Free tool for processors
Processing price calculator
Enter the weight and your rates to work out a customer's processing bill and roughly how much meat they'll take home. Nothing is saved or sent anywhere.
How the bill is worked out
- If you entered a live weight, it's converted to hanging weight with the dressing percentage.
- The share takes its part of the hanging weight: half, or a quarter.
- Cut and wrap is that weight times your rate per pound.
- The slaughter fee is divided by the share.
- Other fees and add-ons are added as entered.
For laying out your rates, flat or itemized, and deposits, read how to price custom processing. For splits, see splitting a beef between customers.
Let every order do this for you
Cut Sheet Helper puts your rates on your cut sheet. Enter the hanging weight once and every order, half and quarter re-prices, with the deposit taken off and the bill ready to send.
Common questions
- How do you calculate the cost of processing a beef?
- Multiply the hanging weight by the cut and wrap rate per pound, then add the slaughter fee and any other per-animal fees, plus add-ons like patties or vacuum sealing. A 700 lb carcass at $1.10/lb with a $100 slaughter fee is $870.
- How much meat do you get from hanging weight?
- Take-home weight is usually about 60 to 65 percent of hanging weight for beef and about 70 to 75 percent for pork. Bone-in cuts keep more weight; boneless cuts and lean trim lose more.
- How do you convert live weight to hanging weight?
- Multiply live weight by the dressing percentage. Beef typically dresses around 60 to 64 percent and hogs around 70 to 74 percent, so a 1,150 lb steer hangs at roughly 710 lb.
- How is a half or quarter beef priced?
- Most shops price a half on half the hanging weight and divide per-animal fees by share. Some charge a half or quarter a little more than its share of the flat fees.