Timber pricing

[codlasher]

My dad used to sell 30,000 cubic feet a year to Ercol @ £1 per per hoppus foot. This paid for a staff of four in later years to maintain the woodland that he was responsible for.

When I was asked to continue his work the price had not changed at all. As the mill had ceased because the overheads, labour difficulties, marketing issues and a plethora of other problems that come with elderly milling equipment. I had to try and find other markets.

The main being through Euroforest/Tillhill. This was mainly for softwood and we all know the market forces for that.

Ercol rang a few years back asking for some beech and I asked if they wanted a truck load......No was the answer they'll just put a couple of sticks in the boot of the car:lol:

The smaller more unusual pieces went to the boat building world and they were not prepared to pay more than £12 per cube sawn for oak. The specs were simple; 12' long x 6'' thick + delivery. There are several historic vessels with these planks floating around the coast of Britain.

Beech was only ever sawn as specialist orders or in the firewood pile, which always seemed a shame! Without sawmill though it was sensible. I still received the £1 per hoppus!

I know just how delabodge feels about the hoarding:big grin:

codlasher

[Big J]

Anyone had any further thoughts on this?

 

It's not just because of a price reduction, but I have lowered my prices and March was my best month by turnover by 60%.

 

Jonathan

[Rob D]

Only just seen this thread!

 

 

It's a good one to keep looking at. I think it's a brave move to lower your prices Jon - time will tell if this works - it could be your customers have taken advantage of lower prices to increase their own stocks before you have a chance to change your mind back again! But hopefully not and it will attract new business.

 

 

There is a new initiative called 'Grown in Britain' Grown in Britain | Creating a sustainable future for UK woodland

 

which should be exactly what is needed - why don't you see about writing up in their blog Jon Grown in Britain | Get Involved | Contact Us - I have e-mailed a few times along the lines of

 

'I am a small timber producer and struggling to find markets for my product can you help link me to these...' and replies have been 'yes we are here to help people like yourself access new markets please register on our site and...'

 

... but little practical advice on how to do it!

 

But I think someone such as yourself fighting the corner of small timber producers and generally being vocal would be good!

 

 

[Rob D]

I still find selling timber very difficult although now finally have a working model and am selling regularly on ebay... but it's small margins and any lower and it would not be worth doing.

 

 

Looking at reducing timber prices - we tried reducing our ebay prices for a week with a 30% off sale - result - no more/no less timber sold!

 

We tried doing auctions with £0.99 start - a lot did not sell at all and a lot went for less then £3-00! Yet the pieces that didn't sell when re listed sold further down the line for £20 to £40 each.

 

 

I don't think I know any customers that have bought off me that look to stock timber - they usually always wish to buy what they are just about to use. When they have a specific project they tend to buy exactly what they need and are happy to pay higher prices if you have the right timber.

 

 

So in my case it is better for me to keep prices higher but store stuff for longer and selling cheaper did not make any difference to quantities sold... but the average sale price would be around £40-00.

 

 

[Rob D]

Ref timber pricing and prices of imported timber - from people I've spoken to if you're looking to spend a few thousand £ a time you can look to pay around £20-00 a cube for US kiln dried oak.

 

 

I'm not sure if it will ever be possible to compete with this as a small producer so unless you have something special ie. something figured or unusual then you are looking to sell to people spending say a few hundred £ so you can keep your price per cube higher. But then this is going to limit your available market ie. after you've satisfied this demand then who do you sell to next?

 

 

[lgl]

That's sawmilling,... unless you are cutting to order or a fast moving product or can afford to carry stock until the right person comes to buy then it will always be a problem.

Larger hardwood mills can be carrying stock for 5+years but none of them started off like that.

If you look back through the history of sawmills they cut for a demand whether it was chocks, fencing , furniture trade etc.etc. not the other way round where they decided to set up a sawmill then find the customers afterwards.

[Tom D]

Demand has got to play a huge part, look in the shops these days, I often see timber products and wonder how they ever did it for that price, the answer is very cheap foreign labour. So as a saw miller your customers are themselves having to compete with very cheap imported products that they have no chance of beating on price. I have never been to Oak Furniture Land but I'll bet its not all hand crafted in the UK from UK grown oak, how could it be at that price?

