Which Chicken Breeds Sell Best?

[ChickenLeg]

I feel like silver laced wyandottes sell well, just hatchery quality seem to do well. As well as blr wyandottes.

I personally raise a lot of bantam ameraucanas and bantam easter eggers. As well as a large fowl project crele ameraucana pen.

My large fowl project birds seem to sell just as well as the pure ameraucanas I raised in the past. My bantam easter eggers sell decent but never get more than $2ea as chicks. The best bantams for laying and selling were my bantam dominiques. Alot of people asked for bantan barred rocks too.

I personally like bantam breeds since they eat about 1/4 as much feed as a large fowl and chicks bring about the same around here. If you have sexed female chicks you can get a little more. That is why I like autosexing like crele or barred birds, since people can go to tsc or a feed store and get sexed pullets for $3-4 each its been hard to compete unless I have something they dont carry or cant be easily bought from online hatcheries. Best of luck!

 

[JacinLarkwell]

https://www.backyardchickens.com/threads/2021-chick-order.1448090/

If you want, you can skim through my thread for this year's orders. It's got lost of pictures, some rambling and plenty of breeds. I can always post pictures if a breed catches your eye

 

[Sally PB]

I was told by a long time chicken farmer that Buff Orpington is the friendliest and gentlest breed.

Maybe they had friendly, gentle ones, but I have a roo who is... tolerable. And he is the nicest of the 3 BOs I got. The other 2 are buried in my garden.

 

[Iheartbirds]

Maybe they had friendly, gentle ones, but I have a roo who is... tolerable. And he is the nicest of the 3 BOs I got. The other 2 are buried in my garden.

I know nothing about roos, but the hens are rated among the top 5 friendliest breeds. Of course, chickens are individuals, like members of other species, so no trait is set in stone.

 

[Sally PB]

Of course, chickens are individuals, like members of other species, so no trait is set in stone.

Yup! The difference between the roo I kept and the other two was night and day.

 

[Sally PB]

One more thing for OP... Be sure you are selling what you say you are selling. (Not that you'd do this, I just need to rant a minute here.)

The birds I got from the breeder aren't what she said they are. The bottoms of the feet of Australorps should be pinkish white. Not yellow. So I don't have Blue Australorps, I have Blue Something Else. I love them anyway, but I wish I'd gotten what I thought I was getting.

I don't know if she hatched them herself (I was assuming so), or got them from somewhere else.

Rant over.

 

[CountingChickens]

Are you able to keep roosters where you live?

Yes!

 

[Marandamom]

Are you able to keep roosters where you live?

Yes. I only have one rooster at a time now so they won't fight each other or break eggs constantly, which I had happened before when I had more than one.

 

[JacinLarkwell]

You'll also have to consider how you want your set up. There are 3 ways I'm aware of:

1) seperate breed flocks, each with male(s) and females of that breed/project
2) a male flock and a female flock kept seperately
3) caged males and female flock (introducing females to male instead of male to females)

 

[BirdmanCA]

I’m not sure what state your in but here in CA. The Best sellers are in numerical order from best sellers and most sold this year from my first hand experience selling chicks and records kept for this year

To start off we sell egg laying breeds the most 1 first

dual purpose meat/ egg layers
2 Second

ornamental show breeds 3 third

Exotic & rare breeds 4 Fourth

Hybrid mix breeds last least sold per week 5th

1. Rhode Island reds
2. Plymouth Barred Rock
3. Easter Eggers
4. Americana
5. Silkies
6. Transylvanian Naked neck turken
7. silver duck wing Phoenix
8. Indonesian Ayam cemani

Hybrids mix breeds like our
Hendrix isa x Rhode Island reds
Rhode red X Hendrix amber link
Rhode Island Red X Plymouth Barred Rock

My best advice is to make sure you keep records of what sells and what your customers are asking for even if there just calling to ask what you have available that will give you a idea of what your viewers are looking for and what’s in demand breed wise and make sure you put the money you make back in to your flock and business like incubators but make sure to cover your monthly feed cost first and grow from there it may take some time but if you do it right you will start to see that they pay for them self and can make you money if you ride the wave right like make sure you have a minimum order size that makes it financially worth your time and covers the time it takes you to fill there order and box them up including pine shavings you may put in the box or gas you may use meeting up to sell them chicks make sure you have Chicks available when others don’t for example during the fall / winter and keep your price competitive with local breeders / sellers even if you don’t make that much profit you will start to build your name and get referred by the customers now I have pet shops buying from me because of customer referrals and chick demand as well they don’t pay nearly as much but buy in bulk buying everything I have left after filling my weeks orders and still available all at one time and will pay you the same for male or female if your price is competitive.
the longer you keep your chicks the more they will cost you and in return cost per chick so keep that in mind we like to sell are chicks as early as we can 1 day to 1 week old anything older then that ends up at the local pet shops for people looking for a pets. I have a people want to partner up with me because my Chick demand get so high we end up with a waiting list so I figured I would partner up and it never works out because some people don’t get it and want to sell there chicks for more then what the market is willing to pay at the time and end up with 100s of birds they can’t sell and then they just want more and more with time witch is one way to sell birds but not the way we do it we fill orders ASAP and fill are higher price smaller orders first then work are way down the list with larger cheaper orders last we make more money/ profits selling 10-20 chicks at a higher price then we do for the larger cheaper orders of 50+ chicks
Make sure to offer a discount on lager orders to make sure you get your chicks out and not sitting and eating up your profits I find that less people want older chicks that are going through that ugly stage if you decide to breed exotic or rare breeds make sure you do your research on Chick price and mark them down just a lil so you stick out from the crowd knowing your still making a good profit at the same time getting more sells then every one els it’s all about numbers with chicks unless you are selling rare or exotic breeds then it’s going to be about the quality we sell both just because there are not that many people out there looking for that $75-$100 per chick like our ayam cemani but we do sell them just not as quickly as are cheaper birds it’s funny the list is also in numerical order in price with a exception to the hybrid witch are the cheapest and the naked neck they are cheaper then are Easter Eggers by $1
And some people want what others don’t have so make sure you have some breeds that are one off
I can keep going but I think you get the idea it’s all about marketing and reputation I can show you pictures of my happy customers and there birds and there current condition because we keep up with all of are sells and help with any questions or concerns they may have and in return they come back for more the next year or send there friends or family our way because we can be trusted and do good business I love this topic and feel that I can keep going but don’t want to bore you lol

FYI you will get a lot of city slickers asking that funny questions : so how many birds do you have and o so do you have a farm it always leads to the same end result witch is can I come to your farm and see the breeding stock lol if that’s your thing then feel free to play show and tell but make sure you have some type of BIO-Security measure in place so your birds don’t get sick or you will not be selling any thing and instead you will be fighting off 2 legged Predators and or The diseases they bring in lol