The first honey harvest under the new law on state regulation and state support of beekeeping, adopted at the end of 2010 by the State Council of Tatarstan, has passed.

The beekeepers themselves, who have already managed to sell the harvest and are now preparing their hives for wintering, talk about its results.

The beekeeper pays for everything

A beekeeper with 20 years of experience, Ilya Ionov and his son Alexander from the village of Yudino dream of turning their hobby into a large beekeeping enterprise - the Ionov family apiary. And it all started in the late 80s, when money was “tight.”

“At first I helped transport a friend’s hives, and he suggested that I take up beekeeping myself. I didn’t want to, I said, I’m afraid of bees - if they sting, my leg would swell up to my waist. But then he persuaded me. I went far for the bees - to Ternopil, and they brought Carpathian bees from there,” says Ilya Ionov. “The first year they died with us.” The second year we went to buy bees again. Then we started reading the literature, asking questions, and in 20 years we have about 80 hives. However, this year only 60 of them were filled.

— Do you work using a certain technology?

— Everyone has the same technology, the oldest, but over time, each beekeeper develops his own method. We try to change the hives, we have all new ones, exactly the same. We use an electric honey extractor (to pump honey out of honeycombs) and are trying to switch to mechanized labor. There are special devices for unsealing honeycombs, but many people just do it in an old basin! Poison collection equipment was purchased.

— In the summer, your apiary wanders, why can’t you stay in one place?

- You can, but you can sit like this all summer and not collect anything, you have to go to the fields, where there are crops. This year we tried a new system - we installed the hives not in one row on the ground, but in two or three floors on a trailer platform. It turned out to be very effective and mobile.

— According to the new law on the regulation of beekeeping, you cannot just come and set up hives; the land must be owned or leased.

— We come to an agreement with the forestry department and set up plantings, and in terms of money we come to an agreement...

— Don’t farmers pay you extra for pollinating their crops?

- This is true all over the world, but here it’s the other way around - the beekeeper pays to stand in the field. With us it’s the other way around.

— If we’re already talking about the law, did it bring anything revolutionary new?

— Unfortunately, and perhaps fortunately, I didn’t find anything new in the new law on beekeeping. The fact that it is necessary to install a two-meter barrier from neighboring areas is correct, but there are not so many of them outside the city at confectionery and chemical enterprises (apiaries can be located no closer than 5 km from them - ed.), so I think these are essential the measures will not affect beekeepers. The only good thing I would like to say is that the law spells out state support measures. Of course, if they were still accepted, it would be great. Time will show. And we, beekeepers, can only work and wait for a good honey harvest.

Business on dead bees?

— Is there a profitable beekeeping business in the Republic of Tatarstan or is it just a hobby?

- In most cases, this is a hobby, although you can make a business out of bees - you need to work, have more families. You can sell not only honey, it is the cheapest and simplest product. In addition to this, there are 11 types of beekeeping products that can be obtained: propolis, bee venom, beebread, pollen, dead bee (dead bees are included in medicines). For example, if 1 kg of honey costs 400 rubles, then 1 gram of bee venom costs hundreds of times more. But we need to find sales channels, and this is difficult for us.

— Does anyone need bee venom?

— Yes, although they write everywhere about the benefits of bee venom. Beekeepers are partly to blame for this. At one time they began to mix something into the poison to make it more effective, because it is very expensive.

— I would like to understand the economics of your business. What are the main costs? How much is left for development?

— The main expenses are gasoline, materials for the manufacture of new hives, and the purchase of bees. Every year we import new bees from the Carpathians to maintain a pure breed, otherwise they will mix with the locals and become less productive and very angry. Each queen costs about 1 thousand rubles, a bee package (queen and bees) costs 4 thousand rubles. We also need to buy foundation (a frame for building honeycombs - ed.), medicines, this year we plan to buy a woodworking machine, complete the repairs, and the rest for personal purposes.

— What remains for personal purposes?

— If we sold 1 ton of honey for 400 rubles per kilogram, it turns out to be 400 thousand, of which about 300 thousand rubles remain net profit.

— Do they take taxes from beekeepers?

— No, if we also take taxes from beekeepers, then there won’t be any left at all. (Here Alexander Ionov joins the conversation - ed.). After all, such a profit is obtained once a year. And we would like the business to become profitable all year round. For this purpose, we opened the website “Ionov Family Apiary”. To not only sell honey, but also provide other services.

