When Assets Become Liabilities
Look up the definition of asset in Webster and it’ll tell you an asset is “anything owned that has value.” But Webster has it wrong. If I put a down payment on a ranch, financing the balance, the full value of the land shows up in the asset column of my balance sheet, but I […]
Having a Ranch AND a Life
A friend included me in an email chain informing us of a farmer he knew who recently took his life. I don’t pretend to begin to know this man’s pain or anything about his situation. But the story struck me as beyond sad. Responses in the email chain spoke of the stress of farming, peer […]
5 Keys to Quality Cattle
A popular industry magazine found its way to my desk this week. An article that described five essential “wisdoms” for producing quality cattle piqued my curiosity. According to the author, the first key is “Be fanatic about animal health.” Key number two is “Pay the extra money for a good bull and build a reputation for […]
Low Hanging Fruit
Someone called me asking if I was available to do some consulting. I explained that even though our name is Ranch Management Consultants, we actually do very little consulting. After folks have been to the Ranching For Profit School they may need some coaching, but they usually don’t need consulting. When we consult, we only […]
Survival of the Fittest & Natural Selection
Nature has a strict culling policy. If bulls and bucks don’t breed, or if does and cows don’t wean fawns and calves, their genes aren’t passed on. Survival of the fittest. Most commercial ranchers select for fitness too. If a cow is open or dry, she’s culled. If she’s got a bad udder or isn’t […]
Smart Debt
A lot of people tell me that they want to be “debt free.” They are tired of making big interest payments on land, livestock, machinery and their operating note. They have had too many sleepless nights worrying about making the next payment. They believe that if they didn’t have to borrow money they would be […]
Free Money Can Be Expensive
Letting government programs dictate your management and set priorities can be costly. The most obvious example is probably the emergency feed program. In drought impacted areas, this program incentivizes ranchers not to destock. The result has been severe overstocking during drought, when the impacts of bad management are intensified. Even programs like EQUIP (Environmental […]
The 3 Secrets For Increasing Profit™
There are three, and only three, ways to increase profit in any business. Stan Parsons called them The 3 Secrets For Increasing Profit™ and introduced them to Ranching For Profit students in 1980. Lately I’ve seen more and more articles by industry pundits that incorporate the 3 secrets in articles and conference proceedings. They rarely […]
Read MoreYou Might Be Ranching For Profit If …
You might be ranching for profit if your spouse doesn’t have to work in town so you can have health insurance. If you are making a profit you ought to be able to pay yourself whatever it would cost to replace yourself and the business ought to be able to provide a benefits package, including […]
It Doesn’t Matter What They Want
Earlier today someone called me asking for advice regarding a bid he was about to make for a property he wanted to rent. The property could support 200 cows from May to October and the term of the lease would be 10 years. He hoped that I would have some knowledge about rents in his […]