# Renting out woodenware



## odfrank (May 13, 2002)

I have several accounts where I have built apiaries and maintain hives for homeowners and more requests coming in. I never thought this current bee having fad would last so long. 
It would be less work and easier for me to build and own the honey supers and rent them to the various clients rather than they have their own. Less sorting in storage and less work always having their boxes along when I visit their sites. In how many years of rental would you think I should try to recover my honey super costs? I doubt I will be in this business ten more years and they might bail out anytime. I keep running short of supers every year.


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## clyderoad (Jun 10, 2012)

od, I too have clients where I maintain their hives, extract for them and bottle in qt. mason jars.
They own the hive equipment and bees. I require they have a protected storage space for their stuff. I will not store it.
When I pull honey their supers are marked and get extracted and the honey put into buckets until I bottle, usually within a week.
The supers remain in my yard until I deliver their honey when I return them and store them in their storage area. I don't want to complicate things or be responsible for their stuff. 

All of the clients purchased the pre painted 2 deep, 2 medium complete setups from Mann Lake so I mark them with their initials.


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## MoeC (Mar 10, 2017)

Interesting. 
I don't know if its ok to ask, but was is the going rate for such a thing?


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## odfrank (May 13, 2002)

I charge by the hour and mark up costs, woodenware, containers, new bees, medications etc. If you charge by the pound a crop failure will kill you.


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## clyderoad (Jun 10, 2012)

Charging by the harvest is not the way to go.
I charge a set maintenance fee per hive, including pulling and extracting the crop which is theirs to keep. After a year or two of average harvests many have more honey than they want or need and excess I'm told to keep. Most are bee lovers first, honey lovers second. No guaranteed honey harvest although I manage them for honey production. There has been "some" harvest for each client every year so far, some years more, some less- In every case the first year with all new equipment is the smallest harvest (one got 12 lbs from 2 hives started as nucs late in the spring the first year).
The first hive is priced highest and additional hives in the yard priced at a lower rate. I strongly recommend a minimum of 2 hives/yard and explain why re resource sharing between the hives instead of paying for them if supplied by me.
The fee covers visits over the year (my scheduling) and medications. Feeding (sugar and sub) is additional ( I use my feeders), as is requeening, any new equipment necessary and qt. mason jars.
In every instance I have sold them the bees to get started. My pricing is loosely based on the revenue I expect to generate per hive in my operation if I were to be working those colonies for my own purposes (honey, bees) and marked up from there. 

(If I were to rent honey supers to my customers I'd buy a couple of hundred 9 frame drawn used shallow or medium supers for say $6-10 each and cover the whole purchase cost, plus some, of those in rental service the first year. I'd use the others for my own operation. Every year of rental pays for more of the purchased supers with the others in service for production.)


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## MoeC (Mar 10, 2017)

Interesting indeed.
How do you hand increases like splits or re-captured swarms?


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## Saltybee (Feb 9, 2012)

Let the pros handle it!

Heard of the pool guy/gal, lawn guy /gal, gardener. ( electrician, plumber)

Why not bee guy/lady? Great idea to cover the cost of small outyards.


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