Courses / Build Your Business

Course Content

Do Some Math
Sketch a Financial Model Farm Size and Design
Calculate the Revenue Potential of Your Farm
How Much Kelp Can You Grow? How Much Money Can You Charge? Have a Whole Leaf Strategy Putting It All Together
Expenses Profit
Make It Legal
Choose a Business Structure Register Your Business Name Get Tax ID Numbers Get Business Insurance
Resources & Tools
The Ocean Farm Design Tool
Lesson 2 Calculate the Revenue Potential of Your Farm

Back to: Build Your Business

Expenses

As the saying goes, “It costs money to make money.” In order for your farm to be financially sustainable, you’ll need to be clear-eyed about all of the expenses associated with setting up and running it. 

In the early stages of planning your farm, you don’t need to know the exact cost of every single expense. The goal is simply to familiarize yourself with all the potential costs and develop realistic estimates to use for planning. When in doubt, it’s better to overestimate than to underestimate your expenses; you’ll want to have a cash buffer in case of unforeseen costs. 

Every time you commute to your farm, record your fuel as a trip expense.

In our example financial model, we’ve included the following categories of expenses:

Expenses

Farming and Production

  • Gear, seed string, packaging, fuel

Payroll and Benefits

  • For farm owners and hourly harvesting labor

General and Administrative

  • Lease and permit fees, insurance, marina fees, software

Contingency

  • A percentage designated for any unplanned costs

While these categories are by no means exhaustive, they will start to give you a sense of what your costs are and how they change as your business grows. Based on our estimates, our total costs for our farm’s second year of operation will be approximately $20,066.