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Ranchers Worst Enemy Himself

S

Sundance

Member
Joined
Dec 12, 2006
Messages
14
Location
Central Florida
We are new to this Bull session so here goes.We are probally the biggest cow calf producer in the USA and for what its worth I beleave the farmer rancher is his worst enemy.First what ever side you are on NCBA or R-calf doesn,t matter .We are the only business in the USA that does not price his product .Last year or this year did we have a surcharge on fuel or fertilizer I don,t think so every one else did.Every one else gets to add cost of production cost to there proffit we don,t .
We have been told supply and demand market free market like Farm Bureau and NCBA tells .But this doesn,t work they manuplate it when they see fit by importing live calves or box beef or lots of other farm products.The only thing that have saved the farmer till now was tecnoligy.We have to stand up and all our organizations need to pull together and price our products and not let them price them for us.
This wto and export market is a joke good for only the companys in the exporting business.
USDA on report there numbers we imported more beef than we exported.Figure it out.
I just get tired of seeing the farmer get lead down the road like a lam to slaughter.We price our product cost of production plus a proffit and then let the jockys play the market from there on.
And yes R-calf did the right thing getting the boarder closed .We have to take care of ourselves till we get our problems fixed and the Hell with every one else.Does every one here know we are broke and all our infurstructure is gone and all the bugget cuts jobs and so on.Enough bitching we just need to organize like all other business we can do this if we put our best foot foward.I read a article that a man wrote to the Farm Bureau in one of the old bull sessions he made me think he said can ( We ) be that stuppid to be told what price is okay and go on.I hope we aren,t .Maybe we should play a taped message every nite when we go to be playing am I that stuppid am I that stuppid till we think are we???
Every one have a Merry Xmas and I hope a Happy NewYear
 
Sundance, we have discussed the pricing of ranch calves before, a couple of main questions come up repeatedly.

How are calves priced from different areas when costs vary according to some by $250 per head?

Feeding costs vary, how are feedlots to be paid for their part?

Packers/processors are needed to turn cattle into beef, how do we handle them?

Retailers won't sell beef for charity, what do we do for them?

What happens if consumers refuse to pay what the final cost is?
 
Jason our organizations need to work these things out.True it one producer can have less cost than others thats in every product.Freight also is a player.But we need to reach a happy medium and price our products use the cost of production like I said if fuel goes up or fertilizer then we have to cover that cost and pass it on like every other business.
Remember we don,t want to be called stuppid do we.If we do nothng to solve the problem then they can call us stuppid.
Hey I don,t have all the answers I will tell you that but we have to help outselves no one will do it for us.
Notice how many read the article and how many replyed no one wants to go there.
They want to wine and go on about the packer .
We are going to make a big move after the first on this issues and R-calf is interested in getting involved in the ground work.
Thanks for taking time to read this .
You have a Merry Xmas & Happy New Year
 
Sundance said:
Jason our organizations need to work these things out.True it one producer can have less cost than others thats in every product.Freight also is a player.But we need to reach a happy medium and price our products use the cost of production like I said if fuel goes up or fertilizer then we have to cover that cost and pass it on like every other business.
Remember we don,t want to be called stuppid do we.If we do nothng to solve the problem then they can call us stuppid.
Hey I don,t have all the answers I will tell you that but we have to help outselves no one will do it for us.
Notice how many read the article and how many replyed no one wants to go there.
They want to wine and go on about the packer .
We are going to make a big move after the first on this issues and R-calf is interested in getting involved in the ground work.
Thanks for taking time to read this .
You have a Merry Xmas & Happy New Year
Click to expand...


So your telling us that R-CALF is in favor of "Orderly Marketing"? You know with quotas for production so they can control the number of cattle coming to market. How many are raised in each area ect.
 
Let's just for the heck of it lay out some random numbers.

How about we say each calf should be worth $600 at weaning?

Rancher 1 raises 400 pound calves and rancher 2 raises 800 pounders. Do you think there would be a conflict between producers? One got $1.50 a pound the other $.75

Or maybe we should garantee a price per pound? Pick a number...$1.50 a pound. In the above example the first rancher gets $600 the second gets $1200. How much is left for the feeding processing and retailing of that second set of calves?

If we start setting a slide price so heavier calves get less per pound, (as the market determines now) you basically are setting the cost of gain(cost of gain now sets part of the slide). That has to fluctuate based on grain prices and other costs to feedlots, pegging it would lead to more complications.

How can you legislate a commodity in a free market economy? That is the real question.
 
