# Hobby finances



## Walliebee (Nov 17, 2006)

hob·by  
–noun, plural -bies. 1. an activity or interest pursued for pleasure or relaxation and not as a main occupation.

I know what you're asking, but IMO if there is a cash flow it is not a hobby; it is a business.


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## Apuuli (May 17, 2006)

Walliebee said:


> pursued for pleasure or relaxation and not as a main occupation.


I meant hobby as opposed to sideline or commercial. I certainly didn't start bees for the financial gain but for the pure pleasure of getting stung, however that doesn't mean I can't sell my honey.


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## Oldbee (Sep 25, 2006)

GOOD QUESTION! "good records of the flow of money in and out". What is that;.........."records"? Hey man!..............It's only a "hobby"!! How many "hobbyists" [any kind] are in the "black". It's all for the "fun" of it, don't you know? If I didn't have my bees [3 colonies] I don't know what I would do with myself! Lol. Records, in the "red", hives/years, Dadant, Mann Lake, Brushy Mountain, etc. etc., and the price of gas just to see my bees fly? I didn't even add that all up! WOE.. is me! I "charge" it all to MasterCard............ some things are "priceless".


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## Oldbee (Sep 25, 2006)

"nirvana"?........................Hey!!......,.I think I got that [feeling] recently when I sold about 60 pounds of my honey. A little "balancing" of the "books" so to speak. I understand your question and perhaps other "hobbyists" should,..........."keep track" of things better?


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## Aspera (Aug 1, 2005)

Hehe, the real question is "How many people beekeeping professionally are in the black?"

It is not a very lucrative business. Only the best of the best survive, and even they often take a lot of short cuts or rely on unsustainable practices. People who say otherwise are probably about to sell you something.


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## BigDaddyDS (Aug 28, 2007)

I'm the same way with most of my hobbies; I don't mind spending my time, as long as they don't cost me money!


Good record keeping, especially at the hobby level, is pretty easy. My record keeping, when I began, consisted of receipts shoved into a manila envelope in a desk drawer. As long as your receipts are equal to or less than what you've made selling your honey, you've got a good grasp on your hobby!

Personally, I've always felt that profit is made at the onset. That is, I keep my purchasing cost low for equipment and supplies, (through shopping around, making things myself, or making due without) so I don't have to make it up with honey, wax and other product sales. 

And, for me, the transition from hobbiest to side-liner is when, if you remove all of your income from your bees, you'd experience a measurable decrease in your lifestyle. (And side-liner to commercial is when you quit your "day job"!)

BDDS


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## ScadsOBees (Oct 2, 2003)

6 or so hives, 4-5 years working at it.

Am I in the black? If I'm talking to my wife, of course! 

In reality, probably. It is hard to tell sometimes. I can track expenses pretty easily, but income is where I have trouble, sell some here, some there, wife sells some, kids some. Money goes into wallet and then *poof* something happens to it and it disapears.
But what I can track, my expenses are smaller than my income from it. Until I get the new extractor that I *need*...

That doesn't count my hours... I spent many of them making wooden ware in years 2-3.

Well, it isn't my main occupation, I enjoy it, but it isn't a whole lot of rest and relaxation. Mostly the Euphoria of watching them cap another super and watching a split explode.
The rest of the time it is the worry that I did something wrong or that some thing is going wrong. Then harvesting on a hot day kicks the daylights out of me.

Regardless, I consider it a hobby, just like gardening and fishing (wait...that is a sport, right??).

Nirvana? That is after the honey is harvested, the mead is fermented and aged to perfection...then we can work on nirvana 

Rick


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## james115 (Jan 22, 2007)

*hobby or sideline*

check your state tax laws, i use all the mileage i drive, bottles, supplies, treaments, 
and keep records of 700 pounds for sale .. without a tax break it would be sad. 
cash sales are all smiles this year i will make more in cutouts than in sales


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## EKW (Feb 2, 2005)

I don't think that charging for honey and other hive products makes beekeeping less of a hobby- just makes it an income-producing hobby!

