I often hear people joke, “Ranching for profit? That’s an oxymoron.” I get frustrated hearing it, but I don’t blame anyone for thinking it. There is a lot of evidence…
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A popular industry magazine found its way to my desk this week. An article that described five essential “wisdoms” for producing quality cattle piqued my curiosity. According to the author,…
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Most family ranches are subsidized with free, or underpaid, family labor. Sometimes the difference between what family members get and what it would cost to hire someone else to do…
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Income - costs = profit, right? The answer is “sort of.” It’s a little more complicated than that because we need to adjust for inventory changes, consider non-cash costs like…
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Some people think that records are THE key to managerial success. Not me. I think most records are a waste of time. Records give us data. We need information. It…
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The risk of wildfire has always been a normal part of ranching. But today we are faced with a new normal that includes the increased risk of catastrophic wildfire. The…
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Someone called me asking if I was available to do some consulting. I explained that even though our name is Ranch Management Consultants, we actually do very little consulting. After…
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I go to a lot of meetings. I often hear people complain about how tough we have it. The three favorite topics are bad weather, low prices and government regulations…
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How is the next generation ever supposed to step up if the current generation can’t step down or at least step aside? The short answer is they can’t. It’s one…
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Most people assume that the biggest estate planning fights involve “Who will own what?” It’s been my experience that, “Who will run what?” is often an even bigger issue. “Who…
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