Unpredictable fuel costs & the necessity of keeping warm in the winter have resulted in "boom sales" for manufacturers of wood-burning stoves. There has also been a return to the use of the fireplace as a form of supplementary heat & as a luxury that promotes the "cozy" atmosphere sought after by both middle class & affluent families. This renaissance in the popularity of wood heat & upward spiraling sales of associated equipment, has created a demand for firewood that's almost impossible to fulfill!

Important element: This demand has caused the price of firewood to almost double over the past several years. Whatever the "going price" for a cord of firewood in his area, he can expect it to increase by 20 to 30 percent each year for the next ten years or so.

His potential market is a varied as the weather; it is also somewhat dependent on the weather. He'll find buyers among apartment dwellers as well as homeowners. The rich are buying firewood perhaps more than the poor; those concerned with the purity of the environment and the so-called "voluntary-simplicity' folk seeking a return to the "pioneering" life are all part of his market.

And don't think for a minute that firewood sales are limited to the colder northern states. People living in Sunny Southern California & along the Gulf of Mexico buy & burn firewood for the same reasons as people living in Minnesota or Montana.

One of the secrets of success in this business understands why the people in his area burn firewood. Then it's a matter of learning when & how often they need it & positioning himself to fill those needs.

It doesn't take special education or training to become a successful firewood supplier. Just for the record, the backgrounds of people operating businesses of this kind range from farmers to unemployed factory workers to doctors, lawyers, real estate salesmen & even university professors.

The kind of equipment he'll need varies according to the type of business he wants to establish & the kind of wood he will be supplying.

The first prerequisite to the establishment of his business is to decide what kind of business - wholesale to retail outlets, or retail to the general public he wants to operate.

Next, he'll have to decide on the type of firewood he will sell. There are three major categories: l) mill ends or sawed up scrap lumber & kindling, 2) whole logs for the buyer to cut according to his own specifications, 3) fireplace & stove wood, cut & split according to the general requirements of his market area.

 Then he is to line up a source of supply. Actually, it's best to "lock in" a number of sources of supply. Later on, as his business develops & grows & may want to offer several different kinds of firewood, that is, become a full-service dealer offering firewood to meet everyone's needs & fancies for his area. The different categories of wood in demand, so that he can explore sources of supply & costs.

MILL ENDS: His best source of supply for this type of wood is the sawmills in his area. If he lives in a metropolitan area, take a few weekend trips to the small towns in the wooded areas of his state. With a little bit of initiative on the part, he should be able to discover any number of small sawmill operations within a 200-mile radius of most metropolitan areas in this country. What he'll want to do is buy a truckload of mill ends, take them home & package them into sacks of firewood. Thus, a load of mill ends that he might buy for $50 would be broken down into perhaps 200 sackfuls that he sells for $5 per sack. Multiply these 200 sacks of firewood times $5 each & he has a gross income of $1,000 for a load of wood costing him only $50. He wouldn't have to be very smart to realize that's pretty good, providing his sources of supply can keep up with the demand.

The beauty of mill ends is that they are clean, burn easily & fast, put out a lot of heat & when broken down into sackfuls are ideal for apartment dwellers, as well as people in warmer climates needing firewood for just a few cold spells each winter. Until he has a large full-service firewood supply operation, it's suggested that he leaves the sale of truckload supplies of mill ends to the larger, more established fire wood suppliers. My advice here is that he should stay within his capabilities of supplying the buying demands of his market & further concentrate on selling what brings him the greatest profit. However, as his operation grows, the supply of truck loads of mill end firewood is definitely worth considering.

Other sources of supply for mill end lumber will be his local lumberyards, woodworking or furniture manufacturing firms & home building or remodeling contractors. In many instances, he can offer to stop by these places about once a week & clean up the worksite by hauling away the scrap lumber & they'll let he has it without cost. It is possible to even get paid for doing this. The only drawback will be that he'll have to sort this wood & then saw it up into the sizes he wants for his bundles or sacks. This is no big deal; because he can handle a pickup or trailer load with a power saw in just a couple of hours.

When he has the wood ready to package into sacks, he'll save time & in crease his profits by hiring a couple of high school students. Contact the counselors at one of the local high schools, explain that he needs a couple of students for part time work sacking firewood & he'll have all the help him needs.

As for how much to pay them, establish a pay rate for 100 full sacks. Of two high school students, one would hold open a sack while the other uses a scoop shovel to pick up the wood & dump it into the sack. Between them, they can gather the top of the sack & tie it with twine. The full sacks, of course, must be stacked on a pallet or in an area ready for selling. Check the time it takes two good students, working at a reasonably fast clip, to load 100 sacks. Knowing the current minimum hourly wage rate, he can then determine the labor value of 100 loaded sacks.

For a supply of burlap bags for use in sacking his wood, check with a farmers' feed store. If he buys in quantity, he can get them at a very reasonable price. He can purchase twine for tying the sacks at the same place.

WHOLE LOGS: Many people have chain saws & fancy themselves as "do-it-themselves," but they don't have the time to go out into the woods & bring back firewood. If he can supply these people with a location not too far from home, where they can saw & split their own firewood, he'll have a steady stream of customers. He'll need a large vacant lot, about a half-acre to a full acre & preferably on the outskirts of town. The first thing will be to put up a 6-foot cyclone fence around his lot & then a small garden shed type building to serve as his office.

Contact a sawmill or logging operation not too far from where he wants to open his business. Arrange with them to deliver whole logs (lumber rejects) to his wood lot. His costs shouldn't run much more than $10 per log, even for premium wood, but will depend upon the size & number delivered in each load.

If he has the vehicle & the energy, he can also contact the Forest Service or the Bureau of Land Management in his area for a permit to cut firewood in government preservation areas. Then he goes out into the woods, saw up downed tree s into eight- foot lengths, load them into his vehicle & haul them to his woodlot.

Still another source of supply is the farmers in his area. Talk with them & offer to "thin out" areas of standing timber & the downed trees. Oftentimes, he can get this wood at no cost other than offering the landowner a share of the timber he takes out. He may even consider his "thinning" & hauling an even exchange for the logs.

Don't forget about the road building construction companies & commercial & residential developers as sources of supply. Actually, once he gets into this business, he'll find sources of supply virtually unlimited & restricted only by his own initiative in making contact with the property owners.

Once he has a supply of logs within his wood lot, there are many things he can do to attract customers. Run an advertisement in his local paper inviting "do-it-himself" to come out & cut his own firewood. He charges them twice as much per log as his cost & they do the sawing, the splitting & the loading & provide their own car or truck to take them home. He is there only to supervise & receive payment.

He could also rent chain saws, axes & the use of his power splitter. Allow the customer to select the log of his choice & then have the hired help the high school students, perhaps who would saw, split & load this wood into the buyer's vehicle. The ultimate, of course, would be to include delivery & stacking of this wood at the customer's residence.

Once the customer has selected his log at twice his cost & pays him $5 for sawing it into the lengths he wants, plus $10 for splitting it for him & another $10 for loading it onto his vehicle, he is talking about $150 to $200 per cord of wood. The secret here is to has his helpers working in teams, with the kind of efficiency that means $l00 per hour for him.