lost in the fog
New member
Mexico. ? is jidoka going to back up anything he said ? this is very relevant to the rest of us talking to him like a person.
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New Greenhouse and operational advice with employees
- Thread starter Smith111
- Start date
Truth. We do 120,000 sq ft and that requires about 20 people, 4 of which are leads with one gm.
I teamed up with a huge company, that is nation wide. They are getting into the cannabis business, with a huge budget. Money isn't really a big deal, we are more trying to figure out our potential yields, and how to sell 1600 lbs every 6 weeks. Money doesn't seem to be a problem.
Veg:
I am still trying to decide here. I am either going to have 3 10k sq ft greenhouses for flowering, and 1 for veg. Or what seems to make more sense, is divide each greenhouse and put 66% of the sq ft per greenhouse into flower, 33% into veg. Any advice here?
Soil grow:
You say only have 1-2 people per 10k, then you say a manager for up to 9 gh's. I like this, as I planned for almost double the work force. Then you say hire people with manufacturing backgrounds, and not to hire "growers". Has that been a problem for farms you have witnessed? "Growers" not holding up to the potential needed?
Trimming and concentrates:
Trimming will be a hire as needed type of thing for sure. Concentrates will also be taken care of by a "grower" as it stands now. I would think concentrates is a fairly easy gig, with the right equipment and facility.
Thanks for the advice. You can always tell who has superior experience on the boards.
@jidoka or whomever
What size should your harvest room be compared to your grow area? I imagine if you harvest everything at once, the room will have to be huge. If you stagger your harvests, you can shrink the size of your room. However it would be a bad thing to have a fresh harvest ready to dry, and still have the last harvest finishing off.
I was thinking the dry room had to be around 20% the size of the area being harvested. Is that about right?
What size should your harvest room be compared to your grow area? I imagine if you harvest everything at once, the room will have to be huge. If you stagger your harvests, you can shrink the size of your room. However it would be a bad thing to have a fresh harvest ready to dry, and still have the last harvest finishing off.
I was thinking the dry room had to be around 20% the size of the area being harvested. Is that about right?
It would be great if you could pop back into my yield metrics thread, and share some knowledge on your facility and it's variables. Would love to know how you guys measure yields.
When you get on this scale you want to run everything by standard operating procedure...not the opinion of a grower. For example, say you are topping at the third node but you get the idea that maybe the 5th node would fill the canopy better. You want to do a single table test
You want to base change on data not what someone thinks. Growers will constantly surprise you...you walk into a room and every fan leaf is gone cause that’s the internet hype. Then you gotta train somebody else.
You gotta focus on the metrics that make companies successful. Inventory turns, yield, productivity, quality and the touchy feely hr...moral, pride, turnover
IMO those are best served by evening the flow out so labor is the same every week. Harvest the same amount of plants. Plant the same amount of plants. Do the canopy work the same day weekly. And above all spray on foliar Friday ��.
Measure yield by weight/sq ft or weight/bed if all your beds are the same size
Anyways think about the metrics as you plan. Don’t create roadblocks right up front
You want to base change on data not what someone thinks. Growers will constantly surprise you...you walk into a room and every fan leaf is gone cause that’s the internet hype. Then you gotta train somebody else.
You gotta focus on the metrics that make companies successful. Inventory turns, yield, productivity, quality and the touchy feely hr...moral, pride, turnover
IMO those are best served by evening the flow out so labor is the same every week. Harvest the same amount of plants. Plant the same amount of plants. Do the canopy work the same day weekly. And above all spray on foliar Friday ��.
Measure yield by weight/sq ft or weight/bed if all your beds are the same size
Anyways think about the metrics as you plan. Don’t create roadblocks right up front
LouDog420
Well-known member
Farmtek is solid. S1000, S2000, they can stack them together, custom engineer, custom fabrication, whatever you need assuming the order is big enough and you're willing to pay. If you're thinking about stacking together 20 acres of greenhouses, unless you're on perfect level ground, you're going to have to adjust for elevations which might need some custom design work to fill the transitions or brought to grade prior to expansion. Farmtek's manufacturing facility is out of Iowa.
