“Never be afraid of charging”

“Never be afraid of charging”

By Ann Ingerson
April 1984

The MacDonalds market their sheep every way possible and charge top dollar

“You name the market in the past twenty-eight years, and we’ve been in it.” So says Howard MacDonald of his Noire Mouton sheep farm in Sutton, Quebec. The MacDonalds started up with 24 Hampshire ewes and a good ram. The story of their marketing experiments and successes over the years shows a willingness to take risks and try new ideas.

Noire Mouton’s first market was wholesale to Canada Packers, a national Canadian firm comparable to Swifts in the U.S. After subtracting commissions and other payments to middlemen, the wholesale price was so low that the MacDonalds realized there had to be a better way.

Rachel Dion photo
*Ian MacDonald demonstrates sheep shearing techniques at Sterling College, Craftsbury, Vt.*

After two or three years of wholesale marketing, Noire Mouton began to specialize in the Easter lamb market. Their location near Montreal was ideal. Traveling slaughterers would come to the farm, and pay cash for live lambs at 35 to 50 pounds. The lambs would be slaughtered on the farm by severing the carotid artery to the brain and allowing the animal to walk itself to unconsciousness. The skins were loosened by a “siffleur” who blew air between skin and muscle. Skins were then removed easily after hanging a few days. Every part of the lamb but the rumen would be used for some speciality.

This market seemed ideal for eight or ten years. But Noire Mouton farm eventually outgrew it. At its peak the farm produced 1100 to 1200 lambs per year. The next step was to sell “lamb on the hoof”. A sign was erected at the foot of their road, “way out in the boonies”, as Howard MacDonald says. The first week the sign was up the farm sold 40 lambs at $1.00 per pound live weight. Buyers would choose their animal live, then return ten days later to find it cut, wrapped and frozen to their specifications.

Fourteen years ago, the MacDonalds took the next logical step. They bought enough freezers to stock several carcasses and began to sell lamb by the cut. ”People said we’d only sell the legs and chops,” Howard remembers, “but it’s not true. We dressed up all the cuts-made crown roasts and boned rolled shoulder and minced herb Lamb flanks. We even took the livers and turned them into liver pate with a little Madeira wine.” By selling meat piecemeal, MacDonald can gross $3.50 per pound.

Rachel Dion photo
*Howard MacDonald demonstrating sheep shearing*

The latest marketing brainstorm is a project of Howard’s son, Ian. Ian has opened a small cafe at the fa rm where he serves gourmet lamb meals. Meat dressed up this way grosses $15.00 per pound. Ian plans to expand this Summer to offer special “Mechoui” barbecues. The mechoui is a North African method of oooking the whole lamb using radiant heat from a fire. The lamb, at 30 to 35 pounds dressed weight, is spitted off to the side of the fire and turned regularly for many hours. The meat is tender and juicy and very tasty. One lamb can serve 20 people, and with a few extras provided a $15 per person charge can gross nearly $300 per lamb. This has to be the ultimate in vertical integration on the farm!

“In order to succeed in selling lamb at such high prices,” say MacDonald, “You have to produce what the customer wants.” Although Canadian federal standards call for 3/8″ fat for the highest grade lamb, MacDonald considers these standards outdated and aims for an extremely lean carcass. “Fat is the most expensive weight you can put on an animal,” he says, “and the customers don’t even want it. They’ll ask you to cut that off before they take it home.”

Another adjustment to customer needs was to develop a year-round supply of lamb. Noire Mouton developed an accelerated lambing system which had each ewe lambing three times in two years. Lambings were scheduled for December/January, March/April, and September/October. MacDonald used tarpaper over his barn windows to shorten days for Spring-bred ewes.

Pelts have become an even greater success at Noire Mouton farm. MacDonald advises farmers to add as much value as possible to products before they Leave the farm. All Noire Mouton sheepskins go to a Local tannery before returning to the farm. A few are sold as tanned skins, but most are sewn into clothing. The Noire Mouton store carries coats, jackets,’ vests, hats, mitts, slippers and even sheepskin patch bedspreads at a price of $650 to $725. The MacDonalds own heavy duty sewing machines and employ several people to do the sewing. The business started out on a custom basis, duplicating clothing which customers pointed out in their favorite catalogs. Now the farm store carries ready-made articles. Just as for lamb meat, convenience and speed of purchase help sell more.

Howard’s daughter now handles the clothing shop. The clothing business has grown so fast that nearly 8,000 skins must now be purchased in addition to those produced on the farm. These pelts come from Montana, where feeder lambs are shorn as they enter the feedlot, about 90 days before slaughter. MacDonald’s advice to northeastern producers who raise lambs on pasture to seven or eight months of age is to shear these lambs at three to five months to produce a premium pelt at slaughter. The long-fleeced pelts mat up in the tanning process.

Noire Mouton has also sought the best markets for its wool. Early on, the farm introduced some Rambouillet breeding. That wool went to a blanket manufacturer who paid twice as much as the going rate for coarser wool. By finding an unfilled marketing niche, MacDonald once more increased his profits over those of a ”run of the mill” operation.

Howard MacDonald believes in capitalizing on government tourism expenditures. He depends upon people who travel out from Montreal to visit his farm. He has encouraged neighbors to develop similar enterprises. Rather than viewing them as competition, he believes such development increases the number of visits by people seeking a wide variety of activities on their trips to the country.

One neighbor has developed a crosscountry ski trail system which helps draw customers to Noire Mouton farm as well. This same neighbor quadrupled his gross on maple syrup by marketing it directly to downtown Montreal department stores at a premium price.

In addition to taking advantage of government tourist promotion, MacDonald’s second bit of advice is “Never be afraid of charging.” High prices are the best way to convince people they’re getting a high quality product. Admittedly, says MacDonald, “My neighbors don’t deal with me at these prices.” But Montrealers are willing to make the trip to get truly fresh tasty food. The contrast with the “refined tasteless food” they are used to is worth the high price.

For MacDonald, marketing is the key to survival for a smaller farm. “Farmers think it’s immoral to sell what they raise. Sure you have to enjoy what you’re doing, but you have to make a living at it too. The main difference is in marketing. Take poultry, for instance. To sell on the general market, you have to be big, and I mean big–half a million birds. But with a couple hundred hens you could go into the local pub and take orders at 10 or 15 cents over the market price and sell out.”

Direct marketing has also helped MacDonald “tighten up” his management practices. He knows just what kind of carcass and pelt to aim for, since he talks to the people who buy those products every day.

A final word of advice is to do something different. ”When I was a kid,” Howard recalls, “I used to go visiting a relative in Nova Scotia. Everyone there grew some kind of “cash crop” every year. It might be turkeys or broilers or strawberries. When everybody was in strawberries, my relative was in turkeys. By the next year, they’d all be raising turkeys and he’d be on to something else, always avoiding the market gluts.”

With all’ its marketing success, Noire Mouton sheep farm is reducing its sheep numbers. The flock is down to about 150 ewes now as Howard eases himself into semi-retirement. (It is hard to imagine this energetic and excited man actually being fully retired.) His children are continuing on with the clothing and cafe businesses. Keeping a small flock will help market those products by drawing visitors to the farm.

“As far as making money on the farm goes,” Howard admits, “we could kiss the sheep good-bye.” It is actually innovative marketing and not the production of sheep which has made Noire Mouton farm such a success. ■