• aramis87@fedia.io
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    4 months ago

    conservatives bullied the company for its inclusive policies for close to three weeks

    Ooh, were they bullied for an entire three weeks, during Pride month? Poor babies!

  • Flying Squid@lemmy.world
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    4 months ago

    These queer farmers

    “Got a nice lookin’ crop o’ queer this year, Merle.”

    “Yep, plus we got 12 acres o’ weird in the back 40.”

    • boatsnhos931@lemmy.world
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      4 months ago

      Hell I put 60 dicks in the dirt last Tuesday and the got damn cum beetles eat em up already. Make me so mad, I could spit stead of swaller

  • enbyecho@lemmy.world
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    4 months ago

    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.
  • norimee@lemmy.world
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    4 months ago

    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)

      • MoonMelon@lemmy.ml
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        4 months ago

        Check your regional Craigslist, mine’s full of them. This is also why the fair exists (besides funnel cake).

        • enbyecho@lemmy.world
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          4 months ago

          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.

          • Mirshe@lemmy.world
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            4 months ago

            Uhhhh what? It sure as fuck does, in many regions of the world, and HAS for centuries. It even works that way in the US, in a lot of places - unless you happen to be in a weirdly cutthroat-capitalist area somehow.

            • enbyecho@lemmy.world
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              4 months ago

              I’ve edited my original post to explain why I say this. It boils down to this: it doesn’t make financial sense to raise chickens for sale to random people. If there is one thing you can count on, it’s that farms simply can’t afford to do things that don’t make money.

              But go ahead and try it. Call the 5 farms nearest you to ask if you can buy chickens or full grown hens (roosters don’t count!) and report back. If you are lucky there is some hobby farm that doesn’t care about making money… but that’s gonna be the exception.

              • aodhsishaj@lemmy.world
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                4 months ago

                Wtf are you talking about? We often rent out or sell our layers all the time. We contract with Miller’s for our broilers and fryers as well. I’d be happy to sell someone who calls a setup. All they have to do is build their coop as that’s out of my purview. I’m not a hobby farmer either as my contracts pay my mortgage and fund my retirement savings and the kid’s college fund.

                • enbyecho@lemmy.world
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                  4 months ago

                  Well good for you, you are either solely or primarily a chicken operation although I suspect by USDA definition you are in fact a hobby farmer - no offense here, just pointing out the economics of it matter. The original comment here asserted people could just go to any random farm, show up, and buy chick(en)s. I don’t know a single commercial operation that would do that. And the funny notions people get about ag in general are, well, mildly annoying.

              • bradorsomething@ttrpg.network
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                4 months ago

                I tend to hope they were meaning getting accidentally fertilized chicks, which happens. I bet they could get a free cat or two while they’re there.

                • enbyecho@lemmy.world
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                  4 months ago

                  I tend to hope they were meaning getting accidentally fertilized chicks, which happens. I bet they could get a free cat or two while they’re there.

                  I assume you mean fertilized eggs or… just chicks? I suppose some might give them away. I don’t know why you would though. For anyone I know, myself included, chicks mean income. You are replacing expired layers. Or you feed them to the cats.

    • bitchkat@lemmy.world
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      4 months ago

      That’s OK. I’m in the US and have never seen one. Fleet Farm is the king of that type of store in my state

  • Machinist@lemmy.world
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    4 months ago

    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.

    • enbyecho@lemmy.world
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      4 months ago

      I’m lucky that I’m near enough to the central valley in california to have real ag supply stores. They even typically have actual supplies for tractors.

      • Machinist@lemmy.world
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        4 months ago

        We just bought an old farmhouse in Pennsylvania that still has 9 acres, includes a small orchard and vineyard. My girl wants chickens and rabbits. I’m thinking a couple of steers next spring when I’ve had time to get good fencing up.

        I grew up with cattle and worked on a tater farm through highschool.

        We mostly just want to produce our own meat. Venison should be much easier.

        The apple trees need a lot of TLC as does the vineyard.

        I’ll be in the market for a small tractor. As long as it is running, I should be able to fix it up and keep it going.

        • enbyecho@lemmy.world
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          4 months ago

          Best of luck to you. We are on an old homestead and although none of the original buildings remain we did get several 100 year old apple trees. Not great producers (usually every other year is good) but tasty.

