Firewood Business

[kinojango]

Im mortgage free myself and i have some land where i can store the logs. When would be the time to start selling the logs? where could I get hold of timber to log and sell on?

[Dean Lofthouse]

Buying in timber to sell on is another kettle of fish

[kinojango]

Buying in timber to sell on is another kettle of fish

 

Is that a bad way of doing it?

 

Do you have any links to where I could get a price from?

[Dean Lofthouse]

Buying in timber will dramatically reduce the profit margin and making a living out of it would be very difficult.

 

I would only ever do logs as a sideline, ie get a day job and do logs on the weekend.

 

People are stupid and go for the cheapest price and waste money till they learn their lesson. There are far too many people selling cheap unseasoned logs.

 

My logs are undercover seasoned and are not particularly dear, but I still don't sell many until the stupid people have bought up all the cheap wet logs and they have to pay a little more for mine and even then, they leave them outside in the rain once delivered

 

It's a funny market, one you cannot rely on I'm afraid

[Dean Lofthouse]

Is that a bad way of doing it?

 

Do you have any links to where I could get a price from?

 

I,m sure someone on here will give you a price.

[john burgess]

Do you believe it is possible to make a year round living out of just selling firewood?

 

yes i do

[Dean Lofthouse]

Perhaps someone could come up with some costings to be a little more helpful.

 

For example, what do you think the profit margin is in a cu/m of firewood

 

What does it cost to buy in, what does it cost to turn into logs, what do the bags and transport cost, advertising etc

 

If he knows a rough profit margin he will know how many cube he needs to shift to cover his particular living standards.

 

You not giving away the crown jewels, just a rough idea for him

[DN22 Gardening]

we sell purely Arb waste, so if my figures don't match up to yours....tuff

 

say £25 per transit load (approx 2 cube) to get back to yard. (wages, fuel, wear and tear)

£15 per cube processing (my lads do it on price work, takes one of them roughly an hour to do a cube)

£15 per cube delivering (fuel, wages, wear and tear)

£15 per cube for storage, crates, tractor etc.

£ 0 advertising, all ours is word of mouth, or included with our arb side

---------------

£ 57.50 per cube

 

we sell well seasoned h/wood for £75 per cube leaving £17.50 per cube profit.

 

the main reason we do logs is for ease of disposal of timber.

we've sold a lot of loads this winter of un seasoned, unsplit rings. seems to be more profit in it that way.

 

i really don't know how the full time timber lads do it.

what with around £30 per ton roadside, transport, etc

 

fair play to em

[treedave]

Kinojango, geography has a lot to do with margins- cost of timber, haulage ie proximity of timber producing area, price per c/m at point of sale all changes depending on area of the country.

Round me softwood - £20-30 per ton, hardwood - £40-50 per ton. £10+ per ton for haulage.

Conversion costs are, labour per day, diesel, machine repairs & replacement fund, bags £6-8 each. Ball park for me is 26 c/m bags per day with 2 people on a processor and me stacking them in the evening to clear the area for the next day.

 

Other costs, ppe, handling for delivery ( tipper van or trailer, how to load from bags into vehicle?), options for working with oversize timber (cheaper than processor).

This is all presuming you want to go down the processor route and not do it all by hand.

[davetaz]

some basic figures to consider

 

Expenditure p.a.

200T timber @ £50/T = £10,000

Running costs

vehicle

machines

fuels

rent

insurances

repairs/renewals

etc etc £7,000

 

Total £17,000

 

 

Income

200T = 300 cubic metres @ £100 = £30,000

 

Profit = £13,000

 

That's a lot of work for £13k a year