 

Woodworkers are therefore only able to sell niche products to a small but discerning customer base who have the money to spend on something local, there just aren't that many of these people.

I have seen chopping boards etc in garden centres for £10 or less. No uk woodworker could possibly compete with that kind of price unless he was doing it for fun.

 

Find ways of adding value to your products or reach new markets, selling to the diy hobbyist who only wants 1 board for a wee project may be a pain in the ____, but if you find new ways of reaching these people and make sure that you are not unduly inconvenienced by them then they could be a real money spinner

 

There used to be an Edinburgh wood festival where you could sell stuff direct to the public, that kind of thing would be a good way to go.

[Big J]

Very interesting link there Rob - I'll have to have a proper read of their site later on. Quite a new organisation and one worth us in ASHS (Association of Scottish Hardwood Sawmillers) linking up with. There is already the Scottish Working Woods label, but I don't qualify for that as I don't sell 95% Scottish timber.

 

I don't think that I will ever be able to get down to the prices that American oak is offered at, and nor would I want to. All I want to do is get sufficiently close that it makes people think about native timber as an alternative. It's those people, the people that just look for the cheapest option that are probably the largest untapped market for us small scale millers.

 

There is a big resurgence in the use of local timbers. As a consequence, I don't think that it is so niche any more and it should be possible to increase turnover of stock. Increased turnover of stock should bring efficiencies that should reduce prices. I would regard myself as being fairly productive for being just one chap doing 95% of the physical work in my business, but I know that if I was just a touch busier, I could take someone on 3 days a week permanently, which would free up a lot of extra time for relatively little cost. Shoveling sawdust, tidying and other manual tasks that aren't really a good use of my time.

 

Anyway, I'll see how things go for the next few months and report back!

 

Jonathan

[farmerjohn]

interesting subject this,

Originally i was / am a user not a producer of processed hardwoods. i have struggled to get locally sourced hardwoods at reasonable prices which is why i have started to get some timbers milled.

I was paying about £42/cuft +VAT for kiln dried oak, and the 2 places i was getting it from were 1 hr and 1.5 hrs drive away.

the furthest away is the best stocked and the timber is only locally sourced that they fell, cut and dry all in house. the problem i have is 4 hours minimum of my time adds too much cost to the timber to travel that far as i do not work that way.

The closer mill is only about half hour from most of the places i work but the final nail in the coffin for not looking at doing something myself was i picked up some oak and asked the guys if they could remember where the oak was from as my clients are very interested in supporting businesses and sourcing materials and trades as locally as possible and i was told it would probably be from France as they can not keep up with demand / struggle for enough locally sourced trees. Although not marketing themselves as exclusively local timber only they are a local saw mill and it is generally (and wrongly presumed) that all the timber is at least form uk.

though there is absolutely nothing wrong with this i could order the same oak from an importers or even an importer via my Travis Perkins account for less. and my customs would not mind paying a little more for local timber.

A joiner i work with was asked to make a ash table and he could not manage to get some locally sourced KD ash.

being from rural area i have managed to get some good contacts for saw logs, i have a man with a mill who is very reasonable for processing my saw logs and he will do it at the weekend so i can work with him doing this and i have access to space to air dry my timber.

although i am digressing a lot, i feel that there is a market out there for timber to be sold at a reasonable cost for high quality locally sourced timber, it is mainly finding a route to market and establishing a good relationship with your purchases. in more rural areas word and mouth of good quality reliable trades / products sell themselves and good PR (even if its just taking the time to meet, greet and showcase your products to potential new clients) can make all the difference. I firmly believe that well planned networking is fr more efficient than any advertising. Every job i go to see i am as keen to impress as when i first started being self employed. I think if you are reasonably priced, give a good service, the product is of good quality and you can show a customer how passionate you are it pretty much sells itself over the competition.

Edited April 13, 2014 by farmerjohn

[Rob D]

Very interesting link there Rob - I'll have to have a proper read of their site later on. Quite a new organisation and one worth us in ASHS (Association of Scottish Hardwood Sawmillers) linking up with. There is already the Scottish Working Woods label, but I don't qualify for that as I don't sell 95% Scottish timber.

 

 

It would be a very good way of putting out information and as a side benefit I think it would be an excellent way of promoting your own business.