Greetings from Hammerstead Farms!
Well, I'm sitting here on Monday morning, writing what should've been written a week ago. But somehow, I just kept holding out hope that I wouldn't have to do it. But, alas, such was not the case - hence this missive.
When we started our home delivery service a year and a half ago, gas was about $1.65/gal. When the price spiked after hurricane Katrina last year, I imposed a $1 per delivery surcharge to help cover costs - and it helped, but it didn't make up the whole difference. I was counting on energy costs falling, which they did, and I removed it when gas dipped below $2.50/gal.
Today, I honestly don't think we'll ever see prices like that again. On my route last week my net profit was a whopping $4. On a big week I might clear $15, but that's still for about 8 hours of work, so it's less than $2/hour.
So I have two choices. I can raise delivery prices to cover costs, or I can concentrate on commercial business. If I raised prices, my eggs would have to sell for between $3.50 and $4 per dozen for me to get the same return on investment that I made in the beginning. And I honestly don't see that big a market for $4/doz. eggs, home delivered or not.
Therefore, we have made the decision to cease home delivery of eggs, at least for the foreseeable future.
We class a "commercial" delivery as any order of 10 dozen or more. Cost for our eggs in these quantities is $2 per dozen. If you have the space to store the eggs that may be an option - farm fresh eggs will keep quite a while under refrigeration - we date label commercial deliveries for a month. We require a weeks notice on such deliveries, and also payment on delivery unless you have a commercial credit account with a major bank.
Our major commercial outlet in Indianapolis is the Sunflower Market, located at 1021 Broad Ripple Avenue. And we'll still be selling eggs from our back porch - we're just west of State Road 75 on State Road 32 - about 8 miles west of Lebanon and 14 miles east of Crawfordsville.
Home delivery has been fun: I've met many of you and like to think of my customers as friends. We'll still be selling our beef, lamb and meat chicken, and I'll post a notice via this newsletter when we have meat available.
Thank you all so very much for your interest in and patronage of Hammerstead Farms - we're still excited about our farm, and hope you'll continue to enjoy our farm fresh products in the future.
Be well,
Dave Haxton