Did you know that we don’t have any employees on the farm? I know it’s strange for any business. But amazingly, we don’t have plans to change this aspect of our business either. Here’s why:
Let’s start with the obvious… money. We’ve always felt that our farm should be making a solid profit with just the two of us before we start considering adding any employees to the budget. Last year, we were able to start paying ourselves for the first time and we’re aiming for making a teacher’s salary from the farm moving forward. Right now, without having to pay an hourly employee, plus all of the added costs that come with it, we might actually be able to pull this off this year!
Another perk to not having a farm crew is that we can stay nimble. We can adjust whatever we’re doing on the fly without any issue. Since we don’t have any employees to worry about, we can much more quickly adjust our plans and goals for the day, week or year, without having to reorient or train a group of employees. And it means that when the weather turns sour and we want to take the entire afternoon off, we can!
Knowing that the buck stops with us also means that we’re here… pretty much all the time. I looked back and it turns out there were only 5 full days this year that we hired a farm sitter and did no farm work.
But you won’t hear us complaining about this. And it’s not just because we love this farm and we love this work, but because this responsibility motivates us to to accomplish awesome things like building our timber frame barn and the Fairy Godmother House.
Of course, there are some downsides to doing it all ourselves. As you can imagine, it can be stressful keeping all the balls in the air. And if one of us gets injured or is indisposed for any reason (KNOCK ON WOOD FOR US HERE, please), our farm could come to a screeching halt.
I do worry about this last one and Greg does, too. The thought of this kept us up late talking at least once this week. But like all farmers, we’re going to continue rolling the dice and keeping the faith that the decisions we’re making now will continue to serve us well later. If that doesn’t pan out, I guess we might need to start hiring!
Your Farmers,
Jenney and Greg