North American Farmers' Direct Marketing Convention
v. (grÖ west) a direct marketing journey of innovation and inspiration through Alberta's historic Cowboy Trail
| REGISTRATION |
Speaker: Bob Cobbledick, Cobbledick Services
Look
around your farm market at all of the items on your shelves. Are these items
priced for profit? If you’re not sure, then you won’t want to miss this
workshop!
Bob
has created an automated pricing system for on-farm marketers who want
to ensure a profit. It was developed primarily for marketers who buy
and sell products, but it can work on products that you grow yourself
as well.
The package is designed for on-farm marketers who divide their business
into departments or enterprises, such as, bakery, gifts, produce,
preserves, entertainment, etc.
To get the full benefit of this package, it is critical that your cash
registers are set up so sales are entered by department, (bakery,
gifts, produce, etc.).
The package automatically calculates the required margin, but it also
allows the marketer to change that price to whatever price they feel
will move the product. Then the program will track the affect those new
prices have on the overall margin within that department.
The package also allows a marketer to track their year end inventory.
By tracking each department’s year end inventory, marketers can quickly
see which departments are making them money, and which are not, so you
can focus your energy in the areas that will give you the best return.
The package will also help you track “shrink,” which is the profit lost
due to waste (breakage, spoilage, & delivery shortages), as well as
theft (both from customers and employees).
The program was developed using Microsoft Excel, so you will need to
have Excel on your own computer to be able to use this system when you
return home.
The day will include:
- Understanding the Income Statement, so it works for you, not just to facilitate filing taxes
- The difference between margins and mark-ups
- An explanation of how margins are calculated
- Understanding the relationship between expenses and margins
- How margins allow marketers to track profit and shrink
- Allocating expenses into various departments
- How to track inventory that enters the market, both home grown and purchased
- The importance of tracking labour and how to do it easily
Special notes: A computer is required to participate in this
workshop. A limited number of laptops are available from the convention
if you don't have one of your own.
They will make entries into the program, to see how margins are
automatically calculated, how easy it is to adjust retail prices and
how those prices affect margins and gross profit. The hands-on
experience will also allow participants to become comfortable with how
the package operates. Bob will also contact registrants before the workshop to help establish some benchmarks for the group.
As a small exercise, I would like to establish some “benchmarks” for
the group taking this workshop. Benchmarks (averages) that you can take
home and use to better understand your own business. The most important
to calculate is “labour as a percent of gross sales.” This is usually
the single biggest expense in on-farm marketing. Another is
“advertising as a percent of gross sales.” The best way to calculate
these would be for each participant to bring a copy of a recent “Income
Statement” from their operation.
Firstly, we need to separate out retail sales from total farm income.
Then we need to make sure that all labour costs are in the calculation
(do you pay family members, any contributions you make to unemployment
programs, worker injury plans etc. then there may be bonuses etc.). No
one has to see your Income Statement; I just want you to see how to
calculate it with your own figures. You will go home knowing both your
actual numbers as well as the group averages (benchmarks). If you
want to talk to me about this ahead of the workshop, my e-mail address
is bobcobb@cogeco.ca
You can learn a lot from other farm marketers, by knowing how to
calculate some of these percentages, and then sharing percentages (not
dollar values), with other farms doing similar activities to yourself.
This program is not rocket science. It is just a system for setting
retail prices that should allow you to ensure a profit or know the
reason why!
Feeling comfortable with computers and a moderate ability to type is helpful.
Registration is limited to 30 participants.
This workshop is sponsored by Canadian Farm Business Management Council.
Join us for all or any part of our convention.
Each component is priced separately.
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Monday |
Tuesday |
Wednesday |
Thursday |
Friday |
Saturday |
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Feb. 12, 2007 |
Feb. 13, 2007 |
Feb. 14, 2007 |
Feb. 15, 2007 |
Feb. 16, 2007 |
Feb. 17, 2007 |
|
Bus Tour |
All-Day Workshops |
Conference Sessions | |||
62 White Loaf Road
Southampton, MA 01073