Keeping the cash flowing

[PAmizerman]

What do y'all do to keep cash coming in when it's too cold to saw and lumber isn't selling? 

[WV Sawmiller]

   I am watching this with interest because I sure don't have the answer. I don't live off my sawmill income and treat it more as a cost neutral hobby but the first quarter of the year is nearly all expenses and very low income for me. 

   I'd suggest you advertise more, maybe line up some shows or demos, build/stock up on items to sell later in the year if that is part of your business plan and just hold down expenses as best you can.

   Let's see what the really smart guys responses are.

[TimW]

Cut and sell firewood?

[doc henderson]

"Don't quite my day job", although I am getting close.

[customsawyer]

I'm fortunate that we don't really have much of a slow down. If I do, it's normally just before Christmas, as I don't sell a lot of the smaller boards that folks are making gifts with. My lumber for gifts, was bought in the fall, so they could get it made.  
I would take a look at what lumber is getting used in my area during the slow time. Then figure out how to make it better or cheaper. I prefer to make it better so I can charge more. I don't like doing things cheap. Then have to sell cheap. Then having to make a bunch to make any money.

[Ron Wenrich]

I always had problems with equipment and logs when we hit cold snaps.  Half frozen logs always had a tendency for the sawdust to cake on the side of the log and that pushed the blade.  Lumber quality was terrible, and ended up as pallet lumber or chipped.  Lots of degrade.  If you're sawing unbarked logs, cutting into the ice doesn't dull the blades.  Its what is frozen in the ice.  After logs are fully frozen, this goes away until spring.

On the equipment side, metal becomes more brittle and breaks easier.  Lube is frozen and doesn't do much good.  Hydraulic fluids run slower.  Production gets a lot slower, which raises costs.

Sometimes the best course of action is to eliminate the negative cashflow.  We would shut down until the logs become fully frozen and temps heated up a bit.  Most of the problems would go away.  It usually only lasted a week, at most.

I did a lot of work for a logger.  Winter was the best time to log and the best time to sell veneer.  He also had a firewood business, and that kept the cash flowing.  He prepared for winter back in the summer-fall months by cutting the firewood and buying timber for the winter logging period.

[Peter Drouin]

I shut down for the winter, Dec 1, I put away enough money in the summer to last till April sometime.
With money for a few loads of logs too.
Winter-cut logs are the best.  

[YellowHammer]

Winter is a very good season for us.  People go into their workshops and build stuff, so they need wood.  The joke is when the snow comes, people buy milk, eggs, and wood.  After Christmas, people have new tools and need wood to use them.  The woodworking businesses also buy more after the holidays, filling orders or just replenishing their stock they sold out for Christmas. 

I can't run the mill when it is this cold (13F right now), things just break and so do I, but we have lots of stockpile and run the tools in the shop to get the packs of wood ready to sell, like planers edgers, and stuff.  Our sales won't slow down until "lawn mower season" rolls around.

I have 4Mbf of maple and oak to plane, waiting for me as soon as it gets to at least 20F.  I have a pallet of teak being delivered to me for a home builder, who needs it ASAP at $20 per bdft, and I can do all this without ruining the sawmill.     

   

[Resonator]

I'm no business expert, I'm a poor-boy as far as income goes, and usually too broke to even pay attention.  
I just survive the winter months, I sell a little firewood to keep some money moving, and keep an eye out for other work that I could do. I drove flatbed for years, and got used to winter as the slow down in freight. Building materials moved based on home construction, and fewer houses were built here up north in winter.
The goal with a business is to get enough money squirrelled away from the good months to ride out the slow months, (I'm not there yet but at least that's the goal). If you own equipment, you can try to see if there is other non-sawmill work it can do and earn money. Along with trying to sell all the parts of the log, slabs, sawdust, pallet wood, dunnage cants, etc. As I was told once, it's like filling a bathtub. You want to try to get multiple faucets filling it, even if its just a few drips, it adds up.

[KWood255]

-40c here this morning. It's nearly a full time job keeping the fires burning. At these temperatures, very few people are doing anything outside...myself included. Even at -20c, the risk of damage to equipment is far to severe to be worthwhile. There is basically nothing to do for income around the mill, but an opportunity to burn slabs, service the tractor and get some relax time in the house/shop. I am very fortunate to have a nice heated shop to tinker in when the weather is miserable. 

I did have a small order of black ash and birch picked up today from a truck passing through. Nice to get that off the books. 

