Cost of 5 frames and foundation.. Approx £10
1 frame of honey say 3lbs worth £15
1 queen worth £35
I correx box or a wooden nuc £10 to £50 say £30
Total so far £90..
(and that excludes bees)
And you think £20- £50 is more reasonable?
Bulk bees in those places that sell them go for around 35 to 40 pounds a kilo...you need about that amount.......so add 40 quid onto your costs...so you are at 130 on your figures.......but
The nucs we sell are 6 frames. They will have a good bit more than one frame of honey.
They will have brood in at least 4 bars, plus a home reared queen AND enough bees to cover all active frames (min 5, normally 6).
We will have sacrificed production the summer before. We will have treated it for varroa and fed it for the winter, and again in spring.
So frames and wax.....with assembly and wiring costs you are not far off at 12.00 (for 6 against your 5)
Feeding 3 times, so 10 litres...14Kg...of invert......about 10.00
Home reared queen 30.00
kilo of bees..... 40.00
Labour and fuel costs over 9 months.........est. at 15.00
Varroa meds 3.00
That's 110.00 just to cover this lot.
Hours of answering calls from the nervous worried (usually needlessly alarmed by doomsayers in their own association or on the net) comes free. (Business idea...a premium rate advice line!!) No allowance for production loss.
Now realise I am too cheap lol. 2017 price WAS 140.00 without the poly nuc box, 160.00 with, and 20 back if you return the box.
(Disclaimer...no refund on boxes that have been hacked at by 'improvers' who chop out the feed compartment, or change the bee space, and think they are doing me a favour. One guy thought he would still get his 20.00 back after a rat in his shed had made a meal of the box......seriously! There was as much hole as wall left on one side.)
If we have empty hives to fill, the nucs are worth considerably more to us kept for ourselves than the price we take for selling them.
Guys just stripped a set of last years nucs at the heather. Estimated 35Kg average on that group...so c £280 of honey. Minus costs of the years management, around £110. Thus sold it would have been worth 140...its honey alone is 170...plus still have the bees and gear, so must have retained its value at least and is a full colony now.
Selling £140. Keeping and producing...earnings and asset value added together £310. In many ways a no brainer but shows that even at £200, unless you are being sold rubbish, its still a decent deal.