Alpaca Business Plan Part 4 - Goals

Short term goals are goals you want to achieve in a short period of time. I usually choose a year for this, but choose a time period that makes sense to you and your business.

What are you going to do this year to bring your alpaca business forward? Outside breedings, buy a herdsire, sell females or fiber boys, make business agreements with others for trading are just a few ideas. What do you need or want to avoid?

What do you want to achieve with your alpacas? Lower micron, higher shear weight, easy births, milk production, crimp style, color are examples. Also include things you would like to get rid of.

What marketing are you planning? Will it help you achieve your goals? Is marketing one of your goals? What do you want marketing to do for you?

What profits would you like to see? How might you go about producing a profit?

Brainstorm and see what comes up. Don't worry about reality just yet. Dream.

Goals are your destination, worry about getting there after you figure out where you want to go!

Now take all of your great ideas and write them up in a couple of paragraphs. It can help to make concrete, active statements like "We are selling three alpacas in 2010" rather than "We plan to sell three alpacas next year."

Long term goals just take that information a bit farther. Think 5 or 10 years down the line.

What would you like to see then?

What steps do you need to take to get there? What do you need to focus on?

HomeSpun Alpacas Short Term Goals

The initial business focus will be on quality (fleece and conformation) tame, halter trained alpacas. During the first two to three years, we will strive to improve the herd’s fiber.

During this time, we will also be breeding for black. To complement this objective, we will search out the most appropriate black herdsires to breed to our black females. We will also use finely fleeced and crimpy alpacas to bring down the micron and compliment the crimp in our brown females. They will be bred to the most appropriate male, regardless of color.

We will use males that dramatically improve upon the female’s crimp and decrease any guardhair.

Long Term Goals

It is the intent of the owners of HomeSpun Alpacas to build a fiber business selling yarn and products made from our own alpacas as well as building the herd of females to around 10 head.

Our breeding goals are:

• Soundness of body and limb
• Uniformity of fineness and extension of blanket fiber throughout the brisket, shoulder,
• hip, head, neck, and leg.
• Lack of medulation (low percentage over 30 microns)
• Luster or brightness
• Staple length (minimum of 3 inches a year, preferably 4 to 6 inches)
• Volume (the more finer fiber the better)
• Crimp
• Easy births and plentiful milk supply
  
• Good mothers (females)
• Settles females quickly (males)
• Mellow temperament

The fiber goals for micron counts are as follows:

Age Micron
Up to 12 months 16
1 - 2 years 18
2 - 3 years 20
3 - 4 years 21
4 - 6 years 22
6 - 8 years 23
8 - 14 years 26

To achieve our goals we need to:

• Make smart breeding decisions to produce the high quality fiber that is most marketable.
• The males chosen for breeding will have cria on the ground that are an improvement over either parent. The conformation will be correct and the crias will have the same correct conformation and be healthy.
• For the strong fiber, we will find a salable product to produce. Rugs, felt pads, and teddy bears are one of the options on the table as are quilt batts.
• Raise the herd numbers to be able to produce a quantity of fiber that can be made into enough product to not only support the alpacas, but make a profit.
• Refine a product line that will sell on the high end market. Currently focus is on yarn kits, blankets, shawls, and vests.

This focus will allow us to make a profit out of our poorest quality fiber as well as the high quality fiber ensuring there is no waste.

To be continued

I am sick, but will get the short term goals piece done soon. We did have a cria this morning! Light fawn male. Pictures to come.

Alpaca Business Plan Part 3 - Mission Statement

A mission statement is a concise statement about your business' reason for being. Why did you start raising alpacas? What made you think that raising alpacas would be a good business to get into? What are you doing differently from the other farms? What makes your alpacas the "ones"? What are the values or beliefs that guide you raising alpacas? What kind of relationship do you want with your customers and alpacas?

Answer any, all or none of these questions as it suits you.

It should be short and memorable. If you can spell it out in that infamous elevator speech, then you have done well. If you can print it on the back of your business cards, you get the gold star.

Think of it as a tag line with some explanation. Leave out buzz words and fluff. State your goal and what makes you unique. Tell the world why they should do business with you.

I have listed some websites that have good ideas on how to write mission statements if you are stuck.

http://nonprofit.about.com/od/nonprofitbasics/a/mission.htm

http://www.tgci.com/magazine/How%20to%20Write%20a%20Mission%20Statement.pdf

http://www.entrepreneur.com/management/leadership/businessstrategies/article65230.html

Here is the first draft of my mission statement. I think it lacks some pizazz, so will be working on it as we go through the other steps

HomeSpun Alpacas' Mission Statement

HomeSpun Alpacas provides well-rounded support to its customers, from herd health to shearing to business plans, we are there for the customer. Our goal is to breed healthy, quality alpacas and develop a practical program of alpaca education.

For Thursday, think about your short term goals and next Tuesday we will work on long term goals.

Alpaca Business Plan Part 2- Farm Overview

Having taught Freshman English, I know starting is the hard part for most. So today we will start in the middle with the easy part: Your farm overview. This is a snapshot in time of what you own and where you are in the business. We will later put this information in the main body of the document and in the assets portion. It feeds into the financials too, but don't worry about any of that yet, that will be a later topic.

