Loading Net sacks with Firewood

[rovers90]

Hi,

 

I have trial loaded some Medallion 52 x 85cm bags with both hard and softwood with the bag uniformly packed (i.e. all logs laid parallel across the bag) with small round and split logs to create a 7" x 13" x 26" pack that weighs about 20 Kg (hw) and 17 Kg (sw).

 

I will take a digi pic today and try uploading later.

 

I very much doubt if full costing is being worked out and applied to sell a bag of firewood for £5.00 and would speculate that this price is established and driven more by what it is perceived that the market will stand. Fuel prices are rising dramatically and so too should firewood prices move in line with general energy market prices. A customer who burns firewood to stay warm will buy firewood by the tipper load but the person who buys firewood in a bag does so to stay cheery and might never even light that firewood.

 

The activities needed to create firewood are as follows :-

 

Buy / Rent land

Plant / Grow Tree

Fell Tree

Delimb Tree

Buck tree to chord wood length

Extract / Carry to vehicle

Drive vehicle to yard

Stack chordwood

Cut chordwood into firewood logs

Split logs

Stack logs / pile

Retrieve logs from pile & load Net Sacks

Tie & label sack

Stack Net sacks

Load vehicle with sack(s)

Deliver firewood to customer

 

and then there are capital cost overheads to consider :-

Chainsaw & Consumables, Protective clothing, Vehicle & Trailer, Firewood storage / drying shed, Yard

 

This an awful lot of effort for a fiver !

 

To increase the price of firewood the product needs to be differentiated i.e. a hierarchy of prices applied for different types of firewood, so for example :-

 

Hardwood (top grade)

e.g. oak, ash, beech, cherry, apple, pear, hawthorn

 

Hardwood (lower grade)

e.g. elm, willow, birch, chestnut (?), holly, poplar

 

Softwood (top grade)

e.g. Larch, Douglas Fir

 

Softwood (lower grade)

e.g. Pine, Western Red Cedar

 

In terms of value for money all that really matters is the weight of seasoned (dry) firewood being sold however it would appear that currently firewood is being sold by volume in a non price discriminatory fashion e.g. mixed hard / softwood and of varying dryness.

 

It's difficult to comprehend how Trading Standards continue to allow this non comparative and unmeasurable practice for the sale of firewood to continue since for example in the sale of almost every other product the control of sale by "weights and measures" is extremely tight.

 

Regards

 

Chilterns

p.s Robied - what kind of 25litre container are you using - sounds like a cost efficent and effective solution.

 

I think you are spot on with the above. However, my impression of wood burning joe public is he is not bothered one iota with the above. Because they can see trees all around them they think firewood should be sold for next to nothing. The unregulation of the industry has also not helped either - people have been buying by the pick up load and yet have no idea how big or how much volume that pick up will hold; so if they ring two suppliers and get quoted £70 and £130 for a pick up load they will go for the cheaper one. This despite the fact the first could be a Suzuki Carryall and the second a Ford F350 which could take two Suzukis in it load bed. The wood buying public needs to be educated....how that is achieved is the problem!