Growing without breaking: house by house, cash flow, team, and the thresholds not to cross
The farms that close are not always the ones doing badly: many were doing well and wanted to go faster. A fourth house built too early drains the cash of the first three, dilutes the team, and puts on the market kilos nobody was waiting for. Yet growing is the goal of every farm manager; the question is not whether, but when and how. This lesson gives the method we teach at the NEXTEKCI School: one house at a time, five thresholds checked before each decision, and a cash reserve measured not in money but in days of feed, so that the rule stays true whatever the price of the bag.
14 min read · 5-question quiz at the end
By Abdul Hussein ChoumanFounder of NEXTEKCI · Agnibilékrou hatchery since 2006This lesson is part of Farm manager: finance, growth, succession specialisation. It opens to every registered student, from free registration. Levels 1 to 5 and the tracks remain readable by everyone.
The farms that close are not always the ones doing badly: many were doing well and wanted to go faster. A fourth house built too early drains the cash of the first three, dilutes the team, and puts on the market kilos nobody was waiting for. Yet growing is the goal of every farm manager; the question is not whether, but when and how. This lesson gives the method we teach at the NEXTEKCI School: one house at a time, five thresholds checked before each decision, and a cash reserve measured not in money but in days of feed, so that the rule stays true whatever the price of the bag.
- ✓Explain the three ways a farm breaks while growing: cash flow, technique, market
- ✓Calculate your cash reserve in days of feed and place it against the red, orange and green thresholds
- ✓Check the five thresholds before opening a house: cash, technique, market, team, debt
- ✓Quantify on paper what one more house does to the profit, the money advanced and the break-even point
- Why a growing farm breaks
- The reserve in days of feed: the first threshold
- The five thresholds to check before opening a house
- What one more house does to the accounts, on paper
- The team and the manager: the farm breaks from the head
- Going further
- •Growing means one more house, never more birds per m² (5 per m² in hot weather, NEXTEKCI advice; manufacturers 8 to 10) nor a clean-out under 14 days.
- •Reserve in days of feed = reserve ÷ daily consumption of all houses full: 12 ÷ 0.246 = 49 days with three houses; 12 ÷ 0.328 = 37 days with four; green at 60 days requires 19.7 units.
- •Five thresholds: cash ≥ 60 days; technique over three flocks (FCR ≤ 1.90, mortality ≤ 7%); market (≥ 90% of kilos in ten days, ≥ 3 buyers, none > 30%); team (≤ 3,000 chickens per person, one stand-in per post); debt (instalment ≤ 50% of capacity).
- •Fourth house on paper: turnover 133, costs 121, profit 12 (9%), money advanced 12, fixed 13, threshold 12.3 flocks out of 24; one week waiting for the buyer = 1,600 kg of feed.
- •One house at a time, three flocks before the next, a worker hired and trained before filling, the manager stepping back: the farm breaks from the head before it breaks from the cash box.