The first year we had bees we had one hive; second year, two hives, third year, thirty hives. We started selling (a small amount) of honey the second year and were showing a profit in the third year. We did purchase all of our honey house equipment used, which helped the bottom line. Also, 26 hives were purchased in Year 3 with 2-3 supers of honey on each which, when extracted and sold, nearly covered our investment in those hives plus most of the other equipment. We then went on to produce honey from two nectar flows that year, extracting two more times and really boosting our profit.

It's actually pretty easy to do IF-
You don't buy too many gadgets from the bee supply catalogs (especially books- my downfall);
and IF-
You bottle your honey and sell it direct for somewhere between $3.00-5.00/pound. (Maybe a little more now- that was over 10 years ago.

Having said that, you don't need 30 hives in order to show a profit. We wound up with that quantity because we had an opportunity to buy some hives and that was how many the seller had available. We could have still shown a profit with fewer hives as we would have spent less $$$ on honey house equipment and other "stuff".


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## Chef Isaac (Jul 26, 2004)

I would say that one thing that is important is being self sustainable. Find the your "sweet" number of hives to have and maybe go into the winter with 5 extra to cover your dead outs. Learn how to raise queens as the price of queens can be expensive (even thought... I can understand why... queens are tough to raise). 

The thing that really helps out is if you have the hives at the house. Any travel to the hives via truck is gonna cost you gas money and wear and tear on your truck. Not good. 

Catching swarms and doing cut outs can really help out. "Free" bees and can even bring some money in as far as charging a fee goes. Plus you can sell the bees as nucs.


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## Hill's Hivery (Jan 7, 2005)

Well this is the completion of year three for me. Year 1 started with 1 hive, year 2 ended with 4 (2 died last winter), and year three so far is up to 7 hives. Maybe I am just a little odd, but I do keep fairly detailed records on my "hobby". More to prove to my better half that I indeed do have a hobby that sustains itself! (Hmmm, it's not working yet since I am in the red....maybe I should stop!  )

So far I am a little in the red, under $300, from the very start. As was previously stated, this may vary due to cash sales of honey by me or another member of the family and/ or gifts. I have a version of Quickbooks Pro that I used for a sideline business years ago and that is what I use for tracking everything.

I had a really bad harvest last year and this year isn't looking to good. I was hoping to break the red/black barrier last year so I could justify more equipment. Oh Well!

The other reason I keep track is if I ever decided to cross the line from "hobby" to "sideline" business. Good records/practices now will lead to good records/practices later and will make my tax man that much more happier! Got to buy that honey house and work shop some day. Might as well call it a sideline business and right it off!


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## Troutsqueezer (May 17, 2005)

I've got four hives and all the equipment to keep them going and to process the honey. I figure I'm out about $2k over the last three years. Breaking it down that's $55 per month for my hobby. That cost goes down as each month passes.

I haven't made a penny back. Probably never will. Don't care. Anyway, that cost pales in comparison to some of my other pursuits.


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## Chef Isaac (Jul 26, 2004)

Hills:

I hear ya... gota have a honey house myself... a big one!!! 

You know, if the honey harvest is bad, you can go to a sideliner and buy pails of honey from there at a good price and retail it out. It works nicely!!!


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## Joseph Clemens (Feb 12, 2005)

If I were to go back to 1964, when I was 8 y.o. and tallied all the expenses incurred in my "hobby" of beekeeping, through the years. Then, also tallied the "income" from selling honey, bees, or other; I could easily say that the "red ink" easily out-does any "black ink", by a margin of 1000 to 1. I have sold a few dozen pounds of honey, but mostly I've just given it away to family and friends. I've also sold a few spare colonies, once in awhile, but usually for less than the standard going rate. More to share the bees than to make a profit.

Goes more to my purpose in keeping bees -- which is simply to observe them and enjoy their presence, while trying to keep them healthy and intercede the least in their lives.


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## berkshire bee (Jan 28, 2007)

I think you can have a hobby and still sell your product. Some hope to just sell a little honey to pay for the bees and equipment. I guess I use the term "little" a little loosely(okay, maybe a lot of honey, no wait,make that tons of honey.....just to pay for what you bought Last year) If I had only stuck to 2 hives, I'd be in the black this year, but bee keeping is kid of like a pyramid scheme. Get two hives, they do well, order a package just in case one doesn't makes it through the winter. They both do. Buy more equipment. They thrive and would benefit by doing a couple of splits...more equipment. It like that friendship bread starter, just seems to keep growing but ya gotta love it. It's worth it everytime you taste a spoonful of honey, or see the bees buzzing around in your garden.