Conley's was a bit more expensive and never was as responsive or as flexible as farmtek. Met with them, and seemed knowledgeable, just didn't hit it off quite as well and higher cost for the same/similar items.
FF seemed too gimicky, and higher cost as well. But they were years ago, maybe they've changed.
No experience with the other manufacturer.
Industry standard, might not be the best option. I see plenty of open span greenhouses, 30ksf+. Check out some of the Canadian producers that are doing massive spans. However, Canopy just had a complete crop failure in one of their facilities (over 1Msf, https://greencamp.com/canopy-growth-total-crop-failure-bc-facility/). The problem with large spans is the potential for pathogen spread and the cost to maintain with IPM. Smaller isolated bays cost more up front in construction, but the savings on IPM when needing to spray something specialized is a fraction if only needing to hit 1/20th of the facility and proper biosecurity is used throughout to prevent cross contamination. Plus fine tuning environmental controls to the specific maturity level. You have to decide what is more beneficial there in regards to capex and ongoing/longterm operations.
Go with separate veg/flower houses for sure, instead of splitting up single greenhouses. You want to be able to close up a house and nuke it at the end of the round in case of pests or pathogens, and if there's always plants, you can't do that. Plus climate control for end of cycle and veg should be very different, and you're not going to have different zones in the same greenhouse (more zones, more cost, more wiring, more equipment).
Who are you using for climate controller?? Farmtek will suggest LINK4, but I'd suggest to stay away. Had very good success with Wadsworth, they'll just need all equipment specs and have the SEED controller which is nice and upgrade-able as you continue to build out. Not cheap, but all climate features, lighting, weather station, light dep, vent/circ fans, heaters, etc.
HEPA filtered air?? Assuming you're running wet walls, would be interested to see how that would even be possible. Each greenhouse will likely have intake along most of each endwall, and unless prefiltering into an enclosed walkway, doesn't see massive air filtration being feasible... Greenhouses have cracks, vents, bugs/pathogens will get in eventually even with all the insect screening and prevention one can muster.
CO2, nice for night if you need to close everything up, but otherwise not quite as useful. Burn propane/ng for your heat and you'll generate CO2 as well. I'd love to see a greenhouse that could execute it well, but with air exchange being the main source for cooling, a lot gets wasted unless really fine tuned.
What about post? Dry/cure, trim/package. Extraction. Infusion. Storage. Depending on the state/country, other rules/regs for work areas, access control, camera/security monitoring.
I don't think I agree with those labor numbers when considering all extras aside from growing. Harvest. Planting. Equipment maintenance. Post. Delivery. Sales. All on top of maintaining spaces and actually growing. Are 1-2 people working 24/7/365. Vacations, sick, family emergency. Plants still need tending.
Lots to consider, should be a fun project. Good luck.
Conley's was a bit more expensive and never was as responsive or as flexible as farmtek. Met with them, and seemed knowledgeable, just didn't hit it off quite as well and higher cost for the same/similar items.
FF seemed too gimicky, and higher cost as well. But they were years ago, maybe they've changed.
No experience with the other manufacturer.
Industry standard, might not be the best option. I see plenty of open span greenhouses, 30ksf+. Check out some of the Canadian producers that are doing massive spans. However, Canopy just had a complete crop failure in one of their facilities (over 1Msf, https://greencamp.com/canopy-growth-total-crop-failure-bc-facility/). The problem with large spans is the potential for pathogen spread and the cost to maintain with IPM. Smaller isolated bays cost more up front in construction, but the savings on IPM when needing to spray something specialized is a fraction if only needing to hit 1/20th of the facility and proper biosecurity is used throughout to prevent cross contamination. Plus fine tuning environmental controls to the specific maturity level. You have to decide what is more beneficial there in regards to capex and ongoing/longterm operations.
Go with separate veg/flower houses for sure, instead of splitting up single greenhouses. You want to be able to close up a house and nuke it at the end of the round in case of pests or pathogens, and if there's always plants, you can't do that. Plus climate control for end of cycle and veg should be very different, and you're not going to have different zones in the same greenhouse (more zones, more cost, more wiring, more equipment).