- Which?

- For example, informational. People always come to my father with questions, and he shows and explains everything for free in the old fashioned way. But why not make a business out of it? Conduct lectures for novice beekeepers, and made short films all summer. It would be possible to show how to breed queens, how to treat bees - there are a lot of diseases now. Arrange excursions with tastings. I even quit my main job, I want to devote time to this work. At the employment center I defended my beekeeping business plan and received a free grant. I probably reported for about 10 minutes, and then they bombarded me with questions: how to treat myself with beekeeping products, etc. There is demand. There is also an idea to create apitherapy rooms in Kazan.

— How to choose honey?

— It’s better, of course, from familiar beekeepers, because at the market or in a store you don’t know where and how it was prepared, what was added. Did you heat it up or didn't you heat it up?

- In terms of?

— They heat last year’s honey so that it becomes liquid. This, of course, can be done, but if the temperature is raised above 40 degrees, then honey loses all its beneficial qualities. And if you buy at the market, the traditional advice is that honey should flow in a continuous stream, lie down in mounds.

— Is life sweet for a beekeeper?

- Of course, sweetie, my hands are sticky all the time (laughs). But seriously, if you work, it is quite possible to live off the income from beekeeping.

Getting this valuable and useful product for a beekeeper is only half the battle. You also need to know how to sell honey, because you can end up with it and not know where to put this product.

Sales mechanism

It would seem that you have received honey, take it to the market and sell it. But it turns out that the population is not buying it as willingly as we would like. Therefore, the beekeeper is faced with the question: “Where to sell honey?”

Manufacturers of processed products and cosmetologists are interested in purchasing this product at any time of the year.

When selling this product, it is necessary to sell only high-quality honey, since if you sell a low-quality product, you can lose a buyer. Honey must be collected carefully and stored correctly. A beekeeper should take care of his bees and do not hesitate to ask advice from more experienced beekeepers.

For retail sales, you can involve family members in this business.

You can find out where honey is purchased in bulk by talking with other sellers of this product or studying the market on the Internet. It is possible that in this way you will find a wholesale buyer to whom you will sell all the remains of your honey, and no further search will be needed.

Implementation methods

There are several of them. The beekeeper's task is to correctly choose among them the one that will not deprive him of either time or money. These methods include:

• retail sales on the market;
• wholesale sales to enterprises of various forms of ownership;
• selling via the Internet;
• sales through advertisements or advertising campaigns;
• sales at organized fairs, celebrations, festivals;
• sales to your friends.

These methods can be combined, then the question is “Where to sell honey?” will not stand in front of the beekeeper.

The latter method requires the beekeeper to have a large team of friends, since honey is not in high demand in Russia. Therefore, invite your friends who like your honey to let other people you know try it. Such a chain can continue indefinitely, which can ultimately lead to the appearance of a number of buyers who will be interested in purchasing this product from you.

Wholesale sales of honey

Advertisements for the purchase of honey in bulk can be found both on the Internet and in newspapers with advertisements. It must be taken into account that there are pitfalls here, which include the fact that most wholesalers work with batches of 500 kg or more; for each batch of honey you need to receive a declaration of conformity, for which you need to carry out chemical analyzes in accredited laboratories. And the most significant thing is that when selling wholesale, the beekeeper loses profit compared to retail sales.

If you urgently need money and quick sale of goods, you need to engage in the wholesale sale of honey. How to sell honey wholesale? To answer this question, you need to arm yourself with a computer with Internet access and a printer in order to be able to print out sales advertisements that can be posted at bus stops (yes, this method continues to be popular, especially considering that the main buyers of honey are middle-aged and elderly people ). In addition, you need to contact various confectionery production facilities located nearby, restaurants, teahouses, various hyper- and supermarkets, and consumer cooperation organizations.

Retail sale of honey

With retail sales, the question of where to sell honey does not disappear. When posting ads on the Internet, it is better to accompany the text itself with a photograph of the product. The text should contain information about the merits of the product being sold, without embellishment; it is better to advertise the organoleptic properties of the honey being sold.

In addition, when answering the question of how to sell honey at retail, we can recommend selling through an online store. It's better if it's your store. It is advisable to create a friendly atmosphere, sell a quality product, so that customers leave only positive reviews.

