It got a little more expensive to make mead this year as honey prices rose about 5.5%. All the prices I track were higher in the first half of 2010, with Dutch Gold Clover posting the smallest increase (2.8%) and Costco Clover surging the most (9.3%). Maple syrup and sugar are both down a little (though I only have one source for them right now), and malt extract has been flat.

In the table below, I show the honey prices I track and how they changed from the beginning to the middle of the year.

Where can you get the best deal on honey?

The packers offer slightly better prices on clover honey than Costco, but to get those prices you have to buy in 60 lb buckets and pay shipping. Costco lets you buy in smaller 6 lb jugs and avoid shipping charges by visiting their retail locations. The best price around is still Miller’s wildflower – a high quality honey at a great price. It’s also available as a pair of 3 lb jugs from Amazon, but at $3.42/lb this is a much more expensive option. It’s eligible for free shipping though, so if you don’t have access to an affordable local source like Costco, you don’t want to buy in 60 lb lots, and/or shipping for those heavy buckets would eat up any savings, then it might make sense for you.

Honey prices advanced in 2008, and last January it looked like we were in for more of the same in 2009. But it turns out that honey in December sold for about what it did in January. I now have my first full year of data on malt extract, and here the story is the same. With the exception of The Cellar’s liquid malt extract, which rose early, dry and liquid malt extract prices were unchanged last year. I started tracking malt extract, and other sweeteners, because they might be of interest to our home brewing friends and to provide some context. One hitch in my plan is that I moved during the year, and I no longer have convenient access to a Sam’s Club. Starting with 2010, I’ll be tracking Wal Mart’s prices instead. This means that for table sugar and maple syrup, I only have full year data from Costco. It looks like maple syrup dropped and table sugar rose, at the end of 2009, but with only one source I’m not sure we can make too much of that.

In the table below, I’ve included honey prices from March 2008, just before the surge, as well as January and December of 2009.

Where can you get the best deal on honey?

The packers offer slightly better prices on clover honey than Costco, but to get those prices you have to buy in 60 lb buckets and pay shipping. Costco lets you buy in smaller 6 lb jugs and avoid shipping charges by visiting their retail locations. The best price around is still Miller’s wildflower – a high quality honey at a great price. It’s also available as a pair of 3 lb jugs from Amazon, but at $3.71/lb this is a much more expensive option. It’s eligible for free shipping though, so if you don’t have access to an affordable local source like Costco, you don’t want to buy in 60 lb lots, and/or shipping for those heavy buckets would eat up any savings, then it might make sense for you.

Outlook for honey prices

In October, Kim Flottum forecast rising honey prices this winter:

So … in the short run, the price of honey this winter is probably going to go up some. Maybe a lot. And you may not be able to find local honey later this winter.

With a good idea of US honey production, the worst year ever, and reports that many other exporters are seeing poor crops, he expects a supply squeeze to boost prices. No sign of that, in the prices I track, as of January but it’s something to keep an eye on. Something else to keep an eye on is his assessment that Colony Collapse Disorder hit hard last year and reduced US producing colonies by over 13%. We haven’t seen much evidence that CCD has reduced the US colony count yet – did that change in 2009? The USDA will release their figures in February, and I’ll have more to say then.

For those who don’t know, Mr Flottum wrote the book on backyard beekeeping and edits Bee Culture Magazine. When he talks about beekeeping, the rest of us should listen.

Malt extract prices

Not much has happened in my first full year of tracking malt extract. You can still by liquid malt extract in bulk for $2.01/lb to $2.99/lb while bulk dry extract will set you back $2.52/lb to $4.66/lb. There isn’t anything special about the sources I track, except that I’ve bought from all of them: The Cellar Homebrew, Mountain Homebrew, The Grape and Granary, and Moor Beer.

I noticed Costco charging more for honey on my most recent trip, $2.00/lb up about 9% since January. Maple syrup rose 6% and table sugar was unchanged. I didn’t get a chance to check Walmart. A quick check online showed no change at the packers, and malt extract prices remained flat.

The surge in honey prices, that began in mid 2008, continues. Most prices that I track rose from lofty October levels. Dutch Gold wildflower fell, but only by 2.3% and that was after a 38.9% increase in October. I made a point of sampling prices in January, to compare them with the USDA’s “all honey” price – a year end price that they haven’t published yet. I’ve also started tracking the price of table sugar, maple syrup, and malt extract. If you make mead, you’ll be interested in the price of honey, of course, but this might be interesting to our homebrewing friends and should provide some context as 2009 unfolds. I’ve included honey prices from March 2008, when prices were stable, October 2008, and current prices in the table below.

Miller’s wildflower stands out

The packers offer slightly better prices on clover honey than Costco, but to get those prices you have to buy in 60 lb buckets and pay shipping. Costco and Sam’s Club let you buy in smaller 6 lb or 5 lb jugs and avoid shipping charges by visiting their retail locations. The standout bargain is still Miller’s wildflower – a high quality honey at a great price. Miller’s and Dutch Gold sell organic honey – a wildflower honey that meets USDA requirements for an organic label, and I’ve begun tracking those prices.

