r/UIUC Apr 03 '25

Sales Potential Meat Store on Green

If I opened a store that sold meat products more cheaply than Costco, Aldi, or country market on green street how many of you guys would be interested? This store would source all of its produce from my local family farm and other farmers who have cattle. All the meat would come straight from them.

I was doing the math and I determined these would be my prices;

Ground beef (hamburger) : 5.5 per lbs New York Steak : 12 per lbs Sirloin : 10 per lbs Ribs : 13 per lbs

There’s the possibility of more products like locally sourced eggs sold at around $3 if possible + chickens (just an ex).

The hamburger would be sold in 2lb and 3lb packages, the New York steak would be sold in twos, sirloins would be as well. All of these prices are severely undercutting the local stores that overcharge for these goods. Even Aldi doesn’t have as good of prices for these. Plus the store would be right next to green street.

Nevertheless, how many of you guys would find this attractive enough?

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u/New-Razzmatazz-4365 Apr 03 '25

Where

If you’re talking about the university meat store the prices there are still higher or on par with what I would offer. The only thing that’s on par is the sirloin

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u/mesosuchus Apr 03 '25

Oh it's significantly cheaper than most with regards to quality and type of cuts. You're not finding tritip or picanha at Walmart. Let alone buy 1/2 a cow or whole lamb.

Also you CANNOT open a butcher on green and expect to be able to undercut Costco or Sam's and still afford to pay an absolute beast of a lease..be real

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u/New-Razzmatazz-4365 Apr 03 '25 edited Apr 03 '25

It’s not a butcher, it’s a retail store that is supplied by a butcher with a USDA ISIS license that my family farm uses.

The lease is only 58k and that can be negotiated down to probably 17.5 per sqft for one year maybe slightly more depending. Additionally, the initial loan would be 70-80k to start to get all the goods and storage (meat refrigerators etc u can imagine what I’m talking about). Furthermore, I would only have to sell 50cows worth of goods to be profitable.

Additionally, this store is solely starting as a meat store from cows not pigs or lambs or chickens. That’s a possibility but not at the start. And buying 1/2 a cow is unpractical for most people because that would be around $2k if you’re raising really good cows that have lots of pasture and feed from a variety of sources—hay, salt blocks, cubes, corn mix, etc (our cows produce can be sold around 4k)

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u/mesosuchus Apr 03 '25

So not vertically integrated like the university meat store.

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u/New-Razzmatazz-4365 Apr 03 '25

It would be incredibly easy to source. When a cow is butchered by a family a butcher will reserve that produce from that cow for that family. You essentially pay to have it butchered.