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## kc in wv (Feb 1, 2006)

*There are worst ways to send money up in smoke*

Interesting to find this thread since I just read James Tew's article in Bee Culture suggesting that we remove hobby from beekeeping. He suggested you don't have a hobby to make money. He also said that using Ohio beekeeping figures, each hive contributes between $1200 and $2400 towards the production of commercial fruits and vegetables. Interesting article.

As for my hobby I think the only way to be in the black is to sell all of my hives for maybe $1500 each and not buy any more bee's or equipment.

Any takers out there.


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## indypartridge (Nov 18, 2004)

Dee Bee said:


> I've got four hives and all the equipment to keep them going and to process the honey. I figure I'm out about $2k over the last three years. Breaking it down that's $55 per month for my hobby.


A lot of people spend that per month (often more) just to watch TV. Beekeeping is more fun. I haven't sold any honey, and I figure the honey I give as gifts has cost me roughly $75 per pound. I'm in my 3rd year, and am hoping that amount comes down in the future. If not, that's okay too, I'm enjoying my hobby.


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## D Coates (Jan 6, 2006)

When your time is taken into account you'll probably never be in the black. As soon as I came to that realization I relaxed and reminded myself it's a hobby. Like golf, fishing, gardening, hunting, and other hobbys you'll never be in the black. The hobby of Beekeeping allows you to at least make some of the money back as well as continue to enjoy the hobby and all that it offers.


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## Ruben (Feb 11, 2006)

This is my second year of beekeeping and I have had as many as 17 hives, I currently have 12 hives and have invested a total of arounf $3200.00 since I started (not counting my time) If I would have sold all the honey I have gotten instead of giving a lot away and adding in the $$ I have made from a home extraction or two I would have totally paid for my investments.


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## Barry Digman (May 21, 2003)

Commercial beekeepers are paid for their work.

Sideliners and hobbiests work for nothing.

*Real* beekeepers pay for the privilege.




(That's my story and I'm stickin' with it)


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## mike haney (Feb 9, 2007)

to those (several) beeks that started in the last 3 years in this area, you are doing well to keep the hives alive, much less any surplus. the weather in this area could hardly get any worse for beeks!


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## Chef Isaac (Jul 26, 2004)

I need to keep better track of what I have spent and what I actually have to spend. Seems like beekeepers spend more than what the have... ok ok.. at least I do. 

And thank you Tim for being pataient with me!!! lol


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## Swobee (May 18, 2007)

Bee keeping is just another type of farming. I know commercial guys who call their bee's work "pasturing". We're subject to weather, diseases, wind storms, fires, drought, flooding, etc. just like another farming operation is. There is ample risk to this habit we enjoy, but the inner rewards are difficult to describe. When the harvest comes in, it reminds me of a kid on the farm and how everyone was so excited during crop harvest times. 

A few years ago, a lawyer asked me why I was a volunteer firefighter. He wondered shy I had taken and passed quite a number of national certification exams and testing just 'because' and past 40 years old, firefighting is really a young person's game. I told him as to why? I really couldn't explain it and if I could, he really wouldn't understand it. That's how I see this thing we do sometimes, but honestly we are in it for a profit and watch our expenditures carefully.


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## Hill's Hivery (Jan 7, 2005)

Swobee said:


> A few years ago, a lawyer asked me why I was a volunteer firefighter. He wondered shy I had taken and passed quite a number of national certification exams and testing just 'because' and past 40 years old, firefighting is really a young person's game. I told him as to why? I really couldn't explain it and if I could, he really wouldn't understand it. That's how I see this thing we do sometimes, but honestly we are in it for a profit and watch our expenditures carefully.


Here, Here! I don't think that one can EVER properly explain what/why we do what we do where the general public could understand it. (Firefighting that is.) Nice to see another brother in the "hobby"! Be Safe!!!

