2017 Numbers

Every year I take a look back at the previous year to see how we did and what I want to do better in the following year. Part of the analysis I’ve been doing is to add up the gross income and then subtract out the non-labor expenses. This gives me a net for all of the hours of work that went into the farm. Then I add up all of the hours worked and divide. This gives me a net per labor hour.

You can look back at my write up from last year to get a more detailed explanation of how I’ve been doing this over the years (and links to more write ups from years past). Instead of making this a long post I’ll just refer you back there for the explanation.

In 2017 I worked with Matt Gordon at Cully Neighborhood Farm again. We grew for 60-ish CSA members, and sold a little excess produce through the Cully Neighborhood Farmers Market. We grossed about $36,500 on about 1/2 acre so roughly $73,000 per acre, down very slightly from 2016. The non-labor expenses was about $10,000. Adding in the depreciated BCS expense brings that number up to about $10,940, a little under 30% of gross so we were able to keep the expenses down this year, despite making some infrastructure improvements that really improved ergonomics on the farm. The total hours worked on the farm, including marketing and administration, field work and everything else, was about 1910 hours, so we cut that back a little as well. That gives a (pre-tax) dollar per hour number of around $13.40 across the farm, up almost 4% from last year, which was better than inflation so I think we’re making progress.

For those with an eagle eye, you’ll probably notice that we’re right around Oregon’s minimum wage when you adjust for a “loaded” hourly wage (one that includes payroll taxes). Still, the bottom line is that for now I’m happy with that number for 2017 and we’ll take that information, along with the rest of the numbers we’ve collected and see if we can continue to improve in 2018.