Sundance talks about fuel and fertilizer cost.
My understanding is that recently Canada has become the US biggest supplyer of oil but im not sure if these figgure takes into account electricity, natural gas, etc or in other words energy? I do know we have the worlds second biggest oil reserves up here.
Also I know that an increadible amount of Urea and Amonia nitrate fertilizer comes from western Canada and is exported to the States.
Im guessing because I dont have figgures handy but im guessing American fuel,electricity, heating and fertilezer costs would go through the roof if it wasnt for trade with Canada.
Here is a thought. If they dont want trade then fine lets not trade with them. Our production costs <fuel, fertilizer, electricity> will go way down. There costs will go way up and we can get other world markets that the Americans will have to get out of because of their high costs.
Just a thought :D
Merry Christmas :D
 
...roperab...the americans already own the oil and gas...when mulroney signed the nafta deal in the eighties...that guaranteed the americans a steady flow...the canadian govt could not stop the flow now even if they wanted...whatever people want to say ...money talks and the americans are the ones that have the most...
 
Roper I don,t personally have any problems with the Canadian farmers.
What I am saying we need to take care of ourselves first not every country with a name .
Don,t take this the wrong way just a question.
Do you call yourself and smart person or a stuppid person.
Know one wants to address the problem I ask again are we ( We ) us a farmer ranchers stuppid think a minute.We are led like sheep to slaughter.We don,t price our products this is not a impossible task we can come up with something better than we have now.
We souldn,t have to try and play stock broker and out guess the pretty boys on chicage board of trade.
They don,t have to gamble with weather or anything .we take all the risk in agriculture.And like every other business we need to sell for a proffit we should never sell below cost of production.
And I don,t know about Canada money if the country is broke like us or know but we don,t have any business helping anyone till we get our house in order.Don,t you ever think about this when you are out on the ranch or driving down the road .You know they aren,t to many of us left we might surprise every one one day soon we get our shirt together and run our agriculture farms like any other business.We and make this work if we are detirmind and we are detirmined.
Roper have a Merry Xmas and a Happy New Year
 
If you're going to raise a commodity product then you don't have much choice then to be a price taker instead of a price maker. That's why I won't do it.
Correct me if I'm wrong but Central Florida has a huge advantage over lets say me in Maine to set up a year round forage chain that you could finish cattle on, and I do mean on grass, all year long. How many million people live in Florida, how about just in a 150 mile radius? Why do they get shipped across the country to feedlots and put on a diet that is making a product that is far less healthy?

We finally have good market within our state to raise beef calves for a Natural Producer, but I live near the majority of the population. I'm starting to raise my animals on grass only and sell direct to the population, eventually to some retail outlets.

These people don't flinch at $225/cwt hanging, maybe I'm not charging enough, that doesn't include ANY processing. I'm tired of selling below profit, and everyone else doing it. I'm finishing the product and setting my price.
 
elwapo said:
one answer Jason
OPEC
Click to expand...

Bingo, give that man a cigar.

As Sundance says, agriculture should be a cost plus venture, not this supposedly "free market" that we have right now. Other commodities are cost plus based with a slide in there for demand, so there is no reason why we shouldn't be doing the exact same thing.

Heck it may be as simple as skipping the auction barn process all together. Producer calls either the feedlot or packer (depending on how finished the product is) and says "I want this much". Feedlot or packer says yeah or nay and the deal is done. High cost producers either find a niche to live in, or they go under as low cost producers undersell them. I'm not real wild about turning producers against one another, so it may not be much of an idea, as compared to single desk marketing.

Rod
 
Ben H said:
I'm tired of selling below profit, and everyone else doing it. I'm finishing the product and setting my price.
Click to expand...

That is all well and fine if the consumer buys it. If they suddenly think you are too high, they won't buy it. Basically the free market prevails, and supply and demand rules the day.
 
Sundance,

Pricing your product? What a simple concept if you control your product from pasture to plate. Do you? If not, you are not going to price your product are you?

Since your product I assume is cattle, you are not going to be able to price your product because the price of your product is derived from the price of the end product, BEEF.

The price of BEEF will be determined by the supply of available beef and by the demand from the consumer. That is what is going to price your product. If you insist on a price that is higher than what consumers are willing to pay, they have other protein options.

Ford can price their product but if Chevy and Dodge provide more value than Ford, they will have to drop their price.

If you own your product from pasture to plate and you price your product too high, the local dogs will enjoy what you didn't get sold. You sell it or you smell it.

As far as R-CULT shutting down the border, they were wrong because there was no justification for it. I suppose you supported R-CULT's bse fear mongering too huh? Were you proud of them for taking a stand on imports by standing in front of the American consumer claiming that having BSE in your native herd meant your beef was contaminated and high risk? Did you support R-CULT when they said, "USDA does not care about food safety". DID THAT OPINION CHANGE WHEN WE HAD BSE???