Who are you using for climate controller?? Farmtek will suggest LINK4, but I'd suggest to stay away. Had very good success with Wadsworth, they'll just need all equipment specs and have the SEED controller which is nice and upgrade-able as you continue to build out. Not cheap, but all climate features, lighting, weather station, light dep, vent/circ fans, heaters, etc.
HEPA filtered air?? Assuming you're running wet walls, would be interested to see how that would even be possible. Each greenhouse will likely have intake along most of each endwall, and unless prefiltering into an enclosed walkway, doesn't see massive air filtration being feasible... Greenhouses have cracks, vents, bugs/pathogens will get in eventually even with all the insect screening and prevention one can muster.
CO2, nice for night if you need to close everything up, but otherwise not quite as useful. Burn propane/ng for your heat and you'll generate CO2 as well. I'd love to see a greenhouse that could execute it well, but with air exchange being the main source for cooling, a lot gets wasted unless really fine tuned.
What about post? Dry/cure, trim/package. Extraction. Infusion. Storage. Depending on the state/country, other rules/regs for work areas, access control, camera/security monitoring.
I don't think I agree with those labor numbers when considering all extras aside from growing. Harvest. Planting. Equipment maintenance. Post. Delivery. Sales. All on top of maintaining spaces and actually growing. Are 1-2 people working 24/7/365. Vacations, sick, family emergency. Plants still need tending.
Lots to consider, should be a fun project. Good luck.
St. Phatty
Active member
One of the most useful websites I've found -
https://aa.usno.navy.mil/data/docs/AltAz.php
It helps to know the sun's altitude & azimuth - when you have a ridge between your plants & the sun.
I'm guessing - that's also true when you are situating a greenhouse, and trying to optimize output during the spring, winter, and autumn.
https://aa.usno.navy.mil/data/docs/AltAz.php
It helps to know the sun's altitude & azimuth - when you have a ridge between your plants & the sun.
I'm guessing - that's also true when you are situating a greenhouse, and trying to optimize output during the spring, winter, and autumn.
Humboldt-hermit
New member
Good info in here, without an unlimited budget I like the DIY steel green house build by crushingyuba, these are solid and cheep at only 1000$ for 20x100 it would be easy to build and stack as many as needed on a very low budget . Here in Humboldt things have gotten very industrial real fast. I have seen these built fast and cheep on freshly graded flat acres, at many newly permitted farms. At only 2000 sq ft each your project would require many. You could expect from 60-120 lbs yeild from each every 60 days. Most veg teens else where and replant 24 hours after each harvest, thats maxim efficiency .
**facepalm** LouDog420, you are totally correct. At this scale HEPA is not a feasible option. Pulling crops off in a setup this type of scale is definitely an accomplishment. I greatly appreciate you sharing such valuable information. 
CrushnYuba
Well-known member
Thank you for recommending my design! But at this scale, the design i shared is not the best. I have built gutter connected units but it's very different from what i shared in that thread. for something that scale, he is looking for gutter connected bays that use rack and pinion shade systems. Most are pretty similar mechanically. Forever flowering doesn't manufacture ANYTHING. They are just retail. I believe conleys still makes the FF greenhouses. Really on that scale, i would be checking out more commercial options then any of the guys you have contacted.
You should be looking for the right local construction company to build it. They will bring their own steel.
You can use a set of bays for veg and a larger set of bays for flower. It has to be done perpetually so you have a bay being harvested every week. This allows people to have dedicated 40 hr a week jobs so things run smooth. You have a guy that only harvests, a guy that only transplants. A guy that preps bud for a trim machine and a guy that touches up the bud after the machine. A guy that only prunes. In my experience, running chemish fertalizers through drip is going to be the easiest for this size. Amending organic soil on this scale Will complicate things a good bit. It's way more labor and problems to arise. Is doable though.
Icmag is not Really the place to get this type of info. Most of the people on here are hobby growers. I don't see any large growers on here at all. You are talking agriculture. I have learned allot from this forum about what a plant needs and nutrients. But i have not really gotten any valuable information about garden setup or infrastructure. For that i look to other types of agriculture and had to figure it out how to apply it to cannabis on my own.
