It has become necessary to increase the wholesale price of our milk and cream products because of higher costs. The current price of our Chocolate Milk will remain unchanged. We have seen a 30% increase for raw milk, reflecting the increased production costs for our farmers. This has eroded our narrow profit margin. In the last 8 months we have gone from netting 10% to barely breaking even. We wish this were not the case, but it is.
After 3 ½ years of solid growth and your support in the marketplace, we still cannot get banks to loan us money for further capital improvements. We struggle with an old inefficient carton filler and want very much to begin yogurt production. Replacing the existing filler and beginning yogurt operations will each cost about $100,000. This price increase will help us begin saving for major capital expenditures which we need to continue serving our community better while continuing to grow our local sustainable business.
We also need to better compensate our employees and provide a fair benefit plan as well as keep our facility in good working order. Snowville is committed to advocacy in areas of environmental protection, social justice, sustainable farming, and better agricultural policy in Ohio and in Washington DC. We are spending evermore time and effort on Fracking regulation.
We truly appreciate your continued support of Snowville Creamery. We beg your understanding of our need for this latest price increase and hope that you are confident we are continuing to use and invest your food dollars responsibly and well. As always, we welcome your questions and comments.
Warren and Victoria, and the entire Snowville Team
Great story!!!
http://www.motherearthnews.com/real-food/real-milk-zmrz11zalt.aspx
The best thing about this is the extra cost stays in our community! We’re not paying more to truck food thousands of miles or to payout stockholders or give raises to big, overpayed CEOs. I’ll be using your products for the foreseeable future!
We decided to change the milk we buy for our children. In the past we bought hormone free milk, but it was just ordinary milk. In our efforts to make our home non-gmo, we realized the next step we needed to take was changing our milk. We were going back and forth on what we should buy, and I pulled up your website. We have always appreciated the taste of your product when we sampled it, and we appreciate the quality of how you run your business. Your letter decided it for us! We are going to support you all:) Your local product is wonderful, and you have our full support! Thank you for not settling for anything less than your best!
I’m glad to hear you are aware of the carton issue. Frankly, I would buy your product exclusively, but since you need to shake it before use, it is difficult to manage with the fold-type top.
I keep hearing $100K for a new machine. I’m not familiar with the milk business, but to me that sounds astronomically overpriced. Maybe you can find a smaller/used packager? I can imagine there might be some on the market with all the businesses going under.
http://www.processplantandmachinery.com/liquid-processing/filling-machines/
Either way, good luck. I am glad you are producing “healthier” milk. But it is unfortunate that the packaging precludes me (and I would assume many others) from purchasing the product.
Good luck. I will continue to keep an eye on Snowville milk.
Hi, Snowville.
I can not invest in your milk because I am not from Ohio or Washington, D.C., which is where your milk is sold. However, I am a big believer in strictly grass-fed and pasture raised animal production, and I support the consumption of raw foods from seriously managed, natural, organic and strictly grass-fed animal and plant farms and ranches. I strongly hope that your business grows to become more competitive in the future because you are an excellent example of natural, quality tasting, grass-fed dairy foods in Ohio.
However, I am a little concerned about your decision to increase the price of your interesting milk. I understand that you want give fair prices for your employees and farmers, and improve and expand your creamery. But my biggest question is, how does increasing retail prices help solve your problem, and have you lost any customers because of your decision?
I will respect your philosophy and ideas to grow your business and help make your milk from grass-fed and pasture-grazed cows become more widespread throughout Ohio, its surrounding states, and in Washington, D.C. I just hope that you will manage to have enough customers to grow your business, no matter how much money your grass-fed milk costs.
I wish you all excellent luck with your philosophy, reputation and integrity.
Michael Monthey,
Portage, Wisconsin
We love your milk. Our son has been raised on it. Thank you for providing such a high quality product!
I am glad to hear of the increase in the need for raw milk. It is great to know that people want it. However, I do not see how that increases production costs, it just means that the demand is greater than the supply. Since your company has grown so much over the last 3 1/2 years, I can beleive that your equipment needs updated to a more effecient system to enable you to increase production. I can understand the extra hours your employees have to work to supply the ever increasing demand; new equipment would would help. This is a good thing! I wish you well and will continue to buy the milk at the increased price. Have you though about looking for a few investors since banks won’t loan you the money?
? +1% ? +10% ? +100% ? +1000% ?
Easy to understand your need.
Banks loan to those who need the $ not.