During retail sales, honey is bottled into various containers. The seller must have a container with him, with the help of which and from which he can give the customers a taste of the product. In addition to honey, you need to take separately products such as honey, propolis, beebread, and wax for sale.

Selling honey abroad

If you have tried the options suggested above, but they did not seem attractive, and you continue to be tormented by the question “How to sell honey?”, You should try your hand at selling it abroad. The most profitable countries for selling this product are Australia, USA, France, China, Germany, Japan, Greece. Particularly relevant is the sale of honey to China, which is ready to buy all Russian honey, the supply of which to this country in 2016 increased by 36 times compared to 2010!

When selling honey abroad, the wholesale price is much higher compared to prices from domestic buyers, but there are somewhat more difficulties. With this implementation, it is necessary to pay increased attention to quality, and, consequently, to documentation, to determine the buyer and transportation of honey.

The buyer can be found with the help of special companies, but they do not do this out of the kindness of their hearts, and part of the profit will need to be shared with them. You can search for it yourself by creating a website and filling it with information in Russian, English and the language of the country where you plan to sell honey.

The sale of honey, like any other product, requires constant monitoring of the market situation. Don't forget this when setting your price.

Transportation is usually negotiated and is therefore the least of the problems.

Documents are different for different countries. The following documents are common: confirming your activities, sanitary certificates.

Finally

Thus, the beekeeper himself must determine how to sell honey. This could be retail sales on the market, but this requires time and desire, or it could be wholesale sales within the country or abroad, which is largely determined by the capabilities of the beekeeper.

Starting a business selling honey is quite simple. To create such a point, you will need about a million rubles or two million rubles, plus the room in which you will work, and for proper, fast and efficient work you need workers who will pack and unload honey. The relevance of honey is popular nowadays; many people who want to feel healthier do not buy the honey that is sold in the supermarket, but rather the honey that can be purchased on the street or market. According to buyers, such honey can truly be called honey, which contains all the beneficial and nutritional properties that are so necessary for the buyer. It’s very easy to bring a wonderful idea to open a point selling honey to life, let’s see how to do it!

How to organize a business selling honey?

Here everything is quite simple: you just need to find a room of 10 square meters or more in which you will conduct sales. You can, of course, purchase a container and sell honey at the market, but this is a more expensive option, since in addition to rent, you will also need to pay for the container. Also, the room you have chosen must meet sanitary and technical requirements so that insects, bees, flies, etc. cannot be found in it. After you have found a place and employees at your point of sale, you can think about which suppliers you should buy honey from. There are two options.

First option

Buy honey from beekeepers. Although the price for such honey will be quite budgetary due to the fact that they do not increase the price, this price can subsequently be easily raised and increased by packaging the goods in containers. Packers are needed for this purpose.

Second option

This option for selling honey is also quite easy to find a common contact with dealer companies that sell and supply honey to retail outlets. The price for such honey will be much more expensive than that of beekeepers, but the price can then be increased. The advantage of such sales is that there is no need to hire a packer, since the honey is already packaged.

In these two options, beekeepers and dealers must request certificates for the products, which will indicate that the products are clean and do not contain harmful substances.

You can open a specialized department for honey trading with an amount of 200 - 300 thousand rubles. What is the advantage of such a department and how can you compete with retail chains? Read on.

A special department for the sale of honey or a honey shop is a small retail outlet selling honey and other beekeeping products, as well as related products: tea and confectionery. Such stores are gaining popularity due to a wide range of honey varieties, packaged in different containers (200, 500, 1000 grams, and so on).

The first advantage of such a department over chain stores, which also sell packaged honey, is that it offers a wide range of honey and related products. Thanks to its narrow specialization, in such a department you can sell not only more than 10 varieties of honey: North Caucasian, Far Eastern, Kyrgyz honey, and so on, but also other products and goods:

• royal jelly;
• pollen;
• propolis;
• honey cosmetics;
• bee treat;
• container for honey;
• useful literature;
• unique tea, tea sets.

Another advantage of a honey shop: here you can offer honey for testing. After all, this is important for the client, since honey is an expensive product, and one wants to approach its purchase with special selectivity. You can also think of a unique “honey as a gift” packaging or give useful literature or a tea set as a gift for a large purchase. The client will appreciate this and become your regular customer.

