Commercial maple Production, 10 years down the road.

[southfork]

When you look at other aspects of Agriculture, one has to wonder what a serious commercial maple syrup operation will look like in 10 years. Poultry, pork, beef, dairy and grain have all become much larger commercial entities in order to reach economy of scale, as well as to better comply with regulations and develop larger marketing and distribution channels.

Although data varies, the economic unit for maple syrup production seems to have moved from 4,000 tap operation to near 10,000 taps on vacuum. An economic unit being an operation to fully support a family. In beef, an economic unit in most textbooks five years ago was 300 head in a cow calf, now it has become 450 head or more. Of course it all depends on your standard of living, but let's assume above the national poverty line is the objective, with no other source of income for the family.

Beef and grain operations have tended to go to leasing grazing and farm ground as it is almost impossible to locate and afford enough land within certain vicinities. Poultry, dairy and swine have become more intense as large expansions of land and resources may not be necessary in these disciplines.

What happens when another 5,000 taps are required within the system of an economic unit?

It seems that with costs and regulation we may also see an accelerated tendency to move concentrate to central processing plants. That avoids duplication of expense, much like custom cutters, contract farmers and ranchers.

Where do you guys see the industry headed for the serious commercial operator?

[spud]

It's hard to say what the price for bulk syrup will be for the next ten years. I think the world market for syrup will continue to do well and will grow a bit. The new up and coming market is bottled sap. If this takes off this will raise the bulk price of syrup. Their will be one group wanting sap for syrup and another group wanting sap for drinking. There is no doubt states will crack down on sugaring operations making it tougher for the little guys to survive. I also see more people selling sap to a large operation in their area. I know my area (Franklin County) is big on this but I still think in time other areas will do the same on a larger scale. Right now I think the magic number for taps to have is about 8000-10,000 taps to turn sugaring into a full time business.

Spud

[adk1]

I think the majority of producers are in it because they love to do it, like to make syrup for family and friends and sell enough to cover their costs to make it. Would be an interesting poll for this site. Also, I agree, I think we will see more refulations in our future. Growth though there is allot of potential, especially since we are tapping only a fraction of the available maples. Hopefully the maples stay around!

[BreezyHill]

Southfork,
I would have to totally disagree with your summation. Last year our operation was put thru A SUNY Colleges Ag Business Classes scrutiny. They found that with just the Beef and Maple off of the farm that two families could sustain an above average house hold income. Then you factor in the syrup supplies, the feed mill and the new greenhouse system to be completed in 2017 and it will allow for more income.

The secret is simple...Marketing. You cant sell feeder calves for somebody else to do the back grounding, just to sell them to a finishing yard to sell them to the packers for the packer to sell them to John Q. Public. The Cow calf guy needs to sell to JQP so he/she can cut out all the middlemen and make a descent profit. Thru our breeding program we have gone from selling 500# at 7 months to selling 1400# at 15 months, that $8-900 to $2000. The additional costs was $300.

Maple...a producer needs to refrain from the easy $$$ of selling in bulk and too sell to JQP a finished quality product to make the most return on every gallon of syrup. If you take the funds that are acquired from the sale of 2000 gallons of syrup from a 4000 high vac tap farm sold as all bulk at current prices you are looking at around $55,000 but if you sold the same 2000 gallons at wholesale levels to retailers you are looking at $140,000.

Last weekend we bottled of a $1900 wholesale order in just under 120 minutes. The order was delivered taking another 90 minutes and 60 miles of driving with delivery vehicle. My middle son is a senior in High School and wants to purchase a vehicle for College. So he decided it was time for use to expand into the maple candy end of the business a few months ago after selling some last year in school. Personally I got sick, eating way to much maple candy as a kid and tend to stand way back from this operation. By himself he produced 40 packages of candy in about 4 hours from bulk syrup to boxed candy. When the wife took a shopping trip to town she found candy retailing for $50/ pound. So he is looking to sell at half that price /# in larger boxes. Those 40 boxes will wholesale at $400 from what would have wholesaled as $28 of syrup, $40 of supplies and a few dollars of energy for the stove.

Needless to say I have created a monster now; because he figured real quick that a job in town paying $10/hr is going to suck compared to nearly $65/hr making candy.

Good thing about this is I tried the maple sugar in the morning coffee and boy that is good stuff!

IN 10 years I see a family maple operation being keyed into retail sale for the majority of their sales and low grade products being sold in bulk. There will still be huge producers in the 100,000 plus tap range and those that are in the 10,000 plus range. The majority of producers will be in the under 2000 taps making value added products to maximize their profit on the syrup they produce.

For us in 10 years I think I will have lost my the upstairs of our sugar house to value added maple production from storage space. We will have accepted the offers of friends to tap their bushes and be in that 5000 tap size.

This is as long as the future daughter in laws project on the ALHB is not correct and our area still has maples for syrup production.

[Maplewalnut]

My impression is that there is a growing trend for local, self sustained farming. The organic trend is waning because people just can't swallow the price tag. On the other hand people are sick and tired of large GMO/antibiotic laden meats and vegetables. The happy medium seems to be local subsistence farming. Know your farmer, know his/her practices, pay a fair price and everybody is happy. I believe the sweetner market will continue to expand and will be supported by large operations but there is and always will be a retail/wholesale market to support.

[Sunday Rock Maple]

A good thread as a lot of our futures will be impacted by this whether we wish it or not. So I'll be following this one even though I don't have the wisdom to contribute anything beyond Yogi Berra's observation that 'It's tough to make predictions, especially about the future".

[markcasper]

When you look at other aspects of Agriculture, one has to wonder what a serious commercial maple syrup operation will look like in 10 years. Poultry, pork, beef, dairy and grain have all become much larger commercial entities in order to reach economy of scale, as well as to better comply with regulations and develop larger marketing and distribution channels.
Poultry, dairy and swine have become more intense as large expansions of land and resources may not be necessary in these disciplines.
Where do you guys see the industry headed for the serious commercial operator?

The government is practically 100% responsible for the demise of the small to mid-size dairy farm more than anything else!! The mid-size dairy is labeled as inefficient, out-dated, labor intensive. Yes that is true to some degree, but how many small and mid-size (organic as well) farms employ people that are illegal aliens? None that I know of. The big farms all have them, van loads of them arriving in shifts. They have no doubt capitalized on this illegal activity. Every one of these farms pay them a little more than minimum wage and then take them to the county courthouse and sign them up for every kind of tax payer funded program there ever was that you and I are on the hook for, and then think of themselves as efficient operators. Corn and soybean utopia has taken over in my area and replaced dairying largely and the land and soil are definately showing the damage because there is no hay grown anymore. And this was mostly supported and promoted by the government funded ethanol program.



Not having to expand land acreage in some way for livestock enterprises is not true. The manure has to go somewhere, and if not, the DNR will be involved.
In all due respect....what was mentioned seems like it came from a text book at UW River Falls. (no pun intended.)

As for maple operations....getting your own markets is probably the better way to go if your tap resources are limited. Many people are getting turned off by big corporate operations and are more than willing to buy from smaller local producers where there is "heart" included with the product. I would say the biggest culprit in the industry to be on the look out for is government getting too much involved.