/biz/ - Business & Finance

>>22030
It depends where you live.

I went on the internet and found an industry report that listed the economics and production values for my country:
http://www.honeybee.com.au/Library/gibsmuir.html
You'd need to find one for your country/area/ continent.

from this I was able to produce pic related, a table of possible earnings per hive kept.

It's a viable hobby for some pocket change.
Wether it's a viable business depends on your country.
I am planning to sell the product to friends and family as well as at markets. I am considering selling to health-freak mummies that buy in co-operatives.

If you are doing it as a backyard thing, you'll just be making honey and wax.

This next bit will focus on business, so ignore it except for interest's sake.
If you have enough capital well you could do it as an occupation/business - but consider that what you produce varies on country.
Here in Australia it's mostly honey as a primary product and wax as a by-product, but there are also pollen, royal jelly, propolis and pollination sectors.

For instance the USA has a large pollination sector- not enough other insects to pollinate their plants.
Russia (and IIRC, Europe) has propolis production.
Emerging markets are royal jelly products, especially for the Chinese market, and pollen is increasingly looked upon by the health freak nutters.

Mead remains an interesting thing, especially with the rise of geek-chic in terms of things like Game of Thrones becoming mainstream- potentially a good market.