To organize such a store, you do not need a large area - it is enough to rent from 10 to 20 square meters. m. of retail space. It is not necessary to rent a place that is accessible (such premises are expensive); you can rent premises even in a residential area of ​​the city. In this case, you can count on local residents who will become your regular customers. For example, a room on the ground floor of an apartment building may be perfect. Renting such premises will cost between 15 and 30 thousand rubles per month.

An important component of a store is a competent salesperson. A person who not only stands behind the cash register, but who can suggest, explain and offer the right product to the buyer. He must know absolutely everything about the product: what kind of honey it is, where it came from, what beneficial properties it has, which honey is bitter, which one lasts longer, and so on. The salesperson is the key figure in making the store successful.

There are several options for purchasing goods for your store.

1. You find wholesale suppliers, of which there are plenty in each region, and purchase goods from them (packaged honey). Essentially, you will purchase the same assortment that is available in supermarkets. But this won't be enough. For more variety, you will have to work with local apiaries, who can offer you honey in different containers (even barrels) and at a more attractive price. You can also purchase other beekeeping products from them (propolis, pollen, royal jelly, and so on).

If you buy packaged honey from a wholesale supplier, then you only need to have a quality certificate or declaration of conformity for the batch. But if you take honey from a private person - a beekeeper, then you will have to request an apiary passport and a certificate from a veterinarian for this batch of honey. In the absence of these documents, during a sudden inspection of the store, the retail outlet will suffer, and not the honey supplier.

2. Opening your own honey production or packaging. You find a room for a workshop, purchase the necessary equipment (packing plant), hire staff and begin work. Honey for packaging is purchased from local beekeepers at a low price. And after packaging, its price becomes 3-4 times higher. In this case, you receive excess profits, since you bypass all intermediary schemes (as in the case of purchasing honey from wholesale suppliers). Opening your own packaging shop requires additional investments (from 500 thousand rubles). But you will be able to supply products not only to your own retail outlets, but also to other stores. In fact, you become the same wholesale supplier.

Important advice: before opening a point, study the literature, consult with specialists (the same owners of apiaries). Learn to understand honey, distinguish high-quality honey from low-quality honey, natural honey from honey made from sugar. This will help you avoid many losses at the start.

It is important to decide on the format of the business. There are 2 options.

You can organize your own apiary. One person can service up to 60 hives. To organize the production and sale of packaged honey, you can cooperate with other beekeepers. This is a more profitable and safer option in terms of financial risks. But its implementation requires experience in beekeeping and permanent residence in a rural area. In the summer there is a lot of work in the apiary, and during wintering it is necessary to keep an eye on the hives.

The second option is to buy raw materials from beekeepers. You can organize a packaging workshop. To do this, you need to find reliable suppliers of raw materials among beekeepers.

Having compared both options and choosing the most profitable or probable in terms of organization, you can begin writing a business plan.

Main risks

The demand for honey depends on the season, but not critically. In autumn and winter it increases noticeably. In summer – slightly lower. In the summer months, honey is being actively pumped out, and the workshop will be busy with work. In winter, you will not be able to work at full capacity, but during this period there is a more active sales of products. This is worth taking into account in order to ensure a decent supply for the winter months and satisfy customer needs.

The main risk of a small enterprise is associated with a lack of raw materials. In cold winters, bees can die; in unfavorable weather conditions in summer, they produce much less honey. The risk of shortages of raw materials is quite high. The risk can only be reduced by expanding the circle of suppliers and developing your own apiary.

If you are not experienced in keeping bees, it is not a good idea to start with a large number of hives. Understanding the specialty of a beekeeper should be taken with the utmost seriousness. It is necessary to study the experience of the best farms, the intricacies of caring for each type of bee and the composition of their honey.

Location

The best place to organize this business is in a rural area or a regional center with an ideal climate for breeding bees. In this direction, the most important factor is proximity to sources of raw materials.

If you have chosen a format with your own apiary and cooperation with other beekeepers, you should look for a plot in the village. The costs of setting up a farm are low. A plot of 25 acres is sufficient to accommodate 60 hives. Honey plants should grow around - buckwheat, acacia, linden, mint. The choice of plants largely depends on the breed of bees.

