How much to sell nucs for

[ericbeaumont]

Bees have been undervalued for years and it's about time purchasers get realistic.

people take too much an advantage of beginners

Low price won't lead to a recognition of value; a higher price is more likely to focus the mind.

Cheap nucs encourage easy-come, easy-go beekeeping; some don't even get that far: we've had customers who leave a deposit for an expensive nuc, change their mind and don't collect bees or deposit.

A shake of the hand may have worked for low-cost supply in a pre-internet era to beginners in tight-knit communities - rural or urban - but online buying and social mobility has eroded that reciprocal generosity to a great extent.

Perhaps that's a pity, but nobody should be asked (or expect) to pay 54p for a loaf of bread, just because it was that price forty years ago.

 

[Boston Bees]

Low price won't lead to a recognition of value; a higher price is more likely to focus the mind.

Cheap nucs encourage easy-come, easy-go beekeeping; some don't even get that far: we've had customers who leave a deposit for an expensive nuc, change their mind and don't collect bees or deposit.

A shake of the hand may have worked for low-cost supply in a pre-internet era to beginners in tight-knit communities - rural or urban - but online buying and social mobility has eroded that reciprocal generosity to a great extent. Perhaps it's pity, but nobody should be asked (or expect) to pay 54p for a loaf of bread, just because it was that price forty years ago.

The other issue is the risk if simply being taken advantage of. I can advertise nucs at £80 or £100 for local beekeepers because that covers my costs, but if the market value is far higher, the risk is that someone will just buy them and resell them.

I guess we could compare it to dogs. If I own a female dog and produce litters of puppies, and sell them for just £80 each because I think it is nice for people who don't have a dog to have one, someone is going to come along who just wants to resell the puppies for £400 (or £4,000 on current rates!).

 

[Curly green finger's]

The other issue is the risk if simply being taken advantage of. I can advertise nucs at £80 or £100 for local beekeepers because that covers my costs, but if the market value is far higher, the risk is that someone will just buy them and resell them.

I guess we could compare it to dogs. If I own a female dog and produce litters of puppies, and sell them for just £80 each because I think it is nice for people who don't have a dog to have one, someone is going to come along who just wants to resell the puppies for £400 (or £4,000 on current rates!).

These are middle men and we won't get rid of then in any type of business.
Some are more honest than others, some want to profit by stupid %.

 

[mbc]

In response to Apples post above I have tried to work out the approxiamate realistic costs of producing a 5 frame nucleus (assuming that several are produced at the same time).

Material costs = 5 frames (bought as part of a 2nds bulk buy) + 55 nails £3
5 sheets of foundation £5
Cost of Sugar syrup used to get foundation drawn and feed nucleus £4 (@45p per kg )

Cost of queen £8 (reared as part of 20+ queen batch using cupkit or grafting, contribution towards purchase of Apidea (estimated life 10+ years and each used to get 2 or more queens mated per year) fondant for Apidea, contribution towards cost of queen rearing equipment
One seasons use of nucleus hive £2 : polynucleus (bought for £30 estimated life 15yrs+)
one hour of beekeepers time (probably an over estimate for time conscious beekeepers) costed at £20 and used for making up frames, setting up nucleus, rearing queen, marking queen, feeding/maintenance/checking of nucleus
Loss of honey production from colonies providing the bees £20-£30 (much less if exercise done as part of swarm control measures)

I estimate a well organised beekeeper keeping 20 or more colonies could produce a nucleus up to the standards required for around £60 to £70. Anything over that is profit so charging £100 would be a fair price.

I am sure that with the efficiency of scale the costs would be lower and to make a living a beefarmer would need to charge more. Because beekeeping is my hobby and I don’t count my time as everything would fit in with my regular apiary visits I estimate it costs me no more than £40.

I now await others to shoot me down and produce alternative costings.



I

Good effort, I would question the cost of the time and the cost of the queen.
Time is a stretchy thing and while I'd jump at your £20 /hour for seven or eight months of the year, time in April, May and June is precious, even with long days there's just never enough time to do everything and so something has to suffer. I'd calculate a day spent queen rearing rather than swarm control or general beekeeping at this time of year at nearer £1000 than the £160 an eight hour day at your £20/hour would gross.
Also the queen, assessment of breeding stock and the mated queens adds costs, providing drone colonies add costs, duds add cost, failed introductions add cost, taking a whole bloody month to get mated in pissy Welsh weather add costs, or whole batches getting ditched due to no suitable mating window adds cost.
Then add in face to face time with customers and time spent on a little after sales service and £250 a pop is reasonable, or the route most commercial beekeepers take is leaving that side of the business to someone who can be arsed.

 

[Niv]

In response to Apples post above I have tried to work out the approxiamate realistic costs of producing a 5 frame nucleus (assuming that several are produced at the same time).

