First of all, we need to stop using the term, “Pounds Per Light.”

Bragging about “Pounds per Light” is what we primates call, “Chest Slapping.”

It was basically a bragging term that growers used to compare their skill against each other, but it has nothing to do with any form of real measurement because it leaves out all the details.

In the old days somebody might say, “I got 3 lbs per light!” but that doesn’t actually mean anything, mostly because it has no expense component.

For example: everybody knows that in general, the longer you veg a plant, the bigger it gets, and the more flower it can potentially make. So… if you grew a veg plant under the same light for a year, you might get “10 lbs a light”, but would that make you a great grower?  No!  It would actually put you out of business.

And saying you got “3 a light” becomes even more meaningless if you think that someone could have hired 20 people to work only on growing the plants under that one light!  That would also put you out of business.

Was it a 300 watt light, or a 3000 watt light?

Was it 3 pounds of AA grade bud, or 1 pound of AA an 2 pounds of littles and trim leaves?

Obviously a system is meaningless if it only accounts for one variable and in this case, any decent business manager has to consider other variables like over staffing, overpaying for nutrients, or not paying for things like accounting, good managers etc… all those problems can run you into the ground…. but hey if you still got “3 a light” you’re an amazing grower…. right?

 

So How should we measure production?

Commercial farm managers need some way to measure the cost of growing a gram of flower and the beginning of that calculation starts with a measurement system that helps you choose your strains.

 

I believe cannabis farming success can be attributed to three factors, in roughly this order…

“40% business, 40% Grower Skill, and 20% Genetics”

 

These three factors are obviously changeable and they should be changed regularly as you experiment to find what works and what doesn’t. The question is, how do you track the effects of your changes from one crop cycle to the next, or from one year to the next? 

Do you have a business tracking system?

If you ever hope to maximize your business, you have to develop a system that allows you to measure how each decision changes your bottom line. Without any sort of measurement, you have no way to tell if you’re getting better or worse.

You have to develop a method to track your business decisions so you can see how each decision affects your bottom line from a purely financial perspective.

For example, measuring a plant strain has to take into account obvious things like the finished flower weight, the test results, and also the time it took to get those results. We all know some strains that take more time, but do you know exactly how much it costs to run that 12 week Sativa strain you love to smoke? Does that plant produce so much more flower than it’s Indica sisters that it makes sense financially, or does it produce the same as an 8 week Indica which means you lose money if you choose to run it?

• How much does it cost to veg a strain an extra week before you flip the lights?
• How does your canopy height compare to running a shorter canopy that gets more crops per year?
• How do you know which cultivars make the most money in your growing style?
• How does your growing style compare to other growing styles?
• How do you know if it’s more profitable to run your own propagation department, or purchase clones?
• How do you know if your marketing decisions are working?

Do you know how much every decision you make costs?

You should, and in order to be successful, you absolutely must!

In the old days it was so simple… “Dude, I got 3 pounds per light!” 

Today this calculation is more than just something to brag about. Now, the number has to show how much it cost you to create each gram and it reflects how good you are at growing plants, choosing the right plants, and at keeping your costs down.

Let’s face it, once you leave your garage grow and step into the big leagues, your job is no longer just about obsessing over plants. A true measurement of your skill as a grower must show not only how big the buds are, but how efficiently you manage your production staff, how good you are at sourcing quality nutrition at a low cost, how good are you at specifying all the pieces of the puzzle like lights, HVAC, automation controllers, irrigation….etc, You have to grow killer bud – AND keep the staff happy, AND keep pathogens at bay, AND work efficiently, AND keep production costs down, AND keep the sale price up!

Making all those decisions “perfectly” doesn’t just show how good you are, it’s what determines how profitable your company is.

In order to make a meaningful measurement, we have to put EVERYTHING into the equation because you can’t paint the whole picture with just one color.

I’ve seen all sorts of ideas for calculating production. One method is  “Grams/Meter” or “Grams/square foot” but those only look at the space and again, there is no time component, so did you make 5 grams/square foot per day… or was that per run, or maybe you’re talking about per year?

Then there is “Grams/Watt” which obviously takes electricity into account, but electricity alone will not grow a plant, so this system also falls far short because you’re not account for all the “side” expenses which create the true cost of producing a gram of bud.

If you want to measuring yourself as a grower, or if you need to measure one strain against other strains, you really do have to paint the full picture before you get any sort of meaningful comparison.

I’m going to propose that we adopt the term,

Cost per Gram ($/g)

Calculating $/g would go something like this…

Add up all annual business expenses to get your Annual Cost.

Then divide that by 365 to see out how much it costs to run your farm for a day. This is your Daily Cost.

Then figure out how many days it took to grow a crop from start to finish and multiply that by the cost per day, to get your Cost Per Cycle.

Then take the Cost Per Cycle and divide by total grams you got from that run, and you get your cost per gram!

Cost Per Cycle / Total Grams = Cost Per Gram

Whew!

We’re gonna need an excel spreadsheet for this one.

Let’s look at more detail…

The first step is the key component. You really do have to add up all of your business expenses… labor, sales, advertising, trimming, electricity, fertilizer, IPM, water, soil… etc but not things like the building, and other permanent equipment – although you would have to amortize those as well if you want to get really picky and accurate.

Add up all the expendable expenses you have for the year and divide that by 365 to get a Daily Cost of running your farm.

For each run, simply count the days from the time you cut the clones, to the date you refilled the flower room with the next crop. Now you have your days per Cycle.

Now you multiply the Cycle Days X Daily Cost = Cost / Cycle.

Finally, look in your records and see how many grams were produced in that plant cycle and divide the Cycle Cost / Grams = Cost per gram. 

The lower this number is, the better you, and your cultivation team, and your plant strain, are doing – and the more profit your company stands to make.

In the end, the total profit will also depend on how much your product sells for.

There are 454 grams per pound, so if you sell your pounds for $1000 each, 1000\454 =  $2.20 per gram is your GROSS income per gram.

Now look at your calculation that showed you the Cost/gram that it takes to grow it, and subtract that amount from the Gross income.  That should give you a pretty realistic picture of your profit per gram.

Price/gram – Cost to grow a gram = Gross profit per gram.

If you make a spreadsheet and occasionally plug in all the numbers, you could compare the final output in a way that showcased both your skill as a grower, and the ability of that strain to produce weight.

When you grow that strain again, you’ll have all those numbers to look at and you can manipulate things to try to beat your previous number.

Having this information gives you the tools to play with different variables and actually compare to see if you can make the numbers better?

What would you do to increase your bottom line?

• Change to a faster strain?
• Flip the lights faster?
• Buy a trim machine?
• Change to a better producing strain?
• Change your lights to LED?
• Find a cheaper fertilizer?
• Drip feed less and foliar feed more?
• Use more compost and less fertilizer?
• Stop over drying your buds?

I made a rough draft of this spreadsheet and posted it on Google Docs.

Feel free to download it and modify as you like…  Profitability Calculator

Leave a comment if you think I’ve left out anything, or if you know of a better way to calculate all this.