Business Planning

The educational materials listed on this page are about Business Planning.

Farm business planning helps farmers turn their dream into a profitable reality. A farm business plan is essential for sustainable and alternative agricultural business owners to be successful. For instance, creating a poultry farming business plan aids producers in setting realistic goals and determining potential markets for consumers interested in pastured poultry. A cattle farm business plan could help a rancher research the feasibility of alternative processing methods and evaluate financing options. An apple business plan can help an orchard operator improve sustainability on their farm both economically and environmentally. A goat farming business plan or pastured pig farming business plan can help the farmer plan for boosted production and identify or develop specific markets for their products. Key practices include marketing managementmarket studyfinancial managementbusiness planningrisk managementnew enterprise developmentland accesslabor/employmentvalue added.

SARE’s book Building a Sustainable Business aids producers in building a sustainable and profitable business plan for their enterprise. Organic farmers will benefit from Organic Transition: A Business Planner for Farmers, Ranchers and Food Entrepreneurs. Those seeking funding information can find help in Building Sustainable Farms, Ranches and Communities, which includes other sources of loans, grants and technical support to help their business thrive. SARE’s bulletin Marketing Strategies for Farmers and Ranchers is also useful for producers looking to expand or identify markets for their products.

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Beyond Fresh Farmers Guide to Food Processing with different featured images of food and processing under the title

Beyond Fresh: a Food Processing Guide for Texas Farmers

A decision-making guide to planning, creating and marketing value-added food products made from sustainably-grown fruits and vegetables, written from a "farmer-first" perspective. As farmers face competition from meal-in-a-box companies, this guide aims to help farmers prosper in their own food distribution. This Food Processing Guide for Texas Farmers begins with decision-making and walks step by […]

rfdtv logo with windmill and red letters

America's Heartland "Leaders in Sustainable Agriculture" Now Available on YouTube

SARE recently partnered with PBS KVIE to produce an episode of RFD-TV's America's Heartland featuring four farmers describing their commitment to sustainability, how they plan to overcome modern farming challenges, and how SARE has impacted their farming and ranching practices.  The full 24-minute episode titled Leaders in Sustainable Agriculture is now available at https://www.sare.org/resources/leaders-in-sustainable-agriculture/. Watch: Videos featuring each […]

Cover of Scaling Up print publication, featuring an image of a man and a woman and another image of a woman walking through a field of radishes.

Scaling Up Your Vegetable Farm for Wholesale Markets

For direct market farmers, expanding your operation to capture local and regional wholesale markets can represent an opportunity. But such a shift brings with it many changes to how you run your farm because the expectations that wholesale buyers have is much different than your direct market customers. Scaling Up Your Vegetable Farm for Wholesale […]

Cover of Farmers' Guild to Business Structures in blue and brown text lined with phots of farmers at the top

Farmers' Guide to Business Structures

Farmers’ Guide to Business Structures describes the fundamentals of sole proprietorships, general partnerships, limited liability companies and C, S and B corporations in straightforward language, to help you choose the best entity for your operation. Selecting the right business entity for your farm is like building the foundation of a house.

Technical bulletin page

How to Conduct Research on Your Farm or Ranch

This 32-page bulletin outlines how to conduct research at the farm level, offering practical tips for both crop and livestock producers, as well as a comprehensive list of more in-depth resources.

Cover image of the Organic Transition Planner

Organic Transition

The profit potential of transitioning to organic production—along with other rewards—has farmers, ranchers and food business owners across the country considering the switch. But successfully managing your business through the multi-year transition process requires careful planning. Use Organic Transition: A Business Planner for Farmers, Ranchers and Food Entrepreneurs to develop an actionable business transition plan that is suitable for yourself, your management team or a lender.

Dan West next to a solar collector

From Fruit to Fuel

As tree fruit growers know well, annual harvests do not remove all the fruit from the orchard. A great deal is left behind littering the orchard floor. While pondering his fruit waste problem, Dan West of Macon, Mo., who grows apples, peaches, apricots, nectarines, plums and pears, hit upon a novel approach: Why not turn […]

USB thumb drive

The Small Ruminant Toolbox

This Small Ruminant Toolbox is a large collection of publications, presentations and other resources that will be helpful to small ruminant producers and educators.

A man smiling in front of a copy of 'Tilling the Soil of Opportunity' with a pen in hand.

Rural Revitalization through Farm-Based Enterprise

The 10 U.S. counties with the greatest population losses between 2000 and 2003 are located in the western United States, and small towns are scrambling to save what is left of their communities. Like many other parts of the nation, western farmers are discovering that sustainably raised livestock and crops can help revitalize economies. And […]

ASD director Anthony Flaccavento drives a tractor during a farm tour

Helping Appalachian Farmers Tap New Markets

Gary and Cindy Laws’ journey to successful organic farming started in the tobacco fields of western Virginia’s hill country. Both raised on tobacco farms, they saw the crop’s pitfalls firsthand: a declining market, health risks associated with smoking and, most importantly to the Laws, the myriad chemicals used in tobacco production. But, like hundreds of […]

the Hayes family

Agritourism Training Materials

This curriculum was designed to provide detailed training resources for agricultural professionals and farmers interested in expanding their income sources and entering the agritourism industry.