Do you sell eggs to your friends & neighbors - or give away?

[mtnhomechick]

One of my steady customers bought 6 doz. last Christmas to give to here neighbors for the holiday. Quite a few bought extra dozens at Christmas and Thanksgiving to make deviled eggs.

I get about 3 doz a day and I can't keep up with the orders.

 

[TeaLady]

BTW, we just raised the price for our eggs to $5/dz. I've gotten no complaints & still can't keep up with the demand. There are several factors here:

* I live in an area where the cost of living generally is high. (A 50# bag of organic layer feed costs me over $30 including sales tax.)
* There are plenty of people in this area who appreciate quality and would rather have a little of something really good than a lot of something not so good.
* I took a "consumer education" approach when I raised the price. Here is the email I sent to my customers:

Jim & I have been looking at what we've been spending on feed vs. total egg production, and realizing that it is costing more than $4 to produce a dozen eggs. The problem is that organic feed is so expensive -- nearly twice the cost of non-organic feed. Rather than compromise on the feed, we've decided to raise the price of the eggs to $5 per dozen.

We have a friend helping us build the coop who buys eggs from us whenever he's out, either for himself or for friends he has turned on to our eggs. When we've hired him to work for us, his rate is $20/hour. So a dozen eggs from me is worth 15 minutes of his time. Pretty good deal, really.​

 

[Imp]

Hi TeaLady,
$5 per dozen seems like a good deal for organic eggs in Issaquah. Don't think you are overpriced. I live in Renton and one of my neighbors is selling non-organic eggs for $4 per dozen. And Renton is much less upscale than Issaquah.

Imp/Russ- much, much, much less upscale

 

[adriennehearts]

sell them for cheap

 

[jrabbit]

seems to me that most people who "give" their eggs away are really bartering with them - trading for goodwill or services is just as important as for money: Same thing.

We plan to give to our neighbors in return for their putting up with squawking hens ...

Once we get enough eggs, that is! Right now, we're getting 2 "large" and 1 "small" nearly every day (adding up to 15 eggs in 9 days, cool!). And we're excited about that! But I don't think we'll ever have a huge abundance, so it's going to be 6 here and there to our friends and neighbors.

--janis,etc

 

[kristenm1975]

Wait a second...you were getting almost 2 dozen per week from just 4 hens?? That's pretty awesome. I have 7 hens and I only end up with two eggs a day.

I have had a similar feeling about the eggs. I had read the suggestion that you first give the eggs away to friends and neighbors, then once they're "hooked" start selling them to the same folks.

I tried that, but never could get past the giving away stage. It just felt cheesy to ask for money for something I'd previously given away.

 

[Bwaaak!]

Henry and his ladies (used to have 6 hens) seem to wander through the new zealand hot wire fence (not on at the moment) and into my neighbors lot. the neighbor says he enjoys my chickens and has always wanted chickens, but just to be sure, I give him the eggs, and I go buy those things they call eggs at the grocery store. It has kept everyone happy.

 

[Southernbelle]

I give my eggs away for swap/goodwill type of things. I mostly have chickens just because I love chickens.

1. The neighbors that have to listen to my roosters get free eggs

2. My kids are always playing over with the neighbor kids in their yard. They're welcome to play here, too but they never do. So I give them eggs to try to balance things out.
3. Anytime I pick up something from Freecycle or Craigslist - I give a dozen eggs as a thank you.
4. Any repairmen (or just about anyone) who comes to my house leaves with free eggs.
5. One neighbor is involved with the local ballpark and is always attending banquets over there - she brings the leftover catered food home and always shares with us - so they get free eggs.

I recently started selling hatching eggs locally and on here, so that helps with feed cost. I also sell rabbits and chicks I've hatched to help make the chickens pay for themselves.

 

[phalenbeck]

My eggs are free---unless you count free beer with one neighbor, and free tilling my garden, and 'hillbilly' lessons, and soon free babysitting of my chickens and property. My eggs are just part of the exchange here in this community. I am fortunate not to need the money to much, and the sharing of knowledge and tools is valuable. I think that without my eggs we still would share knowledge, tools and beer but as Karl Marx once said "from each according to his abilitys, and to each according to his needs"

 

[momoftwinsinwi]

I give them to my friends, they save cartons for me and buy me beers!! LOL...my dad works for Alterra coffee and mom and dad trade me coffee for eggs, my sis in law does our grass cutting and plowing in winter, and my local bartender of course....gives me drinks!! ha ha!!!

**my son said to me the other day...."Hey Mom, I gave Twan (his buddy) a dozen eggs, he asked, because it's his mom's birthday" - I was laughing...turns out she's been asking for some and he keeps forgetting to ask.

My sis n law's brother in law actually bought me the day old chicks and "expects" eggs for life, but I made sure to get it thru the grapevine that he had used up his $25 that he spent on 12 chicks....

mostly...barter, I have a couple neighbors that insist on giving me a couple bucks, so I just give them another dz....don't have enough eggs yet to be able to sell them, people at work would buy them, but I don't have enough....YET!!!