Maple Syrup

I started tracking the price of maple syrup at Costco ($16.99/quart) and Sam’s Club ($19.88/quart). It’s a sugar syrup, like honey, but is sold by volume rather than by weight. Typical conversions for maple syrup are: 1 Gallon (US) = 11.2 lb. 1 cup = 240 ml = 319 g of 67 Brix syrup with a density of 1.33 g/ml. That works out to $6.07/lb and $7.10/lb at Costco and Sam’s.

Malt extract and table sugar?

For our homebrewing friends, and to provide some context, I’ve started tracking the price of bulk malt extract at four suppliers that I’m familiar with. The Cellar, Mountain Homebrew, More Beer, and The Grape and Granary all offer malt extract in bulk. Prices range from $2.01/lb to $2.99/lb for liquid extract and $2.52/lb to $4.66/lb for dry extract.

Honey prices were flat for the rest of 2009. There wasn’t much movement in malt extract either.

If you make a lot of mead, you buy a lot of honey. I like to buy in bulk and keep an eye on prices – there’s been a lot to keep an eye on in the seven months since my last price report. The stable prices in March have given way to much more expensive honey in October. Price increases ranged from 6.5%, on Miller’s clover, to 38.9% on Dutch Gold wildflower. Have a look at the table below for the details on how various honey prices have changed.

The more things change, the more they stay the same

Clover honey at Costco is still a better deal than at Sam’s or at the packers. Its not just cheaper than the others, but it comes in smaller 6 lb jugs plus you can avoid shipping charges by picking it up locally. The lowest unit price is still Miller’s wildflower – a high quality honey at a great price.

What about other varietals?

I keep track of the prices I do because they’re widely available in the United States. Almost every honey vendor sells clover honey, and wildflower is almost always the cheapest honey a vendor offers. Keeping track of these prices lets me compare like with like and is the best way to spot trends.

Improved price information

I haven’t made much headway in tracking honey prices overseas. I just don’t have enough local knowledge to pick benchmarks (I think acacia honey might be the one to follow in Europe, but I’m not sure) or suitable vendors (Tesco in the UK?). I do plan on recording prices as of Jan 1, 2009 to better compare with the USDA’s “all honey” price, and I’m thinking of adding other sweeteners like malt extract, sugar, and maple syrup.

I’ve been discussing the effects of processing on honey with commenters Eric and Dick Adams. You can check it out for yourself here. Liquid honey that you buy has been processed by the beekeeper and possibly by a packer. Knowing what they do and why can help us understand how it affects our honey and our mead.

Filtering: Why and how

Filtering honey can solve some problems, and which problems you want to solve dictate how you might filter. Honey from the comb can have a lot of debris in it, like wax, propolis (something bees use like cement or caulk), or bits of dead bee. Even the most anti-processing die hards wont be happy to find a dead insect on their toast, so removing them and making honey aesthetically pleasing is a goal shared by almost everyone involved in selling honey. This sort of coarse filtering might be no more sophisticated than a large section of cheesecloth.

Another problem that beekeepers or packers might wish to solve is crystallization. Partially crystallized honey can invite spoilage. As honey crystallizes, it loses moisture to the surrounding honey. If the moisture content of this honey rises above 19% water then some of the wild yeast naturally present in honey will go to work, and you won’t like the result: off flavors and acetic acid. Crystals form when nuclei, like a bit of dust, pollen, or anything of the right size, are available. So, filtering these nuclei can delay or prevent crystallization.

A finer degree of filtering, called ultrafiltration, can produce an even cleaner purer product. Some commercial meaderies use ultrafiltered honey because the resulting mead is drinkable much sooner than mead from ordinary honey.

Heat: Another problem solver

Heating honey liquefies any crystals in it and destroys some potential nuclei for crystallization. Enough heat for enough time (180F for about a minute) can pasteurize honey, killing wild yeasts. A low level of heat can also help honey flow. In fact, a lot of modern bottling equipment requires some heat to operate.

Too much of a good thing?

Anything can be overdone. Some amount of filtration can remove contaminants and improve the honey, but taking this too far can strip out “contaminants” that make honey what it is. How much is too much? I have a hunch, but don’t know for sure, that ultrafiltration goes too far. I’d love to take a batch of honey, ultrafilter part of it, and compare the two. Since I can’t do that, I follow the “no more than necessary” rule. When I buy honey, I don’t want to pay for wax or bits of hive, just honey. That means I want just enough filtration to remove foreign matter, but no more.

The same goes for heat. Beehives get hot in the summer, and so does the honey stored in them. So there’s not much point in insisting that honey not be heated at all. I prefer “raw” honey, which is never heated above 120F. This allows for easy bottling, but doesn’t pasteurize. I can’t say that pasteurization harms the honey, in fact I’ve boiled the honey-water mixture in some of my meads without noticing any ill effects, but I don’t think there’s much benefit.

As I continue this series on honey, I plan to talk about the effects of age and how important “freshness” is. I’ll also take another stab at that always touchy subject of buying honey from beekeepers or packers/wholesalers. You may want to subscribe to this blog. It’s the free and easy way to make sure you don’t miss an article without having to keep checking back manually.