PROFIT TIPS

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Don’t Screw Up the Windfall Profits

fancy steer

2023 is shaping up to be a record profit year for many in the cattle business. I know not everyone is participating as there are regional droughts and specific situations for some, that will take you out of this opportunity. Nevertheless, for some the stars have aligned.   The last time we saw record profits in […]

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Too Many Options

convenience store

We’ve always heard that having options is a good thing. Having options gives us the freedom to choose what is best for us. However, having too many options can feel chaotic and be crippling. When we have so many options, we actually tend to choose nothing. We look at the minor gain to our businesses as not worth […]

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Some Ideas Should Fail

cattle grassland

How many of the new ideas that you implement work? I hope not 100%. If 100% of the new ideas you implement in your business work then you are probably being too cautious. There is a healthy portion of new ideas that should fail.   I spent a year riding pens in a feedlot. I really […]

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Finding What You Look For

close up cattle

“We can complain because rose bushes have thorns, or rejoice because thorn bushes have roses” is an Abraham Lincoln quote that I think about nearly everyday. To me it’s all about life’s perceptions and choosing your mindset. We get to choose our attitude. I have noticed this in multiple situations, and more and more as […]

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Assets, Liabilities and Opportunities

pair of ranchers

In a discussion about succession and estate planning at the Ranching For Generations course earlier this year, a woman told me that she believed “we should leave our kids opportunities rather than things.” I think she’s right. Unfortunately, we often mistake things, for opportunities.  The classic example is leaving the ranch to your children so […]

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Repairs Save Money?

horse fence

Preventative maintenance on the ranch is easy to overlook, and it can be costly. Costly in dollars to actually fix whatever needs fixed whether it is fence and corrals, water tanks, or the farm machinery. As well as costly in finding the time which is nearly impossible; but why hire someone to do something that […]

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Business is a Noble Endeavor

sheep sunrise

Last week I along with Jordan Steele and a few RFP alumni attended the EntreLeadership Summit put on by the Ramsey organization in Nashville, Tennessee. It was an amazing week hearing from world-class thought leaders and business trailblazers. Dave Ramsey gave a presentation called The Nobility of Business. His point was that so many condemn […]

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Lagging vs Leading Indicators

indicators

“When we choose the wrong measurement, we get the wrong behavior” (James Clear, Atomic Habits). At the Ranching for Profit School, we talk about how paradigms, actions, and results are related to ranching. These concepts look hard at why the business does what the business does.  First let’s talk about money. A very common financial […]

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Benchmarks are Overrated

benches

At the Ranching for Profit School, we teach people how to use benchmarks to identify deadwood in their businesses which allows them to find focus areas for managerial leverage. When we finish teaching the benchmark section participants are excited to run their numbers in the RFP format and compare them to the RMC Benchmarks to […]

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Is Opportunity Interest, Real Interest?

opportunity interest

An opportunity cost is the lost benefit of choosing a different option. The opportunity cost of going to college is losing out on four years of wages; the true cost is tuition plus lost wages.  At the Ranching for Profit School, we include opportunity interest as a cost on owned livestock herds, because there is […]

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