Charge for running hives for commercial company

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dickbowyer

House Bee
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Location
W Sussex, UK
Hive Type
National
Number of Hives
Some hives and a few nucs
A number of companies now have hives based on and around their premises as part of their environmentally friendly policies and presume they employ beekeepers to manage those hives. Has anyone any experience of doing this, pitfalls and what might be the going rate per hive for a season? Clearly it would be different depending up on whether beekeepers reward was any honey produced or whether company was charged based up on volume of honey they wanted kept for sale.
 
Only company I have had dealings with ( supplying local native bees as part of their environmental strategy) has a member of staff who is a keen beekeeper, and he is given time during his working hours to look after the bees. The company funds the cost of the hives and colonies. Honey produced from the four colonies is used in the company catering facility!

Also you could try Beefarmers Association, Pollination Secretary
[email protected]

Who would have a list of professional properly insured members who could help?

Yeghes da
 
Only company I have had dealings with ( supplying local native bees as part of their environmental strategy) has a member of staff who is a keen beekeeper, and he is given time during his working hours to look after the bees. ....

Yeghes da

This raises an interesting legal situation. The beekeeper who works for the company is an employee and is therefore protected by the Health and Safety at Work Act 1974. The company has to comply with that Act and the Manual Handling Regs, Personal Protective Equipment Regs, and all the other workplace regulations in relation to the beekeeping work done by their employee.

Interesting!

CVB
 
This raises an interesting legal situation. The beekeeper who works for the company is an employee and is therefore protected by the Health and Safety at Work Act 1974. The company has to comply with that Act and the Manual Handling Regs, Personal Protective Equipment Regs, and all the other workplace regulations in relation to the beekeeping work done by their employee.

Interesting!

CVB

Those regs are not a problem. Short one to one meeting with our H&S lead and we all attend manual handling as part of our yearly mandatory training. Can now come and go across the roof tops!
 
Those regs are not a problem. Short one to one meeting with our H&S lead and we all attend manual handling as part of our yearly mandatory training. Can now come and go across the roof tops!

I agree those regs are not a problem provided the company recognises its employee is doing something out of the ordinary and has assessed any risks arising from that.

CVB
 
In answer to the OP - when I looked at a guy near us doing this sort o thing he was providing something like one or two visits to the hive, a few jars of honey and charging £350 a year while keeping the rest of any yield - what sort of take up he got I couldn't say.
 
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If you are looking to do it as a business you may want to register as a "not for profit" as with all the running about it is not a viable business model without charging the earth.

I have been there and it was not worth it in the end. Also had the company owing us a substantial amount of money go into liquidation which we packed in the entire hive rental service.

There are a few still doing it, but I question if they bother with required upkeep. Others I know have packed in as they have realised it is not viable.
 
There's a beekeeper local to me who runs a hive rental service

http://www.collsbeeshoney.com/


Initially it looks like it pays well for the beekeeper but then factor in how many customers you need to have to generate an income that covers more than costs and it doesn't look so good IMHO.
She's also a SBI, don't know if she combines the two to save on transport.
 

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