Material costs = 5 frames (bought as part of a 2nds bulk buy) + 55 nails £3
5 sheets of foundation £5
Cost of Sugar syrup used to get foundation drawn and feed nucleus £4 (@45p per kg )

Cost of queen £8 (reared as part of 20+ queen batch using cupkit or grafting, contribution towards purchase of Apidea (estimated life 10+ years and each used to get 2 or more queens mated per year) fondant for Apidea, contribution towards cost of queen rearing equipment
One seasons use of nucleus hive £2 : polynucleus (bought for £30 estimated life 15yrs+)
one hour of beekeepers time (probably an over estimate for time conscious beekeepers) costed at £20 and used for making up frames, setting up nucleus, rearing queen, marking queen, feeding/maintenance/checking of nucleus
Loss of honey production from colonies providing the bees £20-£30 (much less if exercise done as part of swarm control measures)

I estimate a well organised beekeeper keeping 20 or more colonies could produce a nucleus up to the standards required for around £60 to £70. Anything over that is profit so charging £100 would be a fair price.

I am sure that with the efficiency of scale the costs would be lower and to make a living a beefarmer would need to charge more. Because beekeeping is my hobby and I don’t count my time as everything would fit in with my regular apiary visits I estimate it costs me no more than £40.

I now await others to shoot me down and produce alternative costings.



I

That looks around the same as I had calculated in the past so pleased that the our numbers are in line, however I factor in providing a nuc box so would consider going up a little. As a hobbyist, charge would be based on a number of factors though (i.e. my association members would be charged much less).

I do agree with others that there are other factors to consider, on queen rearing, selection and duds etc, but my thoughts are based on a hobbyist selling off 'spare' nucs rather than going out my way to make to sell if that makes sense.

 

[Amari]

Overwintering nuclei to sell in April obviously adds costs ( treating for Varroa, cost of feeding, time for more checks and plus a contribution towards winter losses from queen failures etc) maybe another £30 to £40 per nucleus.
Beekeeping isn't rocket science and Ian123 thinks I make it seem easy but I have been keeping bees longer than most and learnt alot in that time often learning the hard way from my numerous mistakes but I now have systems of management that seem to work most of the time. I don't sell bees commercially just produce queens and nuclei for myself and to provide bees for beginners in my BKA to get started. However I will be selling up completely in about 6 years time when I reach 80yrs as I reckon the lifting and work load will be too much for me by then (also under pressure from the better half to get rid of hundreds of beekeeping books (have several signed copies by Eva Crane and other well known authors ) honeypots and other collectables plus beekeeping gear stuff that fills house, shed, garage and attic!)

No need for that! I'm 79 and just getting into my stride - after 49 years of beekeeping. The 70s decade is the prime of life. Follow the example of the late Honorary Colonel Sir Tom. To keep SWMBO sweet: get rid of the bee books.

 

[ericbeaumont]

a hobbyist selling off 'spare' nucs rather than going out my way to make to sell if that makes sense.

Not really.

Parallel here with another recent thread on the price - or rather, the value - of honey. If you're selling a Jag, why ask the price of a bicycle?

 

[Apple]

That's very normal Philip, as long as you didn't go back for tartan paint the next day!

Our Haematology Chief technician sent the new lad down to the hospital stores to get a couple of meters of fallopian tube.
An hour or so later he came back with the storeman to ask what internal diameter he wanted!
Four candles anyone......

Chons da

 

[Niv]

Not really.

Parallel here with another recent thread on the price - or rather, the value - of honey. If you're selling a Jag, why ask the price of a bicycle?

Ok Eric, to clarify a bit then. If it were a stranger / random buying a nuc off me I consider it a business transaction and would sell at a higher price (around £150), if i were selling to a fellow association member it would be on similar terms that were afforded to me. It is also worth reiterating that I was also referring to a hobbyist selling off 'spare' nucs (as i stated) so they are not specifically being produced to sell to make money as such.

Like with honey price, there are factors, my friends will get free/cheap, at the gate etc will pay full price

If i were selling a jag, I may well sell it for less to a mate than I would to a stranger, that does not mean it is being sold at a bicycle price.

 

[sipa]

I estimate a well organised beekeeper keeping 20 or more colonies could produce a nucleus up to the standards required for around £60 to £70

I can tell you with complete certainty your estimate is way off. You have ommitted around 40 additional cost elements that are rquired to produce nucs commercially.
That's not including a profit !

 

[Apple]

I can tell you with complete certainty your estimate is way off. You have ommitted around 40 additional cost elements that are rquired to produce nucs commercially.
That's not including a profit !

Plus £40 for the polly box...... and there is fortunately no VAT on the box if sold full of bees

PROFIT????.... we have to sell at a profit to make up for all the LOSSES!!!

