How do YOU define agricultural success?

[Clive]

unfortunately not financially rich or time rich but family and friend rich

so all you need now is the time and money to enjoy them

as per my original point that balance of time / financial wealth is hard to achieve

 

[Scholsey]

Are you sure profits have nothing to do with success? I agree being happy whilst farming is important, but I for one am generally happier when making a profit than I am when making a loss and I have done both.

True but there has been plenty of big farmers who are considered successful by others as they seem to have plenty of kit roaring around, farming big acres, would be making a big profit more often than not who end up doing very silly things to stop the worrying whereas you never hear of a happy farmer doing it.

My father and I lost around £500k over a 2 year period on several bulding projects. Before that we played at the property game making strong money at the time. In the aftermath we are all happier that we can now do what we want when we want. Money has zero factor in it. Yeah when times were good they were great no doubt, but we never had an opportunity to enjoy it as everything was all re invested. My business partner lost around £21million of his own money (not borrowed money) he's happier now than he ever was, fact!! He gets up in the morning does a few deals, plays golf, has 4 or 5 holidays a year, goes for coffee, looks after his wife who had a severe stroke in the middle of it and is now full time in a wheelchair.

Success. Weathered the storm come out the other side bit battered and bruised, still here, still better off than we started, now doing our thing on our terms.

Exactly my point, there’s plenty of profitable farmers who still aren’t happy due to worry, are they still successful?

 

[4course]

so all you need now is the time and money to enjoy them

as per my original point that balance of time / financial wealth is hard to achieve

you dont need mega amounts of each its as you say the balance and I aint complaining

 

[Billboy1]

Over the last 20 years my farming business size has stayed the same so you could probably say contracted due to not keeping up with the big boys but my other business interests have blossomed so now I’m happy to have enough time and money to enjoy life and family and farming

 

[4course]

Over the last 20 years my farming business size has stayed the same so you could probably say contracted due to not keeping up with the big boys but my other business interests have blossomed so now I’m happy to have enough time and money to enjoy life and family and farming

in reality you are saying other business interests take less time and resources and provide a greater return than farming. thats the way things are heading and have been for been for a long time it seems

 

[Kiwi Pete]

I had a realisation that when I was sitting on the lefthand wing of the same Nuffield 10/60 that the old boy had when I was little, and my boy learning to steer with big "mickey mouse" ears and a grin to match -
I am not "the boy" anymore

That is my definition of success - emulating the pattern of the successful previous generation without forgetting my core values along the way

I don't know how that sits with the greedy guts who want more and more - we are selling the same amount of meat as the old man off a 7th the acreage - but just like the old man, I started from scratch; land got several times more expensive in the 50 years in between, but I could survive at 1980s prices just as they did, but wouldn't make as much as we do now

However the guts remains that we: don't need to expand our area or have fancy grass and fancy genetics to make money - we are about as immune from the "European style" yield dependency as it is possible to be, which indicates we could be here for a while, however bad for the GDP that is

"Sustainable" isn't progress to me, if I can't make full use of the sun and rain that lands on the surface then I am not a "successful farmer" regardless of output, time or profit levels. We are making gains but not neccessarily in measurable areas.

 

[Fragonard]

I know a few people that got millions for development land and it changed them for the worst...

 

[holwellcourtfarm]

I know a few people that got millions for development land and it changed them for the worst...

Just like many lottery winners then

Money doesn't have to change people for the worse but it quite often does. Look how families often fight when an inheritance is involved