03/16/2026
Great example of why purchasing halves or whole cow saves money!! Yes it is a bigger up-front investment, but when you factor in that ALL the meat is priced the same, you’re saving a bunch of money!! Think $9 per pound for EVERY cut of steak… yes, that’s where you can clearly see the savings!!
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oatescattleranch.com
We've been getting a lot of questions recently from folks asking how much a quarter or half beef costs. We recently sold a quarter beef to a customer where we lined up the local farmer to provide a beef for them. Here's how it turned out:
The price this particular customer paid was $3.88 per pound based on carcass weight (Pricing of carcasses vary based on markets, timing, breed, type of feeding, and other factors). Our whole carcasses tend to be around 1100 pounds, and this one was 1122 pounds, so 280.5 pounds for the quarter. 280.5 pounds times $3.88 equals $1,088.34, so that was their cost for a quarter of the animal.
The processing fee on quarters is $1.47 per pound and that includes everything other than "extras" such as patties, sticks, etc. $1.47 times 280.5 pounds equals a processing bill of $412.34.
So, if we add the cost of the animal to the processing fee, this customer paid a total of $1,500.68. After we trimmed out the carcass, the customer took home 160 pounds of meat. $1,500.68 divided by 160 pounds equals a final cost of $9.38 per pound based on the take-home weight. While that may be more expensive than you can buy ground beef at the grocery store for, $9.38 is a super low price for the dry aged steaks and roasts that this customer had their beef made into. We compared cut-by-cut what this customer paid for the animal and processing vs. what they would pay at the grocery store's discounted SALE (not full retail) price, and in this example the customer saved over $282. Even more importantly, they know they are getting super high-quality beef that's raised locally, processed locally, dry-aged, and will feed their family for months to come. The savings would have been even more dramatic on a half beef as processing is 7 cents less on a half beef. In the example of a half beef, the customer saves nearly $600 compared to buying by-the-package at the grocery store.
There are some important disclaimers here. This was a high-quality beef that yielded about average. Not all animals will yield this well, while some will yield better. This customer did not have any value-added products made. If they would have had us turn some of the beef into sticks, jerky, or similar products, their bill would have been higher. Lastly, a 1122-pound whole carcass is larger than most, but the great news is that processing costs are based on the weight of the animal, so if you get a smaller animal, your bill will be less.
It should be noted that in the example above, this customer did not save their liver, heart, tongue, or suet, so those weights were not included in their take-home weight. If you want us to save any of those items for you, we are glad to do so at no extra charge! They also didn't save any ribs, bone-in steaks, or soup bones. If they had chosen any of those, their cost per pound on the take-home weight would have been even less because their take-home weight would have been higher.
We do have a beef processing calculator on our website you can use to estimate processing costs. There is also a link to the complete price list there as well as a link to many other handy resources such as the "How Much Meat Do We Get" file and an FAQ document.
There's lots of talk about how expensive beef is right now, and while it is at record highs, buying beef the way we describe above is a GENIUS way to save big-time money while at the same time buying PREMIUM locally raised mouth-watering product.
Ready to fill your freezer yet? Give us a call at 563-928-6814 or send us a message
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