Can i turn a profit raising cornish x chickens?

I was wondering if raising cornish x chickens would be profitable or not? How much feed do you usually give per chicken daily? I'm thinking the feed would be expensive because they need a lot to bulk up.

I just did my 1st batch of cornish cross. We made a good profit if we dont count our labor. The initial costs were the hoop house, extra feeders, waterer, baby pool, shavings (only used 1/2 bag). Those costs I counted separately. I didnt count electricity or water into costs.

We had 29 birds (supposed to be 30--we have no idea when we lost 1 or if we only got 29..). Nothing went wrong--no predator losses, no heat losses, we mostly free ranged them (propped up the hoop house side during the day and loosely fenced a large area around them). We sold 24 of the 29 birds (kept 5). The birds got much larger than I expected--most were well above 5lbs dressed. The birds that were sold paid for all the expenses of the 29 birds--food, cost of birds themselves plus shipping, processing, & shrink wrap bags. Plus they paid for 1/2 of the reusable expenses.

We will have 2 more batches this year. I wont kid myself that all batches will go as well as this one did. My processor told me of a customer who had 50 birds to be processed a few days before mine--he ended up with a total of 30 birds processed-the short heat wave we had last week killed 20 birds.

I was very nervous at the end because of the heat and size of my birds (we processed at 7.5 weeks instead of 8 because of size) and I did have one smaller female stop standing near the end and the largest male freak out when we were crating them and have a heart attack--we processed both of those ourselves.

We will have to decide if it is better to keep using a processor ($4.00/bird) or get the equipment to do it ourselves.

Raising them outdoors will limit when we can have them. It also depends on your area. I sold them for $4.00/lb. And I am not the most expensive. I live in an organic foodie area. People want to buy from local sources and understand the cost of raising animals in a non factory farming way. I am not organic, but use local sources for grain.

Check out Joel Salatin's Pastured Poultry Profits to get a pretty good idea what is involved in raising pastured chickens. I assume there are totally different costs & issues raising them indoors.

I doubt it, unless on very large scale!

I raised between 10 and 30 meat birds at a time. I calculated the price of feed, of wood shavings and the initial price of birds and I always get to around 9-11$ per bird. The first year I had a full garden for them with seeds and such to keep the feed price down. Plus I did fermented feed.

And this does not consider the time I take to butcher + the material used to build the coop, + the medicine or vitamins if one gets sick.

But I raise the chickens to around 8 pounds, so it's a little more than 9-11$ for a 8 pound bird. Versus at the grocery store (here in Quebec) we can get a 2 pound chicken for 7$.. but sometimes they sell at 2 for 10$.

So.. it seems I can make about 1-2$ profit on each bird, if I take everything into consideration.

Also.. where I live it's not even legal to sell them, so I just give them to friends and family. I always have a tiny little doubt in my head that my chickens could get them sick :S

They are once they are sold....

You need to create a market first and or start small and grow. We have our birds processed because of state limits. We have gotten the cost down to about $8.00 a bird, 7 weeks old 4.77lbs averaged dressed weight. With an average sale price of $19.08 we are profitable.

Your right on about the feed, let's talk a small group of 50 birds. They will eat 8-900lbs of feed, that's pastured and a restricted feed schedule.

I think one of the biggest things nobody talks about is the upfront cost of raising broilers. Remember until you sell them it's all out of pocket. Let's talk about a group of 200 birds:
They will cost you around $1600 to be ready for sale assuming you having them processed, that doesn't include labor or any infer structure. You will need a way to brood the birds till they can go outside( assuming that's how your going to raise them) then you'll need pasture pens and so on. We run ours behind a 5 wire high tensile fence to protect from predators. Let's just call it $2200 for discussions sake. If you sell all those birds they will gross somewhere around $4000 after our $2200 in expenses that's $1800 for 7 weeks of raising them. I'm on the cautious side with the numbers but you get the idea.

Now for the beauty of pastured broilers, when your up and running, the profit margins grow rapidly. I run 75 birds per tractor, which means the very first group of birds raised in it complety pays for it. Every subsequent batch is pure profit, and that's when we start seeing real returns. My tractors pull double duty and house turkeys for thanksgiving which even further increases our profits. Once you reach a certain number of birds you can transition to bulk feed which will cut costs tremendously.

Pastures poultry is a fabulous business model, but requires extreme planning and execution as well as risk management to be successful.

slingshotandLAR said:

You need to create a market first and or start small and grow. We have our birds processed because of state limits. We have gotten the cost down to about $8.00 a bird, 7 weeks old 4.77lbs averaged dressed weight. With an average sale price of $19.08 we are profitable.

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Wow!!! You are selling for much more than I ever thought asking for. Good job on that

You look pretty experienced, I'm happy to end up with bird that cost around 9-11$, compared to your cost of 8$! Thanks for posting this. I will increase my selling price!

I sell 12 eggs for 5$, I don't get why I was selling chickens for 12$. I guess I was comparing with the price in store, but we NEVER see 8 pound organic chickens on the market where I live. I had no comparable except the small ones we have in the grocery store.

Sabz said:

Quote:
Wow!!! You are selling for much more than I ever thought asking for. Good job on that

You look pretty experienced, I'm happy to end up with bird that cost around 9-11$, compared to your cost of 8$! Thanks for posting this. I will increase my selling price!

I sell 12 eggs for 5$, I don't get why I was selling chickens for 12$. I guess I was comparing with the price in store, but we NEVER see 8 pound organic chickens on the market where I live. I had no comparable except the small ones we have in the grocery store.

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8lbs is a tough weight to market..... The ideal market weight is 4lbs, this is good for you because your cost go down significantly. Market research shows the majority of people want one full meal with no left overs, at 4lbs it's perfect and they don't mind the price because they are not throwing anything away. Sounds a bit crazy but consumers don't want left overs. We sell eggs for $4.00 and I know I could easily get 5 or even 6, however I use eggs as a gateway so to speak to convince people to try direct off the farm food. I tell them if they aren't the best eggs you've ever eaten I'll give your money back, haven't issued a refund ever! Because we sell beef, pork, chickens and turkeys the eggs lead into more sales. This year I sold a nice lady a dozen eggs, she called me the next day and bought an entire black Angus steer, that's worth selling them for a bit less. Good luck and have fun Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Oh, I am not going that far, I just sell to friends and they didn't seem to mind the size But thanks a lot for the info. Makes me realize it could be better to grow 2 "batches" of smaller chickens, versus one large batch of big birds.

Mind if i join the conversation?
I live in West Central Illinois and raise quite a few Broilers. My cost per bird here is $5.23, roughly but pretty close, to raise. That included feed, and chick price. I only feed Ross 308 because they have a better conversion for ME. I buy my feed by the ton at a local mill and store in bulk bins, so that reduced costs significantly. I process all my birds and sell quite a few live.
My market consists of a generous amount of hispanics, and healthy food eaters. I am selling 4-5 lb birds processed for $2.00/lb and live birds $8. I am making a decent profit and i enjoy raising them as i grew up raising cattle and hogs.
So yes you can be profitable if you have a market and willing to put time into building customer relationships. Hope this helps!

Also my batches are always 2 weeks apart, and around 30 birds to a batch, all in tracors on pasture.

I sold my first 50 for 3$ per pound and this current batch is going to be sold for $2.75 per pound they cost me 4$ to raise plus 3 to process and the way I find out my Price is Cost+10$ profit, and then if you need say 16$ to be profitable and have 8 lb birds you can lower your price to 2$ per pound