I too think the same goes for beekeeping, generally. I have had several people find out that I keep bees and ask,"Why? Do you ever get stung?"


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## bourdeaubee (Dec 23, 2005)

just broke even this year. (5th year).had to sell two hives to do it though.Now Im buying 6 hives next year.


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## spunky (Nov 14, 2006)

*bees*

Well this is my first year, and if I had known it was going to be this much of a pain in my ass, and my wallet, I sure wouldnt have done it. I am sticking to my budget in 08' , and replacing only one hive with some bees if I experience a loss. 




I enjoy the bees, but not as much as I enjoy my dogs, and my garden.


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## RonS (Dec 28, 2004)

*For Fun Only*

I am in the same position as most hobbyists;I am deep in the hole. I have the equipment and bees, but no honey(because of location). I look at my hobby like I do my garden. All year I spend money and labor trying to prepare the foundation for a harvest. From my garden, I harvest tomatoes that cost me about $10 a pound. From my bees, if I had a harvest, the honey would cost me about $50 a pound. As you can see, I would not do this based on economy. I do it because I like digging in the dirt and observing the bees. I would never counsel someone to get in the hobby if their goal was to turn a profit. If, however, their goal was to attain personal satisfaction and they could afford it, then it is fun.


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## Swobee (May 18, 2007)

Ever figure the cost of fishing or hunting in a per pound yield? You could never justify buying a lure, bullet or even a license, yet millions of folks enjoy those outdoor sports each year. One should never confuse a hobby with profits, although you may make a couple of $$ to help offset some minor expenses. Try to team up with other local bee keepers and trade some or your good help for using equipment if they'll go for that. They might like harvest help and let you use their extractor, knives, etc. in exchange. No money trades hands and you get to learn how they operate. 

An uncle told me when I got a compound bow a couple of years ago that in no time I'd have $1,000 in a good bow and archery accessories. I proved him wrong, so far... but it's sure tempting to try out a high quality model whenever I'm in Cabela's.


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## carbide (Nov 21, 2004)

Since I started reading this thread I have come to the conclusion that my experience in beekeeping has been quite different from most of the other beekeepers on the forum. I started out with two hives and the minimal amount of equipment to get by with. I believe I paid $300 for the hives and a veil and smoker and a couple of supers. The first year I harvested a small amount of honey that we used for ourselves and still had a little that we could sell. I used a friends extractor and knife so that I didn't have to buy either the first year I was into bees.

By the time I was into my second year I was gathering swarms and doing cut outs in the local area. Any money I obtained by selling honey or doing cut outs I placed into a coffee can and designated it as honey money, not to be used except for bee related purchases. If I used money out of my own pocket for bee purchases I would put an IOU in the honey money can stating that the bees owed me that amount of money. The swarms I gathered I charged gas money for and maybe a little more. To do cut outs I charged a reasonable fee depending on the amount of difficulty invloved. I built my own boxes, bottom boards, inner covers and hive tops with material purchases coming out of the honey money. I bought a used heated knife and extractor off of eBay. The extractor was a used 4 frame reversible tangential. When I got it home I removed the baskets and reversing mechanism and retrofitted it so that it would hold 20 frames in a radial pattern. 

Since this is a hobby for me I have not expanded any quicker than the bees could pay for. My honey bottles, medications, pollen traps, wax melter and anything else I need have all been paid for from the honey money. Also since it is a hobby I haven't yet charged the bees for my own labor. I'm not getting rich, but at least I'm not getting any poorer due to my hobby.


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## Fuzzy (Aug 4, 2005)

It did not take as long as I thought it might to break even / get ahead.
Over all investment was aprox $2k including a motorized extractor.
I have had up to 5 hives which produce 100-120lbs per year.
I get $5 per pound for the filtered honey.

So it was not hard at all.

