I am hitting the limit of producing and selling firewood. Need to man up and say no! And October through December are my busiest months.
Finished delivering the rest of my 10 face cord order today. Eleven total in three days and 20 for the month. I actually stacked this firewood Saturday. The customer asked me to please bring a little more cherry today because it was less than the hickory side. Sort of saying I had shorted him. I brought another ten pieces of cherry today to even it out. When I have one customers cord load in my trailer of different firewood types it isn't easy to load exactly the same amount of each and when it is all the same price, I never worried about it. Who could with 600-650 pieces in total? So he received more hickory and white oak than cherry by a few sticks. Was still a cord with probably 5-10 extra cuft thrown in. I didn't bother explaining this to him, just added more and kept my mouth shut. So may other things that got under my skin. My best worst customer to date. The $10 tip on the $2,700 order was the highlight of my day. Paid for 2 gallons of diesel.
At the rates you're receiving, I'd be hustling like no other. With a $2700 order, I wouldn't be worried about not receiving a tip. I'm receiving $300 for a cord of Ponderosa/Lodgepole. Our price has a lot lower ceiling out here. It's when you start doing things extra that aren't paid for that gets irritating to me. I had a guy in a round about way got me to help him unload/stack his firewood which turned into 45 minutes of unloading a cord. No tip. I have another lady that buys 3/4 of a cord and she lives up in the mountains and tips $80 each time. She makes me want to do future deliveries.
Didn't mean to come across as expecting/entitled to tips. It was the "keep the $10 in change" that irked me. The 275 mile round trip to his lake house without any fuel or driving time compensation is what I didn't like about the whole order. Of course, I should have told him what my extra change for the trip was. I have always been compensated by customers without asking when I am delivering outside of my stated range. Just for this month, I have averaged $293.50 a face cord which includes tips. More deliveries scheduled for tomorrow.
Trust me, I have been going full throttle cutting, splitting, stacking and delivering. I put in 12 hour days with maybe a day off a week usually due to weather. And I swing by my loggers woodyard to purchase firewood when I have a spare hour.
This is where I delivered recently. There are hundreds of these small developments in Nashville, Brentwood, and Franklin. Once I make a delivery in one of these neighborhoods, I land more customers from word-of-mouth. These folks don't care much about price, just that it is the best firewood they can purchase.
In no way do I think you are entitled/expecting tips, I think it's more the reality of spending that much money on firewood at once, it's harder to put extra towards tips. If I spent $3,000 on something, last thing I want is to spend more money. Thinking about the business you have right now, my thoughts going to bed last night are that you're biggest time sucks right now are driving and stacking (stack at woodyard, stack into truck, stack at person's house). I would charge more for delivery, not just the cost to cover fuel (especially with your large round trips). I would also charge for stacking at the house. One idea I had is putting some walls on your trailer and toss loosely into the trailer. You already know the volume because you stack at home. It takes me 3x-5x as long to stack in my truck/trailer vs. tossing in loosely.
As my customer base grows and Fall approaches, I am now able to head to the Nashville area with three to four face cords per trip. Therefore, the driving time and fuel expense is greatly reduced per face cord. I spent $99 on diesel, 10 hours of driving and about four hours wheelbarrowing and stacking and four hours of loading on my three deliveries Saturday-Monday. Eleven face cords total which earned me $2,985. And of course there is all the other time and expense of cutting or buying the wood. I don't really care how much per hour I am making since this is more a hobby/passion of mine. With the amount of business I have been doing, I think 80K for this year is doable. $10-12K will be my rough expenses if I sell that amount. Some where around $50 a hour after expenses is a rough estimate delivering three face cords per trip. Around $60 if four per trip.
That’s pretty impressive, and I know you work for every cent of it! Roughly 100 cord/year to not only process, but stack, load, deliver, and restack Nice job
I might get more, of the main trunk doesn't get milled. I have a cousin in the Nashville area. Heard they like and need white oak up there...
