The farm, Hermanot said, increased the number of turkeys raised this year slightly because it sold out last year, but held off on a bigger expansion. The fertilizer is essential to the farm’s organic approach. ![]() And the cost of fertilizer was up a whopping 280%, to almost $1,300 a ton this spring, from $440 in 2021. Purchasing newly hatched baby turkeys - the farm doesn’t hatch their own - increased 25%. Hermanot said the cost for feed, mostly corn and soybeans, soared 60%. Rick Hermanot, co-owner of Ekonk Turkey Hill Farm. Inflation eased a bit in September to an 8.2% increase. Inflation - the measure of the overall increase in prices - reached 9.1% in June, a 40-year high. The farm’s costs tied to raising turkeys - the largest part of its business - saw stunning jumps this year, well above the overall rate of inflation. You can’t stay in business if you can’t even cover your costs.” “That 50 cents - it won’t cover the added cost of raising them but it will help,” Hermanot said. The decision to keep the price increase in check is squeezing profit margins at the farm, Hermanot said. “They’re more expensive than if you went into Big Y and bought a Butterball.” “That’s part of the reason we felt we couldn’t raise the price that much because we’re already kind of a high-priced turkey,” Hermanot said. The farm also grows pumpkins and hay mostly for the farms animals to eat.Įkonk Turkey Hill Farm’s approach also is more expensive to operate. In addition to the 4,000 pasture-raised turkeys, the farm has cattle, goats, sheep and chickens. The farm raised about 4,000 turkeys this year and has established a niche market over time in all-natural birds that are raised in a pasture rather than indoors where most of the country’s turkeys are grown.Įkonk Turkey Hill Farm in Moosup co-owner Rick Hermanot has a variety of livestock on the farm. “It’s the biggest increase we’ve had in one year,” said Hermanot, who has been raising turkeys for 25 years. “And while there will be turkeys in the case, they will not be able to be as selective as they were in the past.”Īt the family-owned Ekonk Turkey Hill Farm in Sterling, co-owner Rick Hermanot said he tried to hold the line on price increases for his fresh, all-natural and pasture-raised turkeys.īut the farm’s skyrocketing costs for feed, fertilizer and even newly hatched turkeys contributed to a decision to raise the price per pound by 9% to $5.99, from $5.49 a year ago. “Consumers just have to accept that the supply chain is extremely tight,” Whitman said. The three reasons he wants the turkeys to have the freedom to roam are diet: pasture raised taste better well-being: turkeys like to forage so they’re happier and exercise: they are not cooped up in a cage. He said that he has always dreamed of owning a farm like Ekonk Turkey Hill Farm from when he was just 10 years old. Ekonk Turkey Hill Farm in Moosup co-owner Rick Hermanot walks through the pasture-raised turkeys.
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