Guess who had to get to the media before R-CULT did? NCBA and USDA because R-CULT was going to have a hard time explaining the difference between the bse precautionary measures in Canada and the bse precautionary measures in the US if anyone in the media had held them to their previous positions. That is why R-CULT has no credibility in Washington, D.C.

You can't have it both ways Sundance. You can't make claims about Canada regarding bse that will not also apply to us in the same situation. That is hypocrisy at it's finest and that's R-CULT through and through.

Leo McDonnell contradicted R-CULT's previous position on bse when he said (paraphrasing), "if we ever have a native case of bse, we can look our consumers in the eye and tell them our beef is the safest in the world due to our precautionary measures".

NEWSFLASH: CANADA'S BSE PRECAUTIONARY MEASURES ARE THE SAME AS OURS! FACT!

Well Mr. Florida, I would love to see Leo try to pass the red faced test explaining to the media the difference between Canada's bse precautionary measures and ours. Would you like to answer that question if you had just stated that "having bse in your native herd means your beef is high risk and contaminated"???? I didn't think so!

What was gained by stopping Canadian imports anyway? That beef wasn't going to disappear off the world market. Canada would simply absorb that portion of our export markets. The trade picture is bigger than stopping pot loads of cattle coming out of Canada.

Isolationism is a road to destruction. R-CULT is a joke!


~SH~
 
As in all business we work on margins sometimes they are better.

In my welding shop there were plenty of times I got a good buy on raw materials.Did I in turn pass that on to my customer who had purchased at a set price NO I made a little extra.But I also have been on the other side where I agreed to build for set price then materials cost more and I lost some money.

Margins will keep getting tighter so we will all need to deal in something knowone else produces and fill a niche.Or deal with enough numbers to make the margins work.My self I don't see where grassfed is the answer,it takes too much land base and time do this were in a commodity world useing cheap commodities to produce cheap beef as quick as possible

I know right now I am feeding 200 cows in 2 hours if that group was 400 cows I could feed them with all the same equipment with about an extra 1/2 hour of time hence my feeding cost margins will change.

Do you think the margins are any different for these big stores they need to move large volumes to make the bottom line work.Its a competative world either learn how to compete or quit the only 2 choices there are.
 
SH, "NEWSFLASH: CANADA'S BSE PRECAUTIONARY MEASURES ARE THE SAME AS OURS! FACT! "

It doesn't matter what you say you're going to do if you don't do it. FACT!

SH, "Well Mr. Florida, I would love to see Leo try to pass the red faced test explaining to the media the difference between Canada's bse precautionary measures and ours."

The difference is that Canada's has been proven to not be working as designed. The jury is still out on us. Pretty easy explaination.
 
For the guys that think we could price cattle based on an OPEC model, why hasn't OPEC been able to keep the price of oil at a higher level?

Oh I see they are just generous.

Reality is they don't control all oil production and even in their cartel they have dissenters. 1 major producer can open the lines and shoot production limits down.

Oil is not a perishable product. It can stay in the ground if the country that owns the land above it can do without the money. Let's see you put a hold on cattle for a year or two.

BenH is closer to pricing his product, but notice the price he gave is based on a beef price for carcass weight. Ben also isn't moving 100 carcasses a year this way.

Reality is most consumers don't know how to save enough cash to buy a 1/4 of beef, let alone a whole. As consumers make more disposable income they have less time and/or incentive to use the cuts that take more time to prepare. They still will only eat 1 steak at a time, they don't double their consumption although they may increase their spending.

So the only reality we have is consumers will decide what they want and we are in a position of trying to do our best to deliver it. Consumers will look at pork and chicken and compare perceived value. A neighbor here has been buying cryovac boneless pork loin at $1.99 a pound because he says beef is too much money for him to afford! He raises cattle, but can't pencil buying beef at the store. He finally bought a commodity beef, priced at the current rail bid plus processing costs ($1.85/lb). Price was the factor, not implants or organic, but he was adamant he didn't want grass fed.

At the $2.25 Ben gets some would lose money, some would lose at $2.75. How many beef can you sell, can you live on that amount?
 
blackjack said:
...roperab...the americans already own the oil and gas...when mulroney signed the nafta deal in the eighties...that guaranteed the americans a steady flow...the canadian govt could not stop the flow now even if they wanted...whatever people want to say ...money talks and the americans are the ones that have the most...
Click to expand...

If there is one thing that we have learned from the Americans its that foreign contracts<nafta> mean nothing.
Here is a question for you, how has the Albertan cow/calf guy or farmer bennifited from the Alberta oil patch?
 

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