Fuzzy


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## spunky (Nov 14, 2006)

RonS said:


> I am in the same position as most hobbyists;I am deep in the hole. I have the equipment and bees, but no honey(because of location). I look at my hobby like I do my garden. All year I spend money and labor trying to prepare the foundation for a harvest. From my garden, I harvest tomatoes that cost me about $10 a pound. From my bees, if I had a harvest, the honey would cost me about $50 a pound. As you can see, I would not do this based on economy. I do it because I like digging in the dirt and observing the bees. I would never counsel someone to get in the hobby if their goal was to turn a profit. If, however, their goal was to attain personal satisfaction and they could afford it, then it is fun.




Got ya beat Ron, my honey is only 40$ a pound this year. Wow, I get a ton of produce out of my garden for pennies.


Bees to me arent like other hobbies, they are more like livestock, farming. When my chickens used to quit laying I ate them. Only had to worry about the hawks and coyotes, and plus they ate ticks and grasshoppers to


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## delber (Dec 26, 2010)

Thought I might resurrect a old thread. . . You all I have a question in line with this. If you have profit a given year and your expenses were from 1-3 years ago, do you claim that as income this year? I am still slightly in the whole but made great strides this year to get out. I'm only about 2-300 in debt to myself in my "hobby". I could have sold a hive or 2 to make this easily, but the hives are worth more to me than the 2-300. How do you all do it in this regard? Do you claim in as income or do you let it go? Or do you claim it as income and bring expenses up to match that?


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## Andrew Dewey (Aug 23, 2005)

In some ways it is simpler than your question - hobby income (not profit/loss) is listed as miscellaneous income on your federal tax return. If you take the standard deduction that's all there is to it. If you itemize your deductions you can include your hobby expenses up to the amount of your hobby income - in other words you can't force a loss, but you can effectively make it so you have no hobby income.

Bee business taxes are more complicated and you will start dealing with things like depreciation - what form you file depends in part on how your business is organized. If you haven't done bee business taxes yourself talk with someone who has - a good, checked out CPA or tax pro will be worth their weight in honey (ok, gold!)


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## Rader Sidetrack (Nov 30, 2011)

If you are reporting honey sales or other bee related income on a federal return, make sure you are also complying with _state _sales tax law/payments/reporting. State tax departments can access your federal return info, and expect their piece of the pie!

In some states, sales of farm products _may _be exempt from sales tax, but check that out before you find yourself in a deep hole.


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## David LaFerney (Jan 14, 2009)

Once you stop buying equipment you should be able to operate in the black from then on if you are careful.

I broke even on the whole thing (not counting time) on my first honey crop in year three. But I've never yet owned a piece of store-bought wooden ware other than frames - and I built the *first *several hundred of those from scratch - everything else cobbled up out of free scraps or cheap sheet goods. Also I started with one package of bees and never bought any more until I was up to about 20 hives - some of the inbred buggers were getting kind of mean at that point and I purchased some queens for genetic diversity. Never used any commercial treatments until this year - season 5. Frames and sugar have been my main expenses so far, and I shouldn't need any more frames for several years.

If you want to make a little money you can, if it isn't a goal then you probably won't. But as long as you keep increasing your hive count significantly you will have investment expenses that might make it hard.

If I wasn't making any money I would cut back from 25 to a few hives to play with. I know to a commercial beekeeper 25 sounds like a plaything, but it's really fairly time consuming for me.


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## delber (Dec 26, 2010)

Thanks for all of your thoughts and advice!!! This summer I'm looking at 3 jobs that I did get paid for and I got the bees as well. So this is the main concern right now. It's not much, but there is something to it. Perhaps I can file on the federal return "payment of an IOU" or something like that stating that the income this year was recooping expenses from the last 2 years? Is this possible to bring your expenses up? I did start this "hobby" as a way of gaining a little income and haven't bought things this year just to get back to even, then next year we'll go from there.


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## Andrew Dewey (Aug 23, 2005)

@delber - Unless you can prove that what you are running is a business and that you are operating on an accrual basis rather than a cash basis - there is no way to recoup your expenses. If you were operating on an accrual basis the IRS would wonder why you didn't report the amount of the IOUs each year as income - IOUs are as far as the tax code goes accounts receivable.

As a hobby none of your prior year expenses are going to help you - unless you bought an extractor or something that would be depreciated and it is beneficial for you to itemize.


