Don't sell yourself short!

This is a serious issue. Setting your price can make or break your business. We're guilty of undervaluing our product. For many years we didn't consider our blood, sweat and tears invested. How can we expect our customers to value our product if we don't?

Originally, we were doing great setting prices for our cattle and chicks, at least doing a little better than breaking even. But, we didn't increase our prices when we started genomic testing every cow, added more health testing for the herd and NPIP for the poultry, brought in Faverolles bloodlines from the East Coast, and went to Artificial Insemination cattle breeding with specialty frozen straws shipped from across the USA in biohazard tanks. Our expenses went way up, as did our quality, but our price didn't! Doh!! Obviously, we saw value in these expenses but we didn't translate that into our products.

​I'm not sure exactly when we made the shift away from "backyard breeders" to that of producers of a top shelf livestock. I think we were offering great family cows, chicks and eggs before our mentality caught up!

---

We're purposely cultivating rare breeds. This isn't that uncommon. Doing so with skill though is a rarity! I spend about 30 hours a week researching everything from breed standards, market trends, and genetics to nutrition. Should our customers care? Should they value my time when buying livestock from us? Of course!​

As we hone our eye for confirmation that meets the breed standard we make better choices for breeding. For example, this translates to investing in AI breeding our Mini Jersey herd and importing Faverolles bloodlines. Our stock also improves as we learn more about optimum nutrition for each species. These add value to the distinctive quality of livestock we produce. That's not just figurative but literal dollars.