[Ianab]

Logger friend has a firewood side line. When it's too wet to log he goes and processes scrap logs into firewood and throws it into a shed to dry. It's just a big tin shed with the North (sunny) wall covered with plastic, so it gets nice and warm. It's big enough they can run chainsaws and a small firewood splitter in the doorway even if the rain is dumping down. Winter the logging can get even slower (more mud), but now he's got trailer loads of dry firewood, and that always sells well in Winter. But that takes some forward planning, to get the firewood stashed away to sell when it gets top dollar. But it keeps the cash flowing in the slow times. 

Or are there any part time jobs through Winter? Winterize your gear and put it away for a couple of months. You won't get rich "working for the man", but if you get a paycheck each week, cash is flowing. By the time you get sick of that job, it should be warming up.

[Cedarman]

8 above and we are running cants through the resaw this morning. After that Have 115  2x8x8 and 115 2x8x4 to get ready to ship.  They are on stickers.  3 or 4 people at mill doing the work.  My knee is acting up is my excuse for staying at home.
Frozen cedar is not too bad if frozen solid.  Since logs are small, doesn't take too long to freeze or thaw out.  Partially frozen can make for poor cuts.
We have only missed one day for the 10" snow a couple weeks ago.  They made it up on the next Saturday.
I spent a winter in northern British Columbia working in the oil industry.  Coldest was 30 below and I was crimping blasting caps to prima cord with bare hands.  Wore mitts, never gloves rest of time.
To counter BC, spent 15 months working in Trinidad on east coast.  85 daytime, 75 night time and always ocean breeze.
I will take the warm anytime.

[Old Greenhorn]

This is a question/problem that I think troubles a great many of us. I have been reading along hoping to see a magic bullet as I have spent many hours contemplating this very question. It seems some others have also. I didn't read of any magic bullets in here, so I'll just throw in what I have learned along the way.

 I see no magic bullet. What I have settled in on is diversification. Find something different. I know you are a man of good and varied skills. Take a look around and see what else you can do with the gear you have on hand that might be done in the winter months or be sold in the winter months to fill your gaps. Do any woodworking? Making some simple products such as garden boxes, sawhorses, firewood racks, woodsheds, and other things of that sort might be an answer. Maybe there is something better suited to what you already have and with a minimal of new tools or equipment you can get another product line off the ground?

 Firewood might be goo, but processor and/or splitter cost and handling equipment may or may not be too much of an expense for you. But look for something else, as there must be something. Or you may have an untapped market in the industrial area. Large manufacturers often have a shop to make skids and crates and they may be interested in rough cut lumber or dunnage.. I hate to say 'think outside the box' because I am sure you are already doing that, but look around and see what's in your area you might tap into.

This is how I came up with the Mushroom Log part of my business. I confess when I started it my hope was just to make some extra pocket change from some quick cash sales and also have another excuse to spend time in the woods. Maybe at best I would sell a couple hundred logs per year. Well as it turned out I filled a niche' market that few knew existed and I have been selling over 1,000 logs/year for the last 4 years. I have not contacted any clients yet this season and I already have over 300 logs to cut for the orders that came in on their own. One from a new client, the CIA (Culinary Institute of America) which is using them to teach student Chef's how to grow their own mushrooms. These type orders often lead to students contacting me directly for their own logs. I get references from the oddest places. Those in the field who know my log quality send me references all the time because there is no other reliable source that does it like me within 500 miles. There are others, but not as reliable as me or as business like. It's a niche' I was lucky to find. I cut from January to the end of March and them am pretty much done. Most of the pickups and incoming cash happens from mid-march on, but some is in February also.

So look around and see what you can find.

[barbender]

Sometimes you have to think outside the box

[Old Greenhorn]

I wish I had said that, oh wait......never mind.

[WV Sawmiller]

   I like Tom's reply. 

   Look for other opportunities. It is cold now but Spring is just around the corner. If you do any simple crafts look at using up scrap and low grade stock laying around or not selling to make birdhouses and raised bed planters and such. Make a bunch of plant and tomato stakes and such. Catch op on any maintenance you can and build up stocks of items you can sell later when the weather and market improves.

   If, as with most of us, storage space is a problem make many of these items as kits. Cut out birdhouses to assemble quickly when they are selling - or sell them as kits. Make raised bed planter boxes but don't put the legs on so you can stack a bunch of them. Make bench legs and prepare to tops and shrink wrap the legs to the top to install quickly later. Make tomato stakes and bundle in dozen and half dozen using shrink wrap. Make boxes and trays and shelves and organize your tools and stock items.

    These things may not be making money for you now but they are ready to finish and sell later when you won't have to time to make or do them.