RE: [AlpacaTalk] Let them eat cake.
At the risk of posting this and getting a bunch of angry emails back, I
must add my 2 cents. I am a small farm - I have 22 beautiful animals and
I plan to stay at just this size, which I can manage by myself. The
beauty of this business is that you can be large, medium or small and
still be successful. Every farm can have things to offer that others
don't. There is so much email sent on "big farms" having advantages and
having all the money and getting all the ribbons. That's just not
correct. Large farms do have some advantages over smaller farms, but
small farms have advantages over large farms and I don't usually see
those talked about. And there is an assumption that the larger farms
have all this money to spend - I don't think anyone can really know that
for sure unless they look into their accounting books. Feed costs me a
lot of money, but think about how much it cost for someone with 100 or
200 or more alpaca. The costs skyrocket. While some may think they have
all this money, we should remember that their costs are also large.
On the advertising costs - it's just like any other business. Some
choose to spend more on advertising than others, but that doesn't mean
they are making more profit than a small or medium farm. There are many
ways to advertise and get your name out there. Some avenues are more
expensive than others, but just because someone is putting their money
into more expensive advertising, doesn't mean they are rolling in dough.
There are less expensive ways to advertise that can fit everyone's
budget. ANY business that can put more into advertising is going to get
their name out there more - that's just a matter of results. It sounds
like some breeders are bashing successful farms and I don't think that's
what we should be doing.
I'm not sure how we can assume that just because you are a larger farm
means you are only in it for the money?? Would we assume that of any
large company dealing in a particular merchandise? Just because you are
successful doesn't mean you are only in it for the money.
Smaller farms should also realize how much benefit we get from the farms
that are able to do heavy advertising. I have people visit my farm
sometimes because they saw an ad on TV or passed another farm. More
people know what an alpaca is because of that. More vets are getting
into the business because more alpacas are out there - including the
large farms - and that benefits us all. Government has looked at alpacas
as a separate livestock and that's not because there were a few small
farms like me holding my hand up. It's because of the larger farms and
the exposure they bring. We (small farms) also benefit from the research
that is being put into these animals and that takes cash and a lot of
that comes from the larger farms.
I honestly don't think this would be a successful business without the
larger farms and without the successful farms that are able to spend
more money. We all benefit.
One more note - to anyone that thinks these shows are cash happy. Please
volunteer to help at a show or get involved with your local, regional
and national organizations. Learn how much really goes into these shows
and organizations. I think you will be very surprised how little money
there is at the end of the day. Shows cost a lot of money to pull off -
even with a large volunteer base. Get involved in your shows and really
get in and see the details that do into them. Look at the budgets from
associations and look into the costs. It might be a lot, but the charges
we are being charged are not to generate a great cash flow to the
organization sponsoring the show.
Just my 2 cents - from the perspective of a proud small farm!
Jacki Robert
Alpaca Creek Farm
1745 Saundersville Road, Hendersonville, TN 37075
Office - 615.826.9380
Cell - 615.828.6419
www.AlpacaCreekFarm
____________
From: AlpacaTalk@yahoogro
Behalf Of Heather Zeleny
Sent: Monday, November 10, 2008 9:05 PM
To: AlpacaTalk@yahoogro
Subject: Re: [AlpacaTalk] Let them eat cake.
Oh yes, I love alpacas is the brainchild of the leader of the old boy's
club. If you don't have $5k in addition to participating in the FRG and
Herdsire edition of Alpacas Magazine, forget it. And if you don't do
the FRG, you have to wait 45 days or something to buy leads at 3 times
the price that the breeders with deep pockets have to pay. That is the
most regressive pricing scheme, it really makes me bitter and angry.
Make the poor people pay 3 or 4 times as much as the rich guys! Ya!
To us little guys, it looks like "they" just want all the money and all
the business. So, I choose to participate in a different playground. I
do business with small, local breeders. I have contacts and
acquaintances across the country, and have actually done some business
cross-country, now that I think of it. :) And I prefer it that way.
Every animal I've sold is loved by its new family, as much as I've
loved them. I am so glad they weren't bought by some mega-farm where
they're identified by a number tag.
I haven't had much luck selling on AlpacaNation, I believe that they
could surely lower their rates for farm accounts by now. They rake in
so much money from all of those banner ads with weekly and monthly
rotations, and those ads are not cheap, even the cheap ones! I don't
know if AlpacaStreet is producing any better results. The best response
I get is from AlpacaMarket yahoo group. And that's free!
I keep saying the economy has got to improve at some point. :) Doesn't
it? And we can be sure that we will get new breeders thanks to
increased exposure from free things like the WSJ article.
Heather
On Nov 10, 2008, at 6:03 PM, Gary & Maryann Simpson wrote:
> Heather:
>
> Are you a member of I Love Alpacas?
> I called & it's like $5,000 a year. Is anybody else here on there?
> I was wondering if the benefit was worth the money.
> Also is anybody having any luck with Alpaca Street?
> I see a little traffic from there, but not that much.
> I'm less than a year into this, but I have some opinions.
> The main opinion is that the growth in the industry is going to
> come from new people, not existing farms.
> So marketing most anything except breedings to existing farms is
> not very effective.
>
> I have some ideas that I would like to get some feedback on, but
> would like to hear from some of the people here first on the above.
> Thanks,
> Gary Simpson
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