Economics of Small Scale Mill Operations Production Costs

It’s incredibly important that every sawyer that is or is thinking about running a mill have an accurate understanding of how much it costs to run a board through the mill. 

The Run Through of a Solo Operation

Working solo on the slow side one could average about 50 board feet per hour. This includes all the work from maintenance on the mill blade, sharpening, milling and stickering. Assuming that you pay yourself $15 an hour for labor, that calculates to be about 30 cents per board foot.

Then assuming that you probably average about one-half of a gallon of gasoline per hour, ( If you work the mill with a helper you’ll burn about a gallon an hour.) factor in $3 per gallon for gasoline which includes lubrication costs. That calculates to be about 3 cents per board foot. 

If the blades are typically looking good for about 12 hours, three to four sharpenings, about 600 board foot per blade of mill time, six or seven actual hours of cutting before they break. Other bandsaw sawyers have said they get 400 to 800 board feet per blade.

If the blades cost about $30 per blade that calculates to be about 5 cents per board foot. 

As far as capital cost we calculated someplace around 44 cents per board foot capital cost. 

Know Your Numbers

The bottom line to a milling operation is that if the sawmill operation were a business and not just wood for woodworking furniture and hobbies, the cost would be about $1 board foot to $1.75 per board foot. 

The alternative is to purchase from a big box store or lumber wholesaler at greater than $5 per board foot by looking online.

By advertising on Craigslist or on eBay, one could sell some air-dried cherry walnut wood at approximately 10% moisture content at $2 to $3.50 per board foot.

If you want this to be a real part-time business. Get a kiln and dry the wood to approximately 6% moisture content and ask $3.50 to $4 per board foot for the same species.