The first step is to list the resources you dedicate to alpacas, assuming you are raising alpacas on your own land. If you aren't, but would like to, skip to the next paragraph. If you plan to continue agisting, there are still some manner of alpaca accessories you own--these are important too. If you would like to go down the jungle trail, please turn to page 394. To the point: How many acres do you have total? How many are fenced for the alpacas? Do you have room to expand? What buildings are you using for the alpacas? If you are storing alpaca stuff in your garage, list that too.

Next, let's do a little prognostication. Are the land and pasture adequate for the present and next year? If not, what do you need to accomplish to make it so? If they are fine now, how about in 5 years? What would you like to see on your property in 5 years? More alpacas, a bigger barn, somewhere to put the hay - make a list. This is not a list of to-do items, but things you would like in an ideal world.

What alpaca accessories do you own? Halters, buckets, chute, scale - make a list of this too, with how much you paid for it. These are assets.

How many alpacas do you own? Do not include the upcoming cria in this section. Alpacas are also assets, so put a price on each one.

This information can be in list form or in a nice narrative. Remember, this is your business plan, make it work for you. Only include that information that helps you make decisions. Everything else is noise.

Next time, we'll talk about mission statements.

Note: As I work on the whole, I will be editing all sections. When this is finished, I will put the whole thing together in a PDF for anyone interested.

In the meantime, here is what I have come up with for my Farm Overview section:

Farm Overview

Property

Our current property is just over 5 acres. The alpacas have 3 pastures consisting of about 1.5 acres. We are in the process of fencing another acre to bring the total to 2.5 acres available for the alpacas. Each pasture has a shelter, water and a hay bin. There are interconnecting gates between the pastures which enables us to increase pasture size as needed.

One third of the garage is used to store alpaca items and hay.

Current Operations

I have been raising alpacas for 9 years. Over that span I have sold 12 alpacas, plus 5 consignment alpacas. We have 9 females and 5 males with 2 cria expected this year.

halters
leads
buckets
shelters
hay bins
chute
shearing table
shearing equipment
tooth-a-matic
emergency kit
horse trailer
trailer hitch (mine is special - worthy of its own blog post)
herdease software
camera
photo printer
Green panel pen w/creep gate
heated buckets

Cappuccino Chip
Millennium Jubilee
Cinnamon Kiss
Mary Pitcher (Mollie)
Raven
Rheia
Andante
Andantina
Sweetart
Bond James Bond
Ink Jet
Apollo
Heart's Afire
Baby - unnamed cria by Mollie

Improvements Needed

The current capacity is ~20. Our fields are very productive and we supplement with hay/pellets. The existing facilities (including the new pastures) will keep up with herd growth as long as the projected sales happen.

Pictorial update on Mollie's Cria

The baby is doing well. He is gaining slowly and taking lots of naps.


His mom keeps him close, she is especially bonded to this baby.


He loves to pose for the camera. Doesn't hurt he is just so darned cute.


From front to back, baby, Mollie, Mollie's grandmother Cappuccino Chip, and Mollie's sister aunt Cinnamon Kiss.


Baby doesn't seem to take it personally that he is getting tubed. Still interested in people.


What a ham!

How to Write an Alpaca Business Plan - Part 1

Given that every business needs a business plan, how do you write one for alpacas? We don't want to manufacture millions of widgets or raise thousands of cattle no matter how well these business models are documented. There are some books and web sites that give you the outline of an alpaca business plan, but I found them lacking. I am a technical writer by trade, so I dived into those dry books on how to write business plans and applied it to my alpaca business.

I took home the message that you need goals. What gets managed, gets tracked. What gets tracked, gets done.

I acknowledged the need for a financial plan, if not actual financials. Not only answering the question of am I making money, but how will I make money.

Detailing where my alpaca business is today and where I want it to be in the future opened my mind to more possibilities. How many acres do I want, how many alpacas, do I want machinery or material goods to help . In an ideal world, what do I see as my end goal? Now how do I get there?! What are the risks?

Business Plans are the roadmap to success. Once you have the goals set for your one year and 5 year plans, it is easy to make day to day decisions. Should I put in the new pasture, or buy a new alpaca is transformed into the question "Does buying this new alpaca fit into my business plan, does putting in a new pasture fit into my business plan?" I have passed up many alpacas because they do not fit into my business plan. I raise black alpacas, with some brown and fawn sprinkled in. Fawn does not always cover black... But I digress. Even though the alpacas were quality and were well priced, I saved my money for the new pasture because my 5 year goal is to have 10 production black females. To do that, I need more room. Fencing is the priority.

Deciding on which breedings to do is easier with a business plan. Which male will drive my business forward towards my goals? If you have the 20/20 goal of 20 pounds of fiber at 20 microns, then you would want to look at the males that will add density and fineness to your females instead of say color.

The business plan is the way to tell the IRS you are serious and not a hobby. It is one of the criteria for a business, along with stationary, and a bank account. :)

A business plan helps you budget your expenses and income.

