JRC Ranch Management & Consulting

To keep open cows, or to not keep open cows? Generally, we don't like to keep open cows. Some years, the financials pencil out to keep open cows and re-breed them. Most years, though, we urge our clients to ship opens. If it's a year to keep them, we encourage keeping them separate from the rest of the herd or having a robust enough tagging system that no replacement heifers are kept out of that group. Why? Think about it this way: at a company, would you keep an employee around who costs the company money? That's what most open cows end up being--a cost. If a cow is open, that's (at least) one whole year she's not paying her way and decreasing the overall quality of the cow herd. It doesn't matter how many (even nice-looking) cattle you have if your calving and weaning percentages are poor. Plus, a dedicated culling strategy for open and less productive cattle is a key component in eliminating problem cattle and increasing your herd quality and profitability year-over-year. So, in general, we don't recommend keeping open cattle.

This one's for the prospective employees: Consider your social media. Like it or not, we sometimes put resumes in the "no" stack purely based on the applicant's social accounts. The ranching world is small, even on social, and if: 1. You've popped up on the cowboy swap pages as someone who doesn't pay for their items 2. You're constantly posting in the job groups because you're constantly on the hunt for a new job 3. You bad-mouth past employers or your spouse 4. It's clear that you enjoy a good time more than you enjoy getting to work in the morning 5. You have lots and lots of very public personal drama You might get passed over for a job before you've even had the chance to interview, no matter how qualified you are for the position. Looking at a person's social is now just as part and parcel as calling their references. Make sure your social accurately reflects who you are. (And if who you are is someone who does the five things listed above, don't be surprised when you have a hard time getting hired on at a good outfit.)

One of the most common mistakes we see in ranch management is the misunderstanding about the difference between ranch managers and cowboys. Plenty of ranch managers are excellent cowboys, but not all cowboys make good ranch managers. And that's okay. It takes all kinds of kinds to run a ranch and to have a successful operation, but a key component is a manager who not only has the practical cowboy or stockman skills but also understands the beef business. Merchandising cattle, understanding futures and commodities, people management, financial management, big-picture thinking, logistics, and scheduling, etc. are all things that often do not fall under a cowboy's purview but are integral to the success of any ranching operation. Tom Moorhouse says this quote on an episode of the Cowboy Life podcast, and we loved the discussion between him and Ross Hecox about what makes a cowboy, what makes a ranch manager, and the difference in skills between the two. Are you hiring the right kind of manager for your operation?

A common conflict we see on ranches: expectations that do not line up with resources. Specific examples: - wanting all the calves tagged at birth but being unwilling to pay for the cost of the additional labor required - asking that all the equipment be in excellent working order without ever purchasing new equipment - asking management to hire better employees while providing subpar housing - being upset at the quality of the calves without investment into cow herd/genetic improvements TL;DR: If leaders/owners want things to be a certain way, they need to be investing in that outcome. Asking employees to perform without giving them the tools to do so will result in (predictably) poor performance, but also high turnover, a bad reputation, and a failure to meet required objectives for financial success. Want to get vision and investment aligned? We can help.

Are you depreciating ranch assets correctly? The cost of large purchases (think trucks and trailers, cake bins, fencing, barns, wells, housing) is typically spread out over time, but how much time? This is a bit of a balancing act, and CPAs and managers sometimes use depreciation differently. Should you stretch costs out over a longer period and thus "pay" less annually? Should you shorten that timeline? Or, should you be conservative and allocate costs over the expected useful life? We always prefer a conservative (or even more aggressive) stance on depreciation because you don't want a pile of depreciation on your books for things you are no longer using. (Image from an article by The Farm CPA: https://lnkd.in/gic3weHn)

Real Estate vs. Livestock Enterprise For many ranch owners, these two things are separate units with different objectives, though there is often plenty of overlap. On the real estate side, the goals are: - financial (asset appreciation and/or capital preservation) - infrastructure/base of operations - enjoyment/lifestyle On the ranch side, the goals are: - financial (margin, cashflow, fixed costs) - enjoyment/lifestyle Some owners will prioritize one over the other--maybe raising high-quality cattle and a well-run ranching operation is a main goal. Maybe they purchased the ranch as a land asset that allows them to enjoy activities like hunting and fishing, and the ranching operation is more secondary. Maybe they are held equally. Each operation is different. It's up to the ownership and management to work together to come up with a business model and investment structure that suits those goals. Both must be honest about and understand the potential and limitations of the model they choose. Having an excellent leadership team here is key, especially one that can plan for the long- and short-term, and make sound decisions based upon the chosen business model. (Picture taken by our co-founder Cassidy on the Parkview Ranch in Rand, Colorado.)

