I've been selling my eggs to co-workers for quite some time, and barely make enough money to pay for the ever rising cost of feed. It doesn't help that my wife often wins the hatching egg auctions on this site either. It just means more chickens to feed. So, I figured it's time to expand. Last month, I met with a friend for dinner at a wonderful restaurant. I've boasted so much about my FBCM chickens int he past that I brought him a dozen of FBCM with a few Ameraucana in the mix. Needless to add, he was impressed! So much so that he told the owner/chef, which happened to be his friend about the eggs. The owner was opening another restaurant and wanted to buy my BCM and Ameraucana eggs. I was stunned! A few days later, I stopped by a local restaurant that was known for buying produce from local farmers. I told the owner/ mgr about my new customer, and asked what he paid his local farmer for eggs...just to get an idea on what to charge the other restaurant. I gave him a little history on the FBCM chickens and colors they and the Ameraucana produced. Then he became extremely interested! It turns out this owner/manager was once a partner of the other owner/chef in first restaurant. What a small world! Before I knew it, I had a country club requesting eggs, and that manager told me to call another restaurant that also may be interested. My god, I just don't have enough girls to lay that many eggs. My biggest dilemma is how much should I charge per dozen. The owner from the second restaurant never answered my question. Does anyone ?????????????
I think the costs vary state to state but I pay $3-$3.25 per dozen right now at our farmer's market. I've seen a few people mention the $3 mark so I'm betting this is right in line. Hope this helps.
Quote:We pay $2.75-3.00 a dozen at the farmer's market, but our local store charges up to $4.99 for local eggs. Edit to add: CONGRATS!
I spend $20 per 50 lbs for feed (organic), so that works out to .40 a lb. I figure each girl eats about 4 oz a day, (average between the breeds) so that works out to .70 a week in feed. I average 2 eggs per 3 hens, though numbers are improving as they mature. We are pretty close to 4 out of 5. So I take .70x5=3.50 in feed costs for 5 birds giving me 28 eggs (4 eggsx7 days) So my egg cost is 3.50/28 =>.13 I pay .40 approximately per egg carton, don't have room to store 1000s. My asking price is 2.50 w/ carton, giving me .44 to apply towards fixed expenses. Your expenses will include egg flats and boxes or carrying racks that can be returned and sanitized for the next order; delivery cost figure a mileage rate to include wear and tear on the truck. Determine how you will keep the eggs cool in transit, the eggs need to be kept below 40, since you are dealing with food service organizations. Inspectors are a major PITA. You might want to check into whether you need to have inspections/licences to sell to commercial customers - remember CYA! Yeah, this just exploded from selling eggs to friends to a major business w/ rules and regs. I am going to take my eggs all in a cooler and sell they Sat am at our local flea market. I also have a sign going up by the gate. I would like to earn enough to break have the girls feed themselves so I only have to worry about our food budget. I am still in shock, prices have soared in the last 2 months, didn't do a big shopping last month to use down the pantry and this month I spent at least $50 more than normal and I bought no meat or cleaning supplies. Good Luck....