Cannabis is just now getting to become agriculture. There are very few people doing this successfully at the moment. You say that cost isn't an issue, but i know allot of commercial Cannabis growers that just aren't recouping their investments, let alone turning a profit. I have had to drastically change what i do to make my overhead fit the current Cannabis market. The margins are damn slim.
Feel free to PM me. I can share with you some solutions.
Have a really big day for my business today, I will try to hit you up tomorrow or the day after. Thanks!
Can you help on what SOP's are? How to develop an SOP for cannabis? A cut sheet for an example? Everything I have always done has been in my head, time to put everything on paper.
Anybody giving tours of their facilities? Lately I have visited 3 commercial greenhouses that farm non cannabis products and have been impressed, and very not impressed at the same time. Seems like the facility I am pushing for will be far more technologically advanced than most industries greenhouses. I do have a planned tour of my buddies greenhouses he manages in Half Moon bay, and that should be more technologically advanced.
Would love to tour some cannabis gardens, anybody willing? Would fly out of state.
As for my progress, the city and state just gave me my paperwork on my dispensary. I am doing the construction myself, so it should take me about a month before I open. Then I hope to have my manufacturing completed early next year, and ready for a build out. Talks have just begun in my county for farms, but we just passed a cannabis tax measure by 63%, so the political pressure is off the industry, and on the politicians. Time to give them a comprehensive greenhouse build out plan, and start making this dream a reality.
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You say the companies I posted are not big companies, which ones are? What companies would you go with? I feel like Conley and Farmtek are pretty big, legitimate companies......
You talk about operations, do you have SOP's that you can share with me? I like your idea of keeping a daily/weekly work flow. Keeping everything consistent.
Icmag is for sure not the best place. Especially with MODs like TJO trolling all the time. However it's where I have gone for information for 15 or so years. Obviously I get most of my info in real life, but ICmag has been a good source, if you can get past all the haters.
BTW, cost is for sure an issue. However start up costs seem to not be a big issue. Revenue is a huge issue. Lets be clear,
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G
GatorGumbo
Bro, you're going to have to go out and do some serious networking and legwork to get this off the ground. Lots of people have started a business on a shoestring simply because they knew what to do and what to avoid, your investors won't be throwing money at you when you have a defunct operation because you bought as much Gucci equipment and greenhouses as you could from the start and something went wrong. When your production breaks down the profit stops, if you can't afford to completely replace vital aspects of the business overnight then you're heading for disaster. You need to do everything from spare parts and employee interviews to spreadsheets that analyze your entire business. I'll tell you right now, nobody is gonna up and Elon Musk their way straight into farming, let alone medical farming. You're wasting your time asking questions on the internet, seriously, get real consultants. Not trying to rip your skirt, it's just good advice that you probably already know.
Not sure what peoples malfunctions are, but I know all this. I have stated at least three times in this thread I am getting almost all my information from the real world, consultants, and agricultural pros. What I am asking for here on Icmag is extremely remedial, and I am not expecting much.
To address your advice. Shoestring budgets are getting wrecked in this industry. I have an agronomist friend that is now pretty involved in the cannabis industry. He says half his problem is sub-par infrastructure that is very expensive to fix. For example, a common tactic right now is to buy up old greenhouses and make them work. My agronomist is finding this to be a nightmare, and creating nothing but problems. My business plan isn't to get into the market to survive and build up. My plan is to build something that compete in the market 5 years from now. If you want a better picture of what that looks like, take a look at some of the facilities in Canada. In cali, we have the option to grow outdoors, but in the long run, I imagine all the big players will be under glass for year round production.
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Hydro8
Member
There are a few mid sized(50,000sf) out fits for sale here in Colorado. I don't know anything about them just see the ads from time to time. Some look nice from the pics green houses, extraction labs, genetics buildings.
You could probably do a tour of a few with a real estate agent and a interested attitude. People are bending over backwards try to sell cannabis outfits and get out of the falling market right now.
If I was in your situation I would hire previous owners and give them $200-$300 and hour to answer questions about what worked and what didn't work.
You could probably do a tour of a few with a real estate agent and a interested attitude. People are bending over backwards try to sell cannabis outfits and get out of the falling market right now.
If I was in your situation I would hire previous owners and give them $200-$300 and hour to answer questions about what worked and what didn't work.