Given the scarcity of business plans amongst alpaca breeders, I think there must be a reluctance about writing them. They can be a long or short as you want. They can include financials or just a general goal. The can be involved or simple. It really is up to you. I thought it might help for me to walk you through the steps of a business plan with an alpaca slant on the information. Many of the books that are out there are thinking along different lines of manufacturing or production of one item. Farming and ranching have their own unique issues.

Follow along with me for the next couple of weeks as I rewrite my business plan and talk about the steps involved.

Mollie's Cria Finally Arrived!

The cria I have been waiting so impatiently for finally arrived last Thursday. 15.6 pounds of bouncing baby boy.

Day 1

Mollie delivered him like a champ and other than a bit of misunderstanding on nursing, things went smoothly. Oh, it was my misunderstanding. I am supposed to stand waaaaay back and observe. Not participate. Was worried when she would not let him nurse, so got more involved which made things more bungled. Left them alone in a small pen - and low and behold, nursing. Get close, stops nursing. Got it, she is shy:) Or, she doesn't want the silly humans meddling with her precious cria. She is the most nurturing of any alpaca mother I have seen, actually licking his face and nuzzling him.

Day 2 - 4

He lost weight - not a big surprise, most lose about 1/2 pound, but he lost a little over a pound. That is worrisome. The second day he lost weight too. Not as much, but I tried him on a bottle and he spit it out. He tongued it out. He protested quite vigorously. So, I got a 3 cc syringe (minus needle) and filled it with yummy whole milk. He would take about an ounce that way, then would dramatically choke and spit out the milk. He stayed the same weight , on the 3rd, and 4th day.

Day 5

Off to the vet we go. He is a vigorous drinker, says Dr Jackie. And sometimes those are the ones that are difficult to supplement because they want mom's milk. He drinks from all 4 teats and is stripping her dry. She stands patiently while he nurses. The two of them have it figured out, but still no weight gain, because Mollie is not producing as much milk as he needs. We are approaching this from a couple of angles. Baby is getting tubed with milk 3 xs/day with 4 ounces each time to make up the difference between maintaining weight and gaining. Herbs and medicine are on order to stimulate milk production.

The crazy thing is that Mollie will sometimes bring him to us when we come in the field to tube and sometimes not. At least she has decided I am not going to do unmentionable things to him. She accompanies him on each weigh in and we tube in the field with her.

Day 6

No weight gain. He doesn't like it when we get to the end of the third ounce. We are working on technique to make it more comfortable for us and him. He takes the tube well and stands still for the first 2 ounces just fine. He needs all 4 ounces though, so it is a conundrum.

Today, Day 7, we finally have a weight gain. A very modest 0.1 pound. However, he is more active and feisty now, so I think the supplement is doing its job.

Oh, by the way, that shyness she had, it is all gone. At the vet's office she stood and nursed while everyone was wandering around admiring the baby.

The take home message from this would be to weigh each cria for the first 10 days. See, I was listening Dr Scott.

Easy Like Sunday Morning

Summer is upon us. We've been advised that the weather may reach as high as 90 degrees today, and all of the alpacas are taking the day off. It's their humorous (and sometimes concerning) tendency to lay like death itself when they're napping in the sun. About the only thing that can interrupt their lazing is the promise of being hosed down. Being very formal animals, they don't submit to being indiscriminately sprayed, but rather stand patiently while you wet their legs. If they're feeling particularly warm they love to have their belly sprayed with water, and will submit to awkward positions to make it easier for the hose to get under them.

Buttercups have displaced the spring-time dandelions, and the grass grows so quickly I think if you looked closely you could see it happening before your eyes. Cottonwood hangs lazily in the air, and I can't imagine doing hard work of any sort. The alpacas need tending, true, but at this point that is an excuse to experience the weather, then retreat back to the air-conditioned house.

Things will pick up soon. We are due for a baby, and once the first comes they will all no doubt be popping out like popcorn in a kettle, and there will be much work to be done. But today, today is to be savoured.

Conspiracy Theory

The pregnant ladies and Cappuccino stayed in the front pasture while all the rest moved next door. This is the first time I have separated the females, but as I was watching the new game of "sniff the pregnant lady and wake her up, then run", I decided that it would be in the best interest of all concerned to move the young whippersnappers out of there.

The pregnant ones have a new game too. It is called "lay around and watch Mom go crazy". I am going out and checking on Mollie, who is due any minute, about every hour to see if she looks like she is in labor. They all cush together and don't even bother to get up when I wander over, oh so casually, to check out fetal movement and behavior of the dam. I expect they are taking notes to give at the next alpaca symposium on how to drive your caretaker stark raving bonkers. What symposium, I hear you asking - You thought the alpaca shows were for us? "Look relaxed, chew your cud, see if you can get the cria to show her a foot or something, that is always good."

Cappuccino is the master of not showing labor. In the nine years I have had her, I have been present at 2 births, she literally waits until I leave - usually in the car- before she pops the cria out. When I return, there is a happy healthy cria. I think the next trick they will pull, is hiding the cria until it is a couple of days old. "What, this old thing? I've had it for days."