How much did your first egg cost?

[Acre4Me]

5 years later, and it’s not complete…but, we built an elevated walk in coop (wood costs), we put up a roof (50’ long, includes coop roof), and now are replacing the old chain link fencing, adding better doors and trying to get it 100% predator proof ….and the 1x2 fencing we bought took us 1.5 years to find (thx to Covid), and cost 60% more than pre-Covid purchase of same stuff. But, the *First* egg…maybe 1.5K based on the walk in coop build materials, basic supplies needed, and chick purchase (all pre-Covid).

 

[Shadrach]

I was curious… I know some people don’t like to talk about chicken finances.
I’m asking, to those who are willing to say, how much did your first egg cost?
I’ll go first… even though I haven’t even harvested a single egg yet (9 week old chicks on Monday). Our first egg will cost over $5k.
We started from scratch. We had someone else build our coop, but it was a very reasonable price given what it would cost just for what we calculated in building supplies for a coop. We built the run. We bought a bsfl bin & we built a bsfl box, to secure it from predators, after it was attacked multiple times.
Then we bought a ton of grains & seeds for future scratch/feed (if we can’t get feed from our usual suppliers at some point). We prep for ourselves, our cat & now our chicks! We also vacuum sealed all of it (mostly from Azure Standard) for preservation, to prevent mold, to prevent bug egg hatching & to portion it. (Took about 10 hours to vacuum seal everything we bought. 100s of pounds.)
I added EVERYTHING in that number (including the deck screws, to secure the run frame)… plus an excel spreadsheet to track it all. I know exactly what it cost for the first egg… but I am an accountant. So I tracked it, down to the dollar, so I would know exactly (to my husband’s dismay! ).
If you don’t know exactly (because you aren’t a finance nerd)… What’s your guess?!

I think people will vastly underestimate the costs because they are unlikely to include their time and often that is worth far more than the cost of materials etc.

 

[Texas Chicken Tender]

I was curious… I know some people don’t like to talk about chicken finances.
I’m asking, to those who are willing to say, how much did your first egg cost?
I’ll go first… even though I haven’t even harvested a single egg yet (9 week old chicks on Monday). Our first egg will cost over $5k.
We started from scratch. We had someone else build our coop, but it was a very reasonable price given what it would cost just for what we calculated in building supplies for a coop. We built the run. We bought a bsfl bin & we built a bsfl box, to secure it from predators, after it was attacked multiple times.
Then we bought a ton of grains & seeds for future scratch/feed (if we can’t get feed from our usual suppliers at some point). We prep for ourselves, our cat & now our chicks! We also vacuum sealed all of it (mostly from Azure Standard) for preservation, to prevent mold, to prevent bug egg hatching & to portion it. (Took about 10 hours to vacuum seal everything we bought. 100s of pounds.)
I added EVERYTHING in that number (including the deck screws, to secure the run frame)… plus an excel spreadsheet to track it all. I know exactly what it cost for the first egg… but I am an accountant. So I tracked it, down to the dollar, so I would know exactly (to my husband’s dismay! ).
If you don’t know exactly (because you aren’t a finance nerd)… What’s your guess?!

$5076,42 .I do the books for our farm so for and giggles I added a poultry column. I do record our egg consumption and any eggs we give away as a sale . The good news is that ,after 3 month, we are now at $19,68 per egg lol . There is also an app that tracks your flock ,finances and egg count

 

[Henschickspups]

First egg? About $100. Including treats.

We adopted the hens for free, and they gave us a sort of pen for them that we call "the coop" it lives in our garage, and when we get the for reals for reals coop done, they will probably fight me to leave it.

 

[NorthwoodsChick]

50k
(jk)

 

[Nodakj]

I stopped counting @ about $3000. Just added another $700 for some electric poultry fence and energizer.

My mistake $900 in fencing

 

[Melissa67137]

About 50.00
Feed feeder and waterer
Chickens and pens were gifted

Same for me.


I had an old chainlink dog kennel already, and was gifted a rescued hen, used an old pet taxi for the coop, and was given 2 gallon bags of feed. I just had to buy some chicken wire and hardware cloth to secure the run. So first egg was pretty cheap.

To this day my eggs aren't expensive, where I live I can get 50# of good feed for $20 and with my only 4 hens it lasts a couple months. So I am paying approx.....6.50 a month for food. Of course since the first one I have bought 3 more hens, and some cattle panels to move the run and create an arched roof. And more hardware cloth, and screws and bigger feeders. I made a coop from pallets that was free other than the screws to put it together and the hinges for a fold down front.

 

[knurse1]

I was curious… I know some people don’t like to talk about chicken finances.
I’m asking, to those who are willing to say, how much did your first egg cost?
I’ll go first… even though I haven’t even harvested a single egg yet (9 week old chicks on Monday). Our first egg will cost over $5k.
We started from scratch. We had someone else build our coop, but it was a very reasonable price given what it would cost just for what we calculated in building supplies for a coop. We built the run. We bought a bsfl bin & we built a bsfl box, to secure it from predators, after it was attacked multiple times.
Then we bought a ton of grains & seeds for future scratch/feed (if we can’t get feed from our usual suppliers at some point). We prep for ourselves, our cat & now our chicks! We also vacuum sealed all of it (mostly from Azure Standard) for preservation, to prevent mold, to prevent bug egg hatching & to portion it. (Took about 10 hours to vacuum seal everything we bought. 100s of pounds.)
I added EVERYTHING in that number (including the deck screws, to secure the run frame)… plus an excel spreadsheet to track it all. I know exactly what it cost for the first egg… but I am an accountant. So I tracked it, down to the dollar, so I would know exactly (to my husband’s dismay! ).
If you don’t know exactly (because you aren’t a finance nerd)… What’s your guess?

Our first egg was probaby close to $5000.

 

[BeefQuesoritto]

I think people will vastly underestimate the costs because they are unlikely to include their time and often that is worth far more than the cost of materials etc.

That's what I was thinking... I don't want to calculate it. My time is also worth different amounts depending on what hat I'm wearing. Don't even want to think about it. Money wasn't that much, I think $300 for the run, the shed was already here. Maybe a couple $20 feed bags. And now I want to build my own records keeping software... that first egg better be pretty dang good.

 

[TwoShepherds]

Gosh, my first egg was probably about $5,000 also. I had my coop delivered and hired fence-builders to put up their pen. My second coop and run I built myself out of cattle panels, hardware cloth, and a tarp for under $1,000--it's not too pretty but I couldn't afford another $5K set-up.