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## Robbin (May 26, 2013)

Joseph Clemens said:


> I could easily say that the "red ink" easily out-does any "black ink", by a margin of 1000 to 1.



I'm a first year BEEK and I'd guess the 1000 to 1 ratio is about right.


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## Cascade Hunter (Sep 22, 2013)

Its only a hobby if you call it a hobby. With a little paperwork and some good record keeping, you have a legitimate Schedule C business expense/income.


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## WWW (Feb 6, 2011)

This is the start of the 5th year for me in this hobby, with all that has gone into building up my 6 production hives, buying extracting equipment and the bad year we have just gone through I ended up with 1 gallon of honey this fall for personal use. I suppose that if I added up what this hobby has cost me my honey would be about $10.00 a spoonful. Nirvana is a long way off......There is always next year.


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## Ddawg (Feb 17, 2012)

I'm in year 2, I have 4 Hives and 2 nucs. I went ahead and bought a decent manual Maxant extractor my first year. I consider myself a hobbyist and my kids and I have fun packaging and selling what honey we extract. It's a great tool to teach them a little about business. I'll be in the red for a few years, but based on my honey sales this year from the two hives I harvested from I should be able to recoup my investment and maybe make some pretty good money. But I'm not in it solely for the money.


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## Glen H (Aug 17, 2013)

For me once a hobby involve selling stuff for trying to make money, it might as well be a JOB.
I go to work to make money and do hobbies for fun. it's one or the other. 
J.O.B. = Just over broke.

Glen


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## beedeetee (Nov 27, 2004)

Glen H said:


> I go to work to make money and do hobbies for fun. it's one or the other.


It doesn't have to be. It's been a hobby of mine for many years and I net a few thousand a year. The difference is that if I don't want to sell bees or honey I don't have to. If my crop was to fail, it wouldn't make any real difference in how I live (I have a real job). So there is no pressure to make money. It can still be a hobby.


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## David LaFerney (Jan 14, 2009)

Making a little bit of spending money doesn't detract from the enjoyment all that much.


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## Glen H (Aug 17, 2013)

beedeetee said:


> It doesn't have to be. It's been a hobby of mine for many years and I net a few thousand a year. The difference is that if I don't want to sell bees or honey I don't have to. If my crop was to fail, it wouldn't make any real difference in how I live (I have a real job). So there is no pressure to make money. It can still be a hobby.


I can appreciate you view point, but for me in the past when I have taken a hobby and turned it into something that makes money, it just becomes work. For me a hobby is something personal, intimate and for me.
IE: I like wood working and enjoy playing guitar. I'm left handed and finding various types of left handed guitars can be difficult and more expensive then right handed guitars. So I started building my own. I made about 7 of them for myself along with a bass. People started to want me to make them guitars too, once they saw my hand crafted figured maple and walnut custom guitars. So I started making them and selling them. it started to become a JOB, people wanted this, people wanted that, had to make up more temples buy different types of hardware... I just wanted an outlet that worked on my time schedule and when I felt like working on it, not on someone else's time schedule and when they wanted it. have you ever tried collecting money from a musician? 
Needless to say once a hobby turns into a JOB I no longer do it. This is just my experience and out look on Hobbies and work, for me they need to be kept separate. If other enjoy making money with there hobbies that is good and I think that is great. Some people enjoy selling stuff, I don't. Something to be envied maybe, people who make money at their hobbies that is?

When I retire I hope to make money from bees, It will be a part time job and no longer a hobby. But that's ok I still have lots of other fun hobbies.

Glen


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## marshmasterpat (Jun 26, 2013)

Apuuli said:


> I certainly didn't start bees for the financial gain but for the pure pleasure of getting stung, however that doesn't mean I can't sell my honey.


LOL - Yea can see a book series on bee hobbiests, "The Sting of Honey" about a bunch of men that get S&M kicks from having bee stings inflicted on them. But not likely a best seller.


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## Glen H (Aug 17, 2013)

marshmasterpat said:


> LOL - Yea can see a book series on bee hobbiests, "The Sting of Honey" about a bunch of men that get S&M kicks from having bee stings inflicted on them. But not likely a best seller.


OH MY that paints a nasty visual image.inch:

Glen


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