What's the #1 reason people leave their job? They don't get along with their direct manager. Turnover in ranching is high (and expensive.) It's tough to find good help. It shouldn't be so tough to keep it. While we know there are often other factors to consider in the ranching industry (housing, ranch location, ability to move up, etc.) bad management is a big one to consider. If you have high turnover and you're ready to change that, get in touch. Our Ranch Assessment considers all the factors involved, and we can figure out a way forward for you and your ranch that doesn't include a rotating door of employees. robert@jrcranchconsulting.com cassidy@jrcranchconsulting.com

We're getting closer to branding season here in the mountains, and we know many of you are approaching branding season yourselves--or maybe it's already started! Brandings can be stressful--lots of people, lots of cattle, lots to get done. But, a well-run branding minimizes that stress and can be pretty dang fun. We plan brandings weeks in advance (if not longer) to ensure the cattle are where we need them to be and we have plenty of help and plenty of food! Our tips for a well-run branding: 1. Have good help that knows what they're doing, and assign people to help the new folks or the kids along if needed. 2. Make the gather in the morning as easy as possible, if there will be one. 3. Make sure expectations are clear--who is in charge? Who is doing what and when? Cowboy etiquette is handy here. 4. Have everything on hand that you might need, plus backups. Medicine, branding irons, vaccine, needles, etc. 5. Whenever possible, don't tie horses in the branding pen. 6. If you've got little kids along, it's helpful if they have a safe place to hang out, and shade if it's going to be hot! 7. PLENTY of drinks and food. We like to serve breakfast AND lunch, with plenty of snacks in between. Branding is hard work! 8. Appoint someone to lord over the vaccine who knows what they're doing and can ensure everything is done correctly. Nothing worse than realizing at the end that the guns were set to the wrong dosage or the vaccine got too hot! 9. Our preference is to keep dogs out of the branding pen. 10. Get a good crew. We know we already said this, but a good crew goes a long way to making a branding successful, even when problems pop up. What would you add?

A key difference between a professional ranch manager and someone who is simply taking care of a ranch? Long-term planning. Lots of people can tend to the day-to-day of a ranch: keeping cattle healthy, fence up, equipment maintained, and animals fed and watered. However, that's not ranch management. Ranch management is looking ahead to next month, next year, next decade to plan for the future of the entire operation, including the real estate/asset investment. Long-term considerations look like: - cow herd improvement - infrastructure improvement - wildlife/biodiversity/soil health improvement - transition and succession planning - asset appreciation beyond simply the appreciation of the land value - adding value and additional income via diversification and/or partnerships Without that long-range planning, ranches can lose out on added value via improvements, diversification, and partnerships, and lack of planning can cause major legal and financial hurdles far into the future. Don't risk it. Hire someone who can manage the day-to-day *and* help build plans for far into the future.

Do you have a vision and mission for your ranch? You should. Vision and mission statements are all about capturing and communicating the goals of the ranch and how you want to accomplish them. They're necessary because they provide a specific target to work towards, and when there is no target, there is no way to know if you're on track. Communicating your vision and mission to employees is helpful so that they know what they're working towards, too! A vision statement is long-term. Where are we going? What do we want this business to become? What does accomplishing our mission look like? A mission answers the question, "What are we here to do?" and communicates core beliefs. This is more than just the finances of the ranch (i.e. being profitable) it's about who you are and how you move through the world. These are generally short, a sentence or two. We ask all of our clients to write vision and mission statements and think about the goals and objectives that are on the path to achieving their desired outcomes. What's yours?