 

[Curly green finger's]

Ok Eric, to clarify a bit then. If it were a stranger / random buying a nuc off me I consider it a business transaction and would sell at a higher price (around £150), if i were selling to a fellow association member it would be on similar terms that were afforded to me. It is also worth reiterating that I was also referring to a hobbyist selling off 'spare' nucs (as i stated) so they are not specifically being produced to sell to make money as such.

Like with honey price, there are factors, my friends will get free/cheap, at the gate etc will pay full price

If i were selling a jag, I may well sell it for less to a mate than I would to a stranger, that does not mean it is being sold at a bicycle price.

I don't know about the price to fellow association members one price for all.
If they are fellow members or not.
I've had no complaints.
And have sold all of the nucs I have for sale.

 

[user 20297]

Bees shouldn't be any different to any other commodity , (or should that be "livestock"?) As a seller, the price can be whatever you want it to be and doesn't have to be based on actual costs of production. According to circumstances, things can be sold at a loss, for minimal profit or for maximum gain.

As with all things, there is usually a buyer for every price-point and every quality of goods. No amateur beekeeper has any obligation to maintain prices at a professional level. In fact, some commercial beekeepers may be right to feel vexed if an amateur, with fewer overheads, (and possibly with less quantifiable provenance and health accreditation), charges the same price that they do.

In recent times, I've had "commercial" bees and "local" bees in trying to build up my stocks......prices were £250 and £150 respectively. Based on performance so far, in future, I will always buy local if I need extra bees. There was nothing wrong with the commercial bees, but I can say exactly the same about the local bees.....and there were a lot more of them.

 

[Niv]

Fair enough, maybe I should just charge more!

 

[madasafish]

I have to allow the following costs:
Insurance
winter feeding
Treatments
Winter losses - Nucs are vulnerable from anything - poorly mated Qs being my problem last year due to weather.So I would allow 20% winter losses in any costing...
Queens? I reckon for a hobbyist like me after cleaning, feeding , testing losses, grafting costs etc. and depreciation I cannot produce a Q for under £12. If my losses due to mating issues improved - but the weather is variable and we are in a Solar Minimum - so harder winters for the next 2-3 years..losses from emergence to mated are 40%. ( I lost one entire batch of 10 to wasps last year)

In my experience people tend to value things based on what they pay for them. There are enough newcomers who buy nucs and - becuase they have not learned anything or tried to learn - lost their bees. I will not subsidise their incompetence.

This Spring I hope to have 4 overwintered Qs in mini nucs. The going rate is c£60-£75 each. commercially. I am not going to give mine away for £25.

With bee imports effectivley banned, I would expect to see Spring prices for a nuc around £250- £300.

But wdik.

 

[Apple]

With bee imports effectivley banned, I would expect to see Spring prices for a nuc around £250- £300.

To be fair... and as I have a list of beekeepers and would be beekeepers, none of them that are friends or friends of friends.... new ones being added to the "list" every day. I am looking at setting up some kind of "on line auction" or even "sealed bids"!
I will set the starting bids at £200 for 5 frames with an overwintered and marked in a correx box.... with instructions for feeding and care.
Once these bees have left my premises and signed for they will be the property of the new owner.... and if they manage to kill them .... sadly that is their bad luck

 

[mbc]

When I was a kid at school I worked during the summer holidays for Bassetts the liqurice allsorts manufacturers .... I worked with the fitters ... On my first day with them they sent me off to the stores for a Long Weight ... I got one ...until the storeman took pity on me !

With bee imports effectivley banned, I would expect to see Spring prices for a nuc around £250- £300.

To be fair... and as I have a list of beekeepers and would be beekeepers, none of them that are friends or friends of friends.... new ones being added to the "list" every day. I am looking at setting up some kind of "on line auction" or even "sealed bids"!
I will set the starting bids at £200 for 5 frames with an overwintered and marked in a correx box.... with instructions for feeding and care.
Once these bees have left my premises and signed for they will be the property of the new owner.... and if they manage to kill them .... sadly that is their bad luck

Whatever happened to bid4bees ?

 

[Apple]

Whatever happened to bid4bees ?

They would want a share of my profits

 

[sipa]

We fixed our prices back on the 1st September for the coming year as we always do, and we arn't going to change them despite forthcoming market forces. With the caveat that if the repalacement costs of poly nucs, wax, or frames increase significantly due to Brexit then prices will have to rise to reflect that.
I like to make a profit but am against profiteering.

 

[Antipodes]

Plus £40 for the polly box...... and there is fortunately no VAT on the box if sold full of bees

PROFIT????.... we have to sell at a profit to make up for all the LOSSES!!!

There is a lot of money in beekeeping.