Is Breeding Still a lucrative trade?

Breeder's Lab
21

I think if a breeder can do the near impossible and maintain a following they can do well.

I think its kinda analogous to the modern music scene. Because it got so decentralized and anyone can upload music to whatever website, app or streamer, its hard to make a dent. The people who existed before or at that point of transition are still big amd known, but the ones who came after have a much harder time. Even the top charted artists are niche and lack the recognition that a mid tier artist previously had.

People can still make it and become popular, but when you are uploading your song against the other 100 thousand daily song uploads, youll need more than a good song to become known

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22

He’s pushing a metal halide lighting line, like what? I used them 20 years ago…… Lol, he probably going to lose a little on that i would assume. Did he buy up all the old bulbs from all these HID companies going belly up? This is just straight weird flex but ok

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23

That’s a good analogy. You need a way to stand out.

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24

Not even cmh?

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25

You can have the best product in the world but if you can’t sell it what’s it really worth? It’s all about marketing. I’ve been pollen chucking or breeding for the last 6 or 7 years and can say a lot more has gone into it than I’ve gotten back but then again I don’t do it for the money although would be nice to pay off one day lol.

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26

I would say it comes down to what ur offering, if it’s rare or never seen before like in the case of the freakshow for Humboldt u could have a decent chance.

On the other hand the market is over saturated with breeders and the competition is fierce, I wish u the best of luck man!

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27

I can’t recall, but he had a cost breakdown… space, electricity, workers. It wasn’t just a single dude growing a handful of plants like MM seems to be, it was a full-on hunt of hundreds of clones and testing for stability. Might have even been a certain “Madman”, but I can’t remember

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28

Nope, straight MH. Swears buy it. I used to flower under MH, a looooooong time ago.

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29

Unfortunately, sounds like he over extended…

For me, this is something i do in my house, and even one tent can make thousands of packs.

I understand the need for pheno hunting but there’s such a thing as over extending yourself without the results that make it worth it

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30

Way too much risk spending that much overhead, for what?

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31

It’s like, look at beleaf and his giant pheno hunts

Congrats, you found an improved pbb cash cropper, gg4 hybridization tool that washes, and slurricane.

Nothing that anybody will phone home about in 20 years
They’re looking for the “wow” factor and fucking Goodharts law in the ass

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32

I was thinking the same when i seen that then though to myself. I spent close to that a couple years ago, wasn’t solely on breeding but rent at 3700 a month, electricity at 800 a month and that was only 2 lights, after water, nutes, equipment, etc. I definitely over extended myself think I popped 20+ packs of seeds had way to many genos/phenos to select through at that time in my life but found some really cool things, probably could have capitalized off of it if I played my cards right.

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33

What i find is most people just don’t have a good barometer of what AMAZING weed is

They know what good or great weed is

But not that stuff that makes people remember it 20 years later

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34

It’s why I talk about it constantly, learning

35

Yes I think breeding is still lucrative. It seems like the size of the retail seed market is growing larger everyday, and seeds are also purchased as collectibles so it has an additional energy behind purchasing power. With the growing retail customer base there will surely be more competition for sales. Then to consider possible plant protection and medicinal contracts, that sort of thing would be quite lucrative. It depends on a lot of factors how things will play out but seeds and more specifically unique desirable genetics will be lucrative for some time I’d imagine.

The landscape is changing for sure. A lot of great comments and perspectives here already mentioned. Cool topic I enjoy these types of conversations. Many blessings and much love

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36

LOL, that was funnier than reading the Onion… :laughing:

This guy’s so full of BS his eyes are brown…

Cheers
G

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37

It’s funny,

He was actually the one to correctly inform me hp13 wasn’t related to HP, g13, or 88g13hp

Cant say I’m into his work tho

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38

I personally love the idea that “the next MAC1” or “the next Skunk” is, for the most part, always right around the corner. And there’s certainly no shortage of new—and old----people trying.

edit* this doesn’t really answer your question “would it be lucrative to work and/or hold and sell older genetic lines” and I would say to a minor extent, yes. The reason I say “to a minor extent” there will always be some level of demand for it, but, you’re also not exploring anything, you’re not finding or discovering anything gorundbreaking or new, or, to a degree, more potent. You’re just holding a line or, in some possible ways, running that line backward as best you can to its origin. . :man_shrugging: a Historian will never be as lucrative as an Engineer, but both are important in their ways

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39

There are those who rely on selling thier work to pay thier bills because it’s what they have a passion for and have chose it as a profession. I think we should respect that and value it.