  • boatsnhos931@lemmy.world
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    4 months ago

    How many openly queer farmers and ranchers are there? Does sexual orientation have any relevancy at tractor supply? I use a co-op most of the time because tsc is overpriced on majority of stuff

    • JasonDJ@lemmy.zip
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      4 months ago

      I don’t think large-scale farmers are shopping at Tractor Supply. Outside of emergency situations.

      However, rural homesteaders suburban “backyard farms” certainly do. And there’s a lot of queer and allied gardeners and backyard farmers.

      • enbyecho@lemmy.world
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        4 months ago

        There are, also, a lot of queer farmers (raises hands emphatically). More than you might think, apparently. I have other options but I have spent a lot of money there because it was convenient - in the same area as a farmer’s market we used to sell at.

        It’s funny though how you discount small-scale farms. 89% of farms in the US are considered small-scale.

        • JasonDJ@lemmy.zip
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          4 months ago

          Not discounting small farms at all. Honestly thought anyone on more than a few acres wouldn’t shop at TSC unless they had to. But I’ll admit I don’t know a lot about that life.

          Not surprised there are vastly more small farms than large farms, but what does it look like in terms of acres?

          As bad as it sounds (in response to the “more than you might think, apparently”), it’s not as if the stereotypes have much overlap.

          • enbyecho@lemmy.world
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            4 months ago

            Not surprised there are vastly more small farms than large farms, but what does it look like in terms of acres?

            Acres don’t actually matter, especially for people who (a) have little idea what an acre is; (b) have little idea what an acre can produce. It’s not uncommon for a small farm that sells direct to consumers to net > $25k per acre while a commodity farmer might be lucky to hit $1k. And that’s the problem with the USDA numbers around “production value” in that report - I need to find a source for this but when last I dug into it, it turned out they treat everything as commodities at wholesale value and don’t use the actual retail sale value because they don’t have that data. IOW if I sell potatoes for $2/lb cash they will tend to see it as maybe $0.75 / lb. Meaning production value for direct-to-consumer is vastly under-reported.

            All this said, 45% of all agricultural land in the US is “small family farms”.

  • hogmomma@lemmy.world
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    4 months ago

    If you don’t shop there to begin with, continuing to not shop there isn’t boycotting.

  • TheReturnOfPEB@reddthat.com
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    4 months ago

    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.

    • jeffw@lemmy.worldOPM
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      4 months ago

      What local agricultural supply stores? I’m only half joking (I live close to one) but there aren’t a ton left

  • DudeImMacGyver@sh.itjust.works
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    4 months ago

    Done! I went there exactly once and never went back because their prices are fucking ridiculous. You’re welcome queer farmers.

  • LaunchesKayaks@lemmy.world
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    4 months ago

    Ah shit. The local TS is the only place that reliably stocks the duck feed I use. Other feeds don’t give my birds the exact nutrition they need, and my one bird needs the right nutrition because she’s prone to vitamin issues. -_-

    • Trainguyrom@reddthat.com
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      4 months ago

      I usually use TSC wood pellets as cat litter since they’re cheap and just break down into sawdust with use. There’s other brands I can shift to, but I’ll pay a bit of a premium for it

    • lolcatnip@reddthat.com
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      4 months ago

      Can you find it online and set up automatic deliveries? That’s how I get my cat’s hard to find food.

      • LaunchesKayaks@lemmy.world
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        4 months ago

        I had that set up with the last brand of feed I used, but the orders kept getting delayed because the product just wasn’t getting restocked. Had to switch brands because of it.

    • JasonDJ@lemmy.zip
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      4 months ago

      I have a small farm supply in my area that makes their own feed and stocks a huge variety of brands. Their house feed is cheaper than TSC and my girls love it.

      I only found out about it because I picked up a bunch of pallets to build a coop off of a guy who also raised chickens and we got to talking.

      Rural general stores may as well.

      I actually just googled “farm stores near me” and found 2 others that are still closed than either of my TSCs.

      • LaunchesKayaks@lemmy.world
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        4 months ago

        Local feed store doesn’t sell duck feed. Their “all flock” feed is what I fed my birds until the one got vitamin issues that crippled her. The other local stores closed because the TSCs moved into the area