Let me state some basic facts from the perspective of a small farmer. I see here so many odd notions about why TSC’s stance seemingly doesn’t matter much. Too many buy into the stereo type of rural = straight, white, male and that somehow small farms that might tend to shop more at TSC don’t count for much.
- 89% of all farms in the US are small family farms.
- 63.5% of young farmers in the US identify as female, nonbinary or a gender other than cis male. 24.2% identify as a sexuality other than heterosexual. Source: https://www.youngfarmers.org/resource/nationalsurveyreport2022/. Story covering that if you don’t want to signup: https://edgeeffects.net/queer-farmers/
- One in five Gen Zers identify as LGBT
- TSC’s customer demographics - you might be surprised to hear - do actually cover a lot of small-scale farms. This report says they average $43k in farm income and are about 441 acres - I acknowledge they are just taking USDA numbers here and extrapolating but this accords with my own experience as a small farmer. A few of us up here prefer to hit the more specialized ag stores in the Central Valley but the TSC is closer and so for a lot of immediate needs we buy there. I’ve even purchased tractor implements at TSC.
- The stereotype of the rural butch lesbian (hi!) is not without substance. Over 3 million LGBTQIA+ people live in rural areas of the US.
What a moment for the small local agricultural supply stores to get some pub and show their hometown roots over the nameless corporate coprolite that has overtaken an entire nation’s value system.
God fucking damnit. TSC is the closest ag supply to our new play farm. They’re high compared to Rural King or a co-op, but they’re convenient. Fuckers.
Yeah sounds about right. All Christianity can do is bully.
Never was it that easy for me to take a stand. None of my money will ever go to Tractor Supply.
(I never even heard of them before and had to google if we have them here. They are US only)
You could try a local farmer
LOL. Doesn’t especially work that way city boy.
Edit: Apparently I need to explain. I’m a farmer. Not one farm - not one single farm - I know will sell you either chicks or full grown chickens as some part of their regular operations. Mainly because it’s a pain in the ass and not profitable unless you are highly specialized and only producing chicks, in which case you are probably contracting with someone like TSC, using the cheapest feed imaginable and likely not making much money.
Now I’m not saying there aren’t exceptions to this. There are probably hobby-ish farms around that will sell you a few chicks for random reasons. And you might get lucky and some farm has an excess for some reason, but generally any farm that’s producing eggs or meat birds needs to keep those chicks. I mean, I’m not kidding, it’s a real struggle to make any money at all even with eggs at $7-8 a dozen.
But you are not, typically, just going to go down to your “local farm” (remember those?) and buy chicks. Go ahead, if you don’t believe me call around.
