Profit prediction in cow/calf operations: Part 1, CowCost software program

Management and marketing are key components of success and profitability of any beef cow/calf operation. There are many factors involved In management of a cow/calf operation and in marketing its products. These factors inter act in a complex manner making any attempt to separate their effects, when predicting profitability as a function of management and marketing decision s, difficult and impractical. Therefore, we developed a simple computer pro gram (CowCost, runs under Windows95 or Windows98) to enable producers to ev aluate various management practices and their potential impacts on profitab ility. The program links the management and marketing variables commonly fo und in a cow/calf operation in an interactive way. This results in an immed iate response to any changes in the Input data and, therefore, provides the users with the ability to test many "what if" scenarios and their subseque nt effects on profitability. In turn, producers can check many different sc enarios, prices, costs, and how they will affect the value of a cow, It is both a program to evaluate management ideas and profit potential of chosen scenarios, The program considers money borrowed to buy a cow, duration of t he loan, cost of the cow salvage value of the cow, yearly cow cost calf wea ning weight calf price per pound and other variables to evaluate profit pot ential. Varying any one of these gives insight to management practices that could be emphasized to increase profit. The program allows investigation o f the effects of costs relative to other inputs in decisions about purchasi ng cows.