Example. If you decide to breed the North Caucasian bee, rent an additional plot and sow it with clover. Only this breed of bees can get nectar from a clover flower, the honey of which has excellent properties.

The area of ​​the premises for organizing a honey packaging workshop depends on the selected equipment. For a small enterprise, 100 m² is enough. Most of the area is allocated for warehouses for storing raw materials and packaged honey. They must have proper conditions in terms of temperature and humidity. For example, the maximum moisture limit for non-hermetically packaged honey is 60%, for hermetically packaged honey – 70%. The storage capacity must have a certain reserve. Selling products at a reduced price because the packaged honey no longer fits in the warehouse is stupid. You can create a certain amount of stock for the winter months, when the demand for your products will increase sharply and prices will rise.

Due to the fact that you produce food products, the requirements for the premises from various authorities will be very stringent. They should be known in advance.

Equipment

For packaging honey, you can purchase the inexpensive domestic line “Medofit+”. It costs about 540,000 rubles and is already a ready-made production facility, which has all the units and components to perform all stages of honey production. The presence of technical specifications will greatly simplify the process of certification of your products. Specifications:

Productivity – 1,500 kg per shift.
- Power – 13.5 kW.
- Container – from 20 to 500 ml.

Equipment for the production of foundation is quite widely available. You can choose an automated line with a capacity of 50 kg per hour, the cost is from 400,000 to 800,000 rubles. But for a small enterprise that is just starting to operate, a small press machine for 50,000 rubles, working on the principle of a waffle iron, is quite suitable. Options:

Weight – 11 kg.
It is possible to produce 5 standard sizes of foundation.
Cell size – 5.4 mm.
Matrix material – rubber silicone.
Losses of raw materials – 2-3%.
The cooling element is tap water.

To deliver products to retail outlets, you need a car. A used Gazelle with a refrigerator can be purchased for an average of 350,000 rubles.

You will also need containers. The price depends on the volume and material - glass jars or plastic containers. About 200,000 rubles should be set aside for the purchase of containers.

Personnel

To operate the Medofit+ line, 4-6 people are needed. Such enterprises rarely operate at 100% capacity. The full scope of work (receiving raw materials, loading and delivering products to customers, working on the production line) can easily be handled by 6 people. It is important that there is at least one person in the production who is fluent in the technology of packaging honey and its storage conditions.

Documents and licenses

A small honey packaging enterprise can operate as an individual entrepreneur. An apiary can operate as a farm or peasant farm. Financial reporting and taxation in these cases are simple. If several farms cooperate to organize a packaging workshop, each of which contributes a certain share to the creation of the business, a legal entity should be registered. In this case, you should consult with an experienced lawyer. He will help you correctly draw up all the documents, distribute shares of the enterprise’s income and draw up the statute. It is very important to foresee situations when one of the co-founders decides to leave the business and find the optimal solution for further development.

The production of packaged honey is not subject to licensing. The certification process must be completed - otherwise you will not be able to sell products through retail chains. If you can achieve quality that complies with GOST, there will be no problems with customers.

Marketing

It is almost impossible for a beginning entrepreneur with small production volumes to enter a large wholesale market. Many people don’t even try, since selling packaged honey through small stores and their own retail outlets at agricultural markets brings in much more income.

It is important to create your own brand and actively popularize it. Creating an online store is a great option for this product. If you have certificates and an active advertising policy, you will be able to sell a significant part of your products online.

Profitability

The amount of starting capital for organizing the workshop described above is about 1,000,000 rubles.

If you purchase raw materials, the cost of packaging 1 kg of honey, taking into account the price of containers of various sizes, is 140 rubles. But this is a very approximate figure, since wholesale prices for the purchase of honey from beekeepers are set on a contractual basis and are very unstable. They depend on the type, average prices in the region and weather conditions in a particular season.

The retail price depends on the region and ranges from 230-250 rubles per 1 kg. If during the period of active honey collection you can work at at least 50% capacity and pack 700 kg per day, your monthly profit will be about 1,386,000 rubles. After paying current expenses, a net profit of 1,200,000 rubles remains.

With established sales, you will be able to achieve payback in 2-3 months. If the enterprise is created by beekeepers, the need to purchase raw materials disappears completely or partially.

Summary

The production of packaged honey is a very promising and highly profitable direction. This is a great business for a beginner or a group of bee farmers.