Midwest Deer Sales said:
I was wondering why our industry has some 8,000 deer farmers and on any given year why only 300 or so attend or opt to put something in an auction. That is a little more than 3%. Are there truly 8,000 deer farmers in the U.S.? Please give me your feedback as I am trying to figure out how we get more folks involved. The more involved, the louder the voice of our industry! Any suggestions would also be helpful.
Thank You
Eric Pinkston
Hi Eric,
This is a really good question and I will be speaking from the side of the "other 7700 deer farmers" that do not attend or opt to put animals in auctions.
I think there are many reasons but the most important is the bottleneck effect. Let me explain.
I know of and have spoken to many folks that have submitted animals but were not excepted, only to then attend the auctions to find out that lesser quality animals made the grade from a "big name". This upsets people and reinforces the fact that a name game deeply surrounds the auctions. This sets up for a huge bottleneck by only a select few consigning.
Yet another reason for the poor attendance could be that the majority (7700 deer farmers) realize the reality of this industry and refuse to look through the same kaleidoscope as the 300 whom do. You basically got 300 deer farmers buying from one another. The new folks coming in look at these auction prices, fall for the trap and then become trapped themselves behind the bottleneck. This in turn quickly increases the number of people who do not attend or cannot consign due to the name game reasons already stated above.
We all know money is also an important issue to the other 7700 deer farmers. Most of these farmers raise shooter breeding stock and when they go to an auction with the intent of purchasing a $3500 deer, it actually ends up costing them close to $5,000 after they consider all the traveling, lodging and food expenses incurred to purchase that "auction select" animal. Then on top of that, they still need to spend another several hundred dollars transporting the animal to their farm. Now a person has close to $5500 invested in a $3500 select auction deer. So basically in a nut shell it ends up costing them unjustifiably by attending and purchasing animals from the the "select auctions". $2,000 will go a long way in paying a feed bill or purchasing semen to upgrade their own stock and with a better ROI.
Let's talk a little about the 3% who do attend and consign to the auctions. Say they consign a doe that sells for $3,500. Now lets figure in the expenses incurred to attend the auction, advertise, pay for booth space, food, travel expense, lodging, etc. $500 for a booth space, another $1000+ for print design, booth design and advertising, $250 travel expense, $300 lodging, $200 food expense and $100 misc.
It is pretty hard for most to justify spending close to $2500 to sell a deer for $3,500 when they already get $3000-$4000 off the farm for the same deer. At least from what I can tell, this is how the "other 97%" that do not attend auctions are making a very good go of it. It is the reality of the deer business and the numbers you stated clearly speak for themselves, IMO.
As an industry, we should be focused on promoting the 7700 instead of the 300.
I know a lot of people in the 97% crowd are thinking and want to say this very same thing but are worried about hurting their chances to get in the 3% crowd. At the end of the day, when it's all said and done, your deer will sell themselves if you are doing a good job at producing what the other 97% of deer farms want, while allowing them too, to make money on their investments.
Just a point of view from the 97% crowd.
.
I know Greg Listle will be looking for the mints again
