# Grocery Store Lamb Prices...



## Slev (Nov 29, 2003)

Next time you're out, take a picture and consider posting it, along with the location, Date, and anything else you find interesting... 

These photo's taken at a local "higher end" grocery store in Illinois, Metro/St Louis, MO Jan. 2011


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## sbanks (Dec 19, 2010)

We don't even have lamb in our grocery store here in Oklahoma. Gonna raise my own.


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## Slev (Nov 29, 2003)

Well then at least try to find out how much your local prices go for and post that. 
I figure this will help anyone wanting to know the prices of whats out there, across the country...


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## MarkNH (Apr 1, 2003)

We tried to get lamb locally - they would have had to order it and it was between 7 and 8 a pound for leg of lamb. Thinking lamb will be first larger animal since we love to it eat and I believe fencing for sheep is easier than that for goats.


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## bergere (May 11, 2002)

I looked at some nice lamb chops at a store I buy my food from. $20.00 a pound!


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## Our Little Farm (Apr 26, 2010)

Wow! Sure glad we have a couple of our lambs in the freezer! Did not realize the price was so high.


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## sbanks (Dec 19, 2010)

and to think you only get a dollar and a half or so per pound when you take them to market.

There is a very big markup going on.


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## sde219 (May 19, 2010)

sbanks said:


> and to think you only get a dollar and a half or so per pound when you take them to market.
> 
> There is a very big markup going on.


I definitely think a $1.50 live weight is sadly low but if you're going to auction I don't know how you can expect to get any better - it's a game of chance and the random lamb moving across the auction is not going to be treated a premium animal.

I've gotta say, I'm not sure 7.99 a lb for a boneless leg of lamb does not seem that bad. And certified organic with truly organic hay/grain would definitely demand that kind of price for me - making the fully certified transition would easily double my costs although I'm not sure it would change my end product.

IME, Lambs dress out lower than other animals with a higher percentage of organs and bone to meat - I think a lot of resources say 50% but I'll use 55% since that's where my last two ended up. Then of the 55% only about 75% of that remains in typically usable cuts and items. 

$1.50 LW = $2.72 HW = $3.63 cost per lb of the cuts

This figure doesn't include a butcher fee. Lets guess you've got a cheap butcher and a heavy lamb and that'll add $1 a lb to those retail cuts. (My last time it would have added $1.40 per lb. 50lbs of Meat and a $70 fee)

Honestly, at $4.63 per pound to the producer and the butcher. How most cheaper would we expect a boneless leg of lamb to be?

Retails cuts in a grocery store also are likely to have been handled by a distributor and then of course the retailer. Maybe each only adds 15% to the price but that would take it to $6.12 a lb.

I think of the leg a decent cut of meat so when you think about the cost across the whole animal getting a little extra on that 2.59lbs seems well unsurprising. 

I think the problem is that consumers don't understand the real cost or value of the meat they eat. I think everyone here who raises sheep knows that $1.50 live weight means seriously operating on the margins until you're big enough to have some economies of scale that decrease operations expenses or your processing cost.

You've either gotta be happy to operate on those margins or you try to end up cutting out some of the "costs of doing business" between you and consumer and turn those into your profits.

Just my experience and take on it. I'll happily take some photos of lamb in the stores around here.


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## Ernie (Jul 22, 2007)

We're seeing $6.99 a pound here in northern Illinois. Not a lot of it available though.

My costs for goat were about $5 a pound and I'm expecting lambs to come in somewhere around the same. The issue is that people compare the price of lamb to the price of feed lot beef. Lamb is much harder to produce and is considered a "specialty meat" by most. When they can get ground hamburger meat from old, worn-out dairy cows at $0.99 a pound, then of course they're going to think $6.99 is outrageous.

However the people who know the difference are willing to pay the difference. If you want to make money in the meat business then my opinion is that you've got to sell something people can't find in their grocery stores easily. That means lamb, goat, rabbit, or duck.


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## leon (Dec 24, 2008)

Prices will stay low until there are people willing to sell at low prices. Just look at the diary farmers who got themselves cornered really bad because every time the price went down a whole bunch of them tried to produce more to make it up on the volume.


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## Ross (May 9, 2002)

Similar here Slev. Good prices I'm just outa gas to take it up a step.


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## leon (Dec 24, 2008)

Sorry, forgot to include the price. $2/lb live weight around here and most farms I know are all sold out and have a waiting list. Any producers in our area with sheep to sell feel free to contact me - I probably can arrange a sale or two for you.


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