Prices for boer cross bucklings

[seanmn]

I have a bunch of boer cross bucklings about 4-5 months of age healthy and fed well, mostly 7/8ths blood and some 3/4 boer 1/4 spanish that I'm selling. I'm the type of person who hates to undercharge and hates to overcharge. I was thinking of pricing them at 125.00 dollars per head....Does this seem fair??

[topside1]

Well I'll be the one to tell ya then. Your price is extremely high, and summer is the poorest time of the year to try to sell. (Not much demand nationally). Your price is actually high even during the peck of winter. In my neck of the woods I could sell the identical goat for 70-75 dollars off the farm. Now if you intended to sell at the sale barn then expect even less of a profit (gas money, commissions, waiting for your check). Here are the lastest numbers in Tennessee, and yes they stink. I'm guessing your bucklings weigh approx. 70-90 pounds, our market would pay you roughly $80 each if they weighed 80 pounds. Factor in commissions 6%-10% and so on...Sorry for the bad news...good luck

Slaughter Classes:
Kids

Selection 1
25-35 lbs few 101.00
36-50 lbs 95.00-104.50, 21 head boer nannies 110.00
51-65 lbs 107.00-115.00
66-80 lbs 92.50-100.00
18 hd 95 lbs 83.25


Selection 2
25-35 lbs 89.00-92.00
36-50 lbs 90.00-95.50
51-65 lbs 88.50-95.00, 18 hd boer nannies 105.00
66-80 lbs 88.00-93.50
6 hd 85-90 lbs 71.00-76.50

Selection 3
25-35 lbs 80.00-81.00
36-50 lbs 79.50-82.50
51-65 lbs 80.00-85.00
66-80 lbs few 80.50-81.50

[Loda Farm]

Yeah, $125.00 here in Ohio is high too. For unregistered bucks, arounf here you could maybe get $50.00-$75.00 each. If you were lucky.

Laura

[Alice In TX/MO]

From what I've seen at the auction ring in southern Missouri, $50 would be really good.

[chris30523]

I have a bunch also. I am expecting to get 50-75$ each. I hate it also.The only market for these bucks is meat and people don't want to pay over 1.00 per pound. I took 2 to the sale this spring one looked Boer and got 90.00 for him he probably weighed about 150 and was a yearling,The other looked more like Kiko and was much larger and brought 70.00. Most of mine are7/8 also and correct boer coloring very healthy I will probably sell sept. oct.
GOOD LUCK
We need to spend time promoting the meat goat market to the "fancy restraunts" If we can make goat "In Vogue" we will be a step up on the market

[Key]

We just visited our local livestock market last night here in Central PA, and kids abut that size brought between $60-$75. My advice is to try to sell them provately first as buyers are willing to pay a bit more to hear they are healthy!
Calves sold high last night though...the market changes all the time. It is hard to keep track. I bought a Holstein bull calf that weighed 85 lbs for $28 two weeks ago. Last night, they were up to .80-.90 a lb.

[Jim S.]

Two weeks ago, I bought a 50/50 Boer/Saanen and a 7/8 Boer/Saanen off the farm in Northern Alabama for $50 each. Both were 6 months old.

seanm and chris, you are marketing your goats at the wrong time of year. Plus, Chris, you are in drought conditions, and too many people who run WAY too many goats on small acres are dumping them for lack of pasture.

This is why I keep saying, "Raise them cheap, raise them cheap, raise them cheap!" Raise your goats for profit and not bragging rights, if you are in it as a business. If you must shed goats now, sell all you can off the farm for $50 for a 5-month-old animal. You have no transport costs, and no commissions. Set up a Web site and maybe you can lure in some newbie fish with more to spend per goat. But if you are in the commercial meat biz, you are selling a commodity. Raise them cheap and sell them when demand is highest and numbers are down (that would be Oct.- Jan.). Now maybe my "crazy" philosophy makes more sense. It is a LOW return on investment business. If you are running them on grass and browse and not feeding grain, you can let them be basically for free til the market gets better in fall. If you are shoveling grain and alfalfa in them, or you have 100 head on 5 acres, you can't keep them that long, it'll cost you too much. THEN you are a slave to the market, and will be FORCED to sell low.

