- Location
- Ceredigion
You say its dear but then farmers are going to Auctions and paying up to £200 ton for it and still got to get it homeBlooming heck that’s not good ! It’s dear enough but poor quality as well ! Not on .
You say its dear but then farmers are going to Auctions and paying up to £200 ton for it and still got to get it homeBlooming heck that’s not good ! It’s dear enough but poor quality as well ! Not on .
A few years back I took a cut of hay from a field that nobody wanted, agreed a price per bale, I baled it and stored it then it rained for about 3 or 4 weeks. Me and the land owner agreed for us to do the same next year and we would graze the grass as well
I gave a fair price per bale and sold them to a neighbour for the going rate that winter which was strong, he asked where it was from as it was great stuff!
Then it’s gets to spring and the landowner rang to say he has been offered £15 a bale out the field by somebody (the man I sold it to in winter) and had taken the deal.
So I thought well that’s fine, we had a deal but feck it, it’s only 10 acre of grass.
Then it’s a wet time, it gets to late July and no hay making weather has come, the man then goes back on his word and says he doesn’t want it the crop now because it’s such a wet time, so I get a phone call asking if I could cut this field again and buy the crop by the bale again!
the landowner thinks I won the lottery by cutting, tedding and baling his field the first year, and the buyer thinks he has been fleeced and paid to much
They think they will cut out the contractor and both gain
A wet time comes and suddenly nobody wants this field of dead wet grass
That’s even dearer ! The other fellas is dear because it’s of poor quality wouldn’t you agree ?You say its dear but then farmers are going to Auctions and paying up to £200 ton for it and still got to get it home
Well if they were not needed they wouldn’t be there , pretty much same as any one else providing a serviceDiscuss that?
We are occasional straw sellers depending on price. If we can achieve £70/t and over we will bale and sell. If it’s less we chop it. Normally we’d sell to a merchant for ease. However this year we’ve sold direct to end users mainly because they are coming direct to us. They’ve been asking merchant truck drivers where stuffs been collected from and then googled for contact details. They’ll pay up front and arrange their own collection. Everybody is happy because we get the price we want but the buyer has cut out the merchants profit on the transport cost as well as the profit on the straw sale.
What a niggardly attitude.Discuss that?
We are occasional straw sellers depending on price. If we can achieve £70/t and over we will bale and sell. If it’s less we chop it. Normally we’d sell to a merchant for ease. However this year we’ve sold direct to end users mainly because they are coming direct to us. They’ve been asking merchant truck drivers where stuffs been collected from and then googled for contact details. They’ll pay up front and arrange their own collection. Everybody is happy because we get the price we want but the buyer has cut out the merchants profit on the transport cost as well as the profit on the straw sale.
You're clearly a very successful individual .What a niggardly attitude.
Do you think i'm going to chase such a low value product 100 miles plus from my yard gate, when there's a queue of traders ready to do that for me?
why would I expect them to work for nothing?
There's nothing stopping you buying a wagon and taking their cut yourself is there?
As it happens, I run a flatbed lorry for one of my diversifications, but I couldn't get anywhere near viability fetching it myself.
I seldom begrudge a trading partner a living, and despair of farmers- or anyone- who do.
It makes them look pathetic.
I went to an Eskimo restaurant and asked the waiter about the specials.Selling straw to livestock farmers is a lot like selling snow to an Eskimo who's cat has just died.
I'd not want to be a straw merchant.
and when your supplies get low will you try and help your customers i.e become by default a straw dealer of whom the ones I know are just facilitating a trade and making a margin as are we all trying to doWe run a wagon delivering our own straw, Averaging 5 loads a week from November done six loads this week already. Built up a loyal customer base, know some great farmers made some good friends and contacts. Get paid on delivery & have bit natter. No need for the middle men i say.
I wishYou're clearly a very successful individual .
I give them plenty notice when i am getting low, I will give them contacts of other growers who may have straw to sell. Its no different to selling the grain we grow, when its gone its gone.and when your supplies get low will you try and help your customers i.e become by default a straw dealer of whom the ones I know are just facilitating a trade and making a margin as are we all trying to do