In my own case… breeding has been a compassion of mine since the mid 90’s and back then it was breeding and hunting seeds for keeper plants to put into the local cash cropper scene. I also had a full time job as a ticketted steel fabricator and in 97 was in a workplace accident that disabled me for life. Since then I have grown and practiced breeding in an effort to find or create plants that help me get thru my day and alleviete the physical and mental toll my disabilities have on my daily life. I had to take a break from growing and breeding from 2005 to 2015 but since my return I got back to my old ways pretty quick.
When I first launched my drops as a seed company it was under the OTLB Seed Collective label and ALL my work was donated to worthy causes like server funds for forums, funding the families of fallen farmers and other charity drops for causes I believed in.
Initially I dropped at the old Seedbay in support of the Gypsy Nirvana coming home fundraiser and server fees. Then I made contacts with Dragboatjeff and my relationship with Greatlakesgenetics began. All my seeds were for charity purposes and at the time I had no ambitions of being a breeder for my own “profit”.
With some personal things going on in the background with other members of the actual OTLB club I was a member of, I decided to drop the name and cease doing drops . At around the same time , quite a few friends urged me to continue breeding and that I should continue on my path. So with that encouragement, I decided to drop the OTLB name and Strawberry Hill Seed Co was born.
While it would be nice to see a reasonable income from selling seeds… I am not under any illusions and I am pleased to drop seeds that I feel strongly about and want to share with the world. The costs help me stay current with seed aquisitions that might benefit my breeding programs and perhaps offset my growing costs. Even though I am disabled and really could use a couple grand a month from seed sales… I know I will never see those numbers save by some miracle LOL
But whatever… it’s my passion and I do it because I can and some folks tell me I am good at it. It’s like any other skill a person may use to employ themselves so why shouldn’t a person with these skills and no real avenues of employment , take breeding cannabis on as a means to generate whatever income they can for themselves.
I see the current seed market as a cornicopia of flavors and effects. There is literally something for everyone. That is a good thing but a grower needs to discern quality from average and average from bunk LOL
That is why the forums are so valuable for growers and breeders alike. Guys like me put our grows on the table for all to see. People can decide on thier own which breeder is worthy of thier hard earned $$$ . This is another reason I try and price things reasonably because I know how hard folks have to work to earn 100 bucks these days , believe me LOL

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40

I think that the actual market is more saturated by erratic demands than really by all types of strains. Catalogs were more singularized 20 years ago also, with maybe 100 times less labels at least.

“More labels, less cannabis” is my POV for the actual situation. It’s a bit the mess.

For a living i don’t know, but yes anyway. When the weed is good, it always pay at one point ^^

I think that being able to make the grow space self-substainable is a good first step before thinking about cashing genetics to make profits. If you need a loan to keep afloat your R&D, you journey will not last long.

A lot of labels don’t even give a fck to put a picture on a product, when there is a description ^^ If you want to directly mount a big structure and all, ok … there is factually a brand and its constraints.

Cannabis was already a strong community-based market before the tools we have now, i think that your niche matter a lot more than the numbers of logos you owned.

I am, it’s a big part of the actual demand actually. Like everything there is abuses, but i don’t see the problem to release some “chunked variations” of a popular line you have, before your competitors made it with you own seeds lol

It happen a lot in fact, suddenly one test line make a riot a good year and you dont really understand why. You invest, you stabilize … and customers themselves are asking you some chunking to continue to smoke their favorite weed, but with a renewed “perceived freshness”.

I don’t see it binary, it’s just that customers never realize that it lock a slot in R&D this kind of stuff. It think that it’s a balance to find between the irrationnality of stoners and the pragmatism necessary to keep moving forward.

Now selling a random chunk for 3 digits … there is limits to decency maybe lol

Things don’t changed much with the numbers of players actually. A lot are falling and it’s normal.

Without talking about the 100th label making 15 cookie-chem-ogk per year, take only DJ short.

The label. An entire journey built on Blueberry, i don’t know for you but if tommorow one is asking me to handle it and make it compliant with the actual demand … i just run away faster than light.

Not bashing the efforts of the son in this sense at all, but market is also a certain sense of the tempo. Not chunking is working on the next hype after all, lol

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