*2o—Lancaster Farming, Saturday, February 23,1980
BY DICK WANNER
stewartSville -
With egg production costs
running 10 cents per dozen
higher than the on-farm
market price, Jim Wolf
expects to see a “blood
bath” before the industry
straightens itself out.
His words should bear
some weight. President of
the Pennsylvania Poultry
Federation, be has been an
egg producer since he was
old enough to tend chickens.
In his Southern York
i
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Although Wolf Farms' outlet store
busy, with a big run on cracked eggs,
potatoes, other key ingredients in the
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This independent pan
County office recently, Wolf
talked about the current
state of the egg market. He
spoke with a quiet intensity
and a very serious manner,
like the captain of a ship in a
howling, savage sea.
Wolf is vice-president of
Wolf Farms, Inc., an in
dependent egg producer and
marketer. With bis brothers,
George, Dan and Dave, Wolf
has built a brand-name
image for Wolf Eggs in York
County, and Wolf potatoes.
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•* * v
FARMSTED® I
BUTLER
State
Theirs is a ship that will
weather the current
marketing storm. But Jim
Wolf can’t help worrying
about the people - par
ticularly the independents -
that he knows will go under.
“The small producers will
most likely go first,” Wolf
said. “The ones who have
their buildings paid for, and
who don’t depend on eggs as
their primary source of
income.
is off the beaten track, customers keep it
The store aslso handles chicken meat and
Wolf Farms success story.
I A. E. ENGEL. INC. KAFFERLIN SALES
I PO Box 216 & SERVICE
I Marlton, N J 08053 RDI2
i PH 609-983-4404 Union City, Pa 16438
| PH 814-438-3180
as well. They also sell
broilers.
* BUILDINGS
“A lot of people will want
to get out of the egg business,
but they won’t be able to.
The farmer who’s borrowed
money to put up a 60,000 bird
house in the last three or four
years, and with all his birds
on contract to his feed
company, can’t get out of the
egg business. He’s got to
stay m as long as his feed
company holds out.
“His feed company will be
hurting, but most of them
have the capital to see it
through. The producer might
not get paid anything for his
labor, but he’ll have enough
to pay the bank and he won’t
lose any money.
“The guy who’s an in
dependent, either by choice
or because he can’t get a new
contract, is going to have a
tough time making it. If a
guy has a big chicken house
and a big mortgage, he’s in
trouble. Whenever the
market is severely
depressed like this, the in
dustry becomes more
concentrated in fewer, but
larger, hands.”
Wolf can’t say whether or
not the egg industry will go
the way of the broiler in
dustry, where 95 percent or
more of the birds being
grown today are grown
under contract to the
companies that own and feed
the chickens. Broiler
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Poultry Federation
try
Marketing Wolf Eggs is a
long hard road, and not
one that every producer
should follow, Jim Wolf
feels. He arid his three
brothers produce and
market the output from
100,000 layers in York
County.
producers supply labor,
management and buildings.
The feed companies
supply everything else,
including a guaranteed
income. Layer contracts
operate much the same way.
Without a contract, most
people would find it im
possible to get into the egg
business. A 60,000-bird caged
layer house, a common size
ED
pro
today, can cost half-a
million dollars or more, and
the pullets to fill it will cost
at least $2 each.
Lenders can finance the
house if the producer has a
contract from his feed
company guaranteeing
income to meet the mor
tgage payments. But to give
the guarantee, most feed
companies want their own
birds m the house. And while
most layer houses are
financed for seven years,
most contracts run out after
three years.
The lending-marketing
cycle will keep a lot of egg
producers from ever
becoming independents,
Wolf feels, and even if that
weren’t the case, he thinks
many of them would never
be ready anyway.
“Farmers for too long
have paid too much attention
to efficient production and
not enough to marketing.
They have to leam how to tie
production and marketing
together, and unless an egg
producer learns how to
market his product, I don’t
think he’ll be able to survive
as an independent.”
Wolf has been with the
family poultry business
since graduating from high
school m 1962. Wolf Farms
has been marketing their
Ag-Master ”
►resident t
u&er si
own eggs s
after more t
plugging a\
isn’t sure
dependent n
is a game
should play.
“We used
run eggs to <
packed our
them to ma
doing all r
system, bu
marketing \
real money w
“We found
is more eh
more stable
money comes
and the mar
consistent. Bi
risky. If our (
than the cost
>t’s ourmone;
the
packer is rea
thanaproduc
But feeling
lessened Wol
for the marl
would be
anybody in 1
who hadn’t
Eggs. Om
strations at 1
newspaper a<
remember W(
An egg eati
a radio chic
make them ur
The egg-e
lured partial
BUILDI
NEKTON
•& soirco.
Delaware 19933
'2-337-8211