As far as promoting goats, we only supply in this country HALF of the demand for goat meat at present. Half is imported. It is not a DEMAND problem. It is a goat breeding cycle problem. July-August are the worst months to sell, just like fall is the worst time to sell calves (which is why I fall calved when in that biz, to sell in spring). Summer goat demand is low and numbers are high.

chris, you mention a yearling that probably weighed over 150. You need to weigh him to know for sure. And if you market a goat that is older than 8-9 months, it will bring less. Why? Cuz the end consumer demands goats no older than 8-9 months.

This is why I encourage people to go to the auctions and see what is being bought. Sit yourself down for the whole session several times a year, and take note of what brings the high dollar. Then figure out how to satisfy that customer. You know, these buyers do it week in and week out. They know what they want, and what fits the bill.

Here is one line from John's auction price post, which I'll bet is Thompson Station, a heckuva good goat auction to learn at cuz a lot of those goats get right on a truck to be slaughtered in PA:

36-50 lbs 95.00-104.50, 21 head boer nannies 110.00

Let's say for the example that all goats in the group were 50 pounds, which would have brought the $95 low to the $110 high. The guy with the low goats missed $15 a head. If he had brought 20 boer nannies rather than 20 "whatever," he'd have an additional $300 gross out of that load. If he had brought in goats in the middle of that group, he'd have grossed $150 more.

Very important for the commercial, commodity producer to raise them cheap and to learn who the customer is, what they buy, and how to get your herd in the target.

[GoatsRus]

And here's something else to note if you're in middle TN. Thompson station is pretty far for us to travel to sell goats and I'm assuming they take their "cut" just like every other yard. We take our young billies to Johnny Barnes over on possum hollow. He pays pretty much what Thompson station pays, he's always graded us high and he doesn't take his "cut".

[chris30523]

I do plan on holding most of my bucklings till oct. I wish I could get more fence done so I didn't have to spend so much on grain. Motivating DH to get out and drive fence posts is another thing. Although I think the vet bills I am about to have should motivate him. Keeping too many goats too close in hot wet conditions is not good!! I haven't lost any yet but I will get fecals run.
The two big bucks I dumped this spring I didn't expect to get much for .The boer I had held to use for breeding till I bought my registered buck and the Kiko was just mean!!! Now if it would stop raining every afternoon(feast or famine) We could get our second cutting done so I can keep these boys till oct..
Your insight and advise is always appreciated JimS

[Jim S.]

Now you sound like me, chris...if I could just get more fence done... ...actually, I have one stretch to make, and one to repair, and I'll be caught up. I'll do those this fall, about November.

Why not learn to do the fecals yourself, and buy a Wal-Mart kiddie microscope to do them? Just do not be fooled by bubbles. I say that seriously, I heard of someone who wormed like every two weeks and finally asked a friend why she kept having eggs even though she was doing that. Turned out the "eggs" were bubbles on the slide.

I dunno about my advice and insight, chris. I just do what works for me. I PMed GoatsRUs about this Johnny Barnes guy. Heck, if he's not too far, I'll try him. Always looking for buyers. I often hear about great quantity buyers, but seldom meet them. That's like I often hear about $25 goats, but seldom see them.

The thing is, if you don't sell them at the farm gate, you are a price-taker and not a price-maker. So all you can do is manage them so hopefully the price you do take will be some higher. I talk to all kinds of hard-head goat people, who say "I do what I want and raise what I like, they are just going to be sold at the sale barn anyway." Those folks are leaving money on the table in a low-profit industry.

Of course, on the other side, we have people who are moving as far away from commodity as possible, and going to the breeder/show end of things. While I can't buy their high-dollar animals, I love those folks, too, cuz I have picked up several of their not-quite-golden animals at the sale barn, and they have pretty much worked fine in my herd.