Northeast Beef Register

About the register

A record, not a ranking of farms.

The Local Beef Index is a neutral publication of what farms say about their cattle, feed programmes, places, and prices. Farms are the subject. Verification is the work.

Purpose

Why publish this

The register contains 312 records. 118 have enough sourced price or product detail for a profile; 30 support a comparable bulk figure. The rest remain visible without being made to say more than the evidence allows.

This register keeps the useful context together: breed, feed programme, geography, a verbatim source quote where available, and a normalized price with an explicit confidence level. It does not sell beef, take commissions, or declare one farm better than another.

Methodology

How prices are made comparable

  1. Find the farm’s own source.We verify against a farm page, store listing, or price sheet and preserve the source URL and, when recorded, the date checked.
  2. Identify the basis.Bulk beef can be quoted by hanging weight, packaged weight, share total, or deposit. Those are not interchangeable.
  3. Normalize only when supported.The index uses the all-in half-share cost per pound of hanging weight. Share-size and processing adjustments are recorded on the farm page.
  4. Refuse false precision.If the source does not support a responsible conversion, the comparable price stays empty and the reason is published.
  5. Keep retail cuts separate.Individual cut prices are transcribed into their own ledger. They do not determine the bulk index.

Hanging weight is not take-home weight.

It is the carcass weight before cutting, trimming, and packaging. The amount placed in a customer’s freezer will be lower and varies with the animal and cut instructions.

When processing is explicitly separate but the farm gives no amount, the pipeline may add its documented regional midpoint of $1.175 per hanging pound and lower the confidence. Whole- and quarter-share adjustments are likewise disclosed on the record; no packaged- or live-weight rate is silently converted.

Refusals

What does not enter the comparison

We refuse a per-pound figure when the source does not name the weight basis, when the number is a deposit or one part of the bill, when a flat package total lacks a stated hanging weight, or when processing cannot be included responsibly. Packaged-weight and live-weight quotes remain on the source record but stay out of the hanging-weight index.

197 records publish neither a bulk rate nor an individual cut price. 9 publish a package total rather than a per-pound share rate. Empty comparable fields are deliberate findings, not unfinished arithmetic.

Maintenance

Quarterly price checks, open corrections

Comparable price sources are re-checked quarterly. Verification dates stay attached to records so a reader can see when the source was last reviewed. Link checks can identify a dead or changed page, but they do not decide that a farm has stopped operating.

A farm can correct its name, location, feed wording, breed, price basis, processing charge, source link, or business context through the listing update form. Submissions are reviewed against a source before the register changes.

The current universe contains 312 records. We publish corrections into that same sourced record rather than replacing evidence with an untraceable edit.

Confidence

What the labels mean

High confidence
The source clearly supports the normalized figure and whether processing is included.
Medium confidence
The published price is usable but needs a limited, disclosed interpretation or adjustment.
Low confidence
The figure needs more assumptions, comes from a less direct price presentation, or has an important unresolved caveat.
No comparable price
No responsible half-share hanging-weight figure can be produced from the published source.

Confidence measures the evidence behind a price record. It is not a judgement about meat, farming practice, service, or value.

Geography & limits

What the register does not claim

All locations are town- or county-level and are not independently verified. County-level locations are explicitly marked approximate. The register does not claim inventory is available, certify production practices, or replace a conversation with the farm.

Prices can change after the verification date. A visible old-year marker is added when a source carries an older year. Before ordering, confirm price, processing, pickup, deposit, and expected packaged yield directly with the farm.

Represent a farm, or know a record needs context? Send an update for review.