. Hope this helps you determine your price.

-- Claudia Glass (glasss2001@prodigy.net), September 20, 2001.

I guess I should say that we have a really high yuppie concentration here that tends to drive up the price... they seem to buy what they think is "more desireable" and pay more for it. It's like the attitude some folks have - if it's good you pay more for it. There are a lot of high-income types, and it's been said that if an atomic bomb went off in the country club at midnight on Friday or Saturday, it would wipe out the population of certain self-important parts of town. Plus, we have a situation in which a single grocery chain monopolizes the town and has little, if any, price competition.

-- Claudia Glass (glasss2001@prodigy.net), September 20, 2001.