Taps, labor, and product mix

[Rand]

I am interested to get a better understanding of what people are doing in terms of hired labor and how product is sold (sap v. bulk v. wholesale v. retail) at operations of different scales. My purpose is to get a better understanding of actual experience as I work on a business plan. If you are interested in sharing info, it would be great to know:

# of taps
Amount of annual labor (e.g., me and my brother and we hire one person for about 6 weeks)
How much (gals or %) you sold as sap, bulk, wholesale, retail, other (sugar, creme, etc)

Thanks so much.

Rand

[tuckermtn]

best to look back a few years ago in our operation, as things like labor and taps were "cleaner" then. We buy sap now, and I am now disabled.

2011 - 1150 taps, 519 gallons produced (exceptional year for us)
Three workers, pretty much full time, 8-9 week season. (we truck all our sap, so quite labor intensive)
25% sold as bulk, 15% wholesale, 60% retail.

2012- 1350 taps, 270 gal produced.
same three workers
10% bulk, 20% wholesale, 70% retail.

no cream/candy until 2013.

I suspect selling a high percentage of syrup at retail would be harder in Vt. Where I am in NH there are fewer sugarhouses, so less competition. If you believe USDA ag statistics, over 50% of the syrup sold in NH is at retail.

[Rand]

Thanks Eric. This is helpful for me to inform my thinking.

Spud, I got your PM and tried to reply to it but the send failed,saying that you have no room left for Private messages and need to clear some space. I will try to resend later.

[JoeJ]

It is interesting for me to see the percentages on the sales. As far as labor goes, I do all of the woods work myself, my brother in law does 80% of the boiling (Free except for syrup)

2011 987 taps 470 gal syrup Retail 33% Wholesale 33% Bulk 34%

2012 935 taps 217 gal syrup Retail 35% Wholesale 39% Bulk 26%

2103 984 taps 508 gal syrup Retail 22% Wholesale 26% Bulk 52%

2014 3,040 taps 1,076 gal syrup Retail 10% Wholesale 17% Bulk 73% plus 38 hours of paid labor at sugar house by high school student

I put in a lot more hours hauling sap 4 1/2 miles from new sugarbush

And unfortunately, the percentage for the bulk sales go way up. The dollar volume for the retail sales in similar, just a lower percentage.

[Rand]

It is interesting for me to see the percentages on the sales. As far as labor goes, I do all of the woods work myself, my brother in law does 80% of the boiling (Free except for syrup)

2011 987 taps 470 gal syrup Retail 33% Wholesale 33% Bulk 34%

2012 935 taps 217 gal syrup Retail 35% Wholesale 39% Bulk 26%

2103 984 taps 508 gal syrup Retail 22% Wholesale 26% Bulk 52%

2014 3,040 taps 1,076 gal syrup Retail 10% Wholesale 17% Bulk 73% plus 38 hours of paid labor at sugar house by high school student

I put in a lot more hours hauling sap 4 1/2 miles from new sugarbush

And unfortunately, the percentage for the bulk sales go way up. The dollar volume for the retail sales in similar, just a lower percentage.

Thanks Joe. Helpful info. How is the market for bulk in your area? Sufficient to accommodate your added capacity? Or approaching saturation?

[JoeJ]

The bulk market is OK as far as accepting syrup, just the price is receding.

[DrTimPerkins]

The bulk market is OK as far as accepting syrup, just the price is receding.

The syrup bulk price is falling, primarily not due to the excess production of syrup, but rather to a falling Canadian to U.S. dollar exchange rate. The Canadian $ currently is worth about $0.86 U.S.

Candian-US Exchange Rate.JPG

[optionguru]

Dr. Tim, is that backwards. Doesn't that mean that .86 US is worth 1 Canadian dollar?

[unc23win]

Right 1 Canadian Dollar is .86 US right now.

[n8hutch]

The area I live In has a highly developed downtown area with many outlet malls & shopping, my wife is a 3rd grade teacher and she works part time in a gift shop in town, anyway last few years there was always bus loads of folks from Quebec & Ontario and there license plates everywhere , but with the Dollar sliding the other way again, the last 6+ months or so seems like there are a lot more Massachusetts & Connecticut plates again. Either way town is busy, but I guess its not so good for the Bulk syrup price. I wonder where the line is as far as large producers selling bulk & still being profitable? I'm sure it depends on each individuals situation but there has to be a ball park # where it might not be worth the effort to make say 5,000 gallons of syrup to make 20,000 in profit.