Managing an alpaca business

West Wight Alpacas and Llamas has enjoyed one of its best ever summer seasons. BAS board member Neil Payne tells us about the diversifi ed business he runs with his wife Michelle and shares some useful guidance for similar enterprises based on their experience.

In 2010 Neil’s wife Michelle announced that she was going to buy four alpacas. “My fi rst question was what’s an alpaca, my next question was where are you going to keep them?

“Within a few months she’d bought 11 alpacas – she’d also sold the house and bought some land,” Neil told members during a BAS webinar.

“I didn’t complain too much as I quite liked the idea and that was the beginning of West Wight Alpacas and Llamas back in 2011.”

At the time Neil and Michelle could fi nd only one other herd off ering alpaca walks. That was Peta and Bruce Ives at Dunreyth Alpacas. Since then, walks and experiences have become hugely popular and at least 80 other businesses are understood to be off ering similar experiences across the UK.

West Wight Alpacas has grown gradually over more than a decade and

Neil and Michelle now employ up to 14 people over the summer months with up to ten people working each day. “We are a tourism island which gives us a great haul of people to draw on,” he said.

The business itself is made up of several diff erent enterprises and Neil described West Wight Alpacas as the centre, or hub of a wheel with fi ve spokes including:

• A breeding herd of Suri alpacas and Woolly-silky Llamas

• A walking and trekking centre with alpacas and llamas • A farm park with rare breed Wensleydale sheep, miniature donkeys,

Golden Guernsey and pygmy goats, Kuni-Kuni pigs, small mammals and “a huge variety of poultry”

• A country gift shop called Snouts and Tails

• A café called the Llama Tree Pizzeria

Alpaca walks

There are 60 Suri alpacas and one Huacaya on the Isle of Wight together with 25 llamas – Neil also shares a Suri enterprise in the north of England. The West Wight walking herd is made up of 30 alpacas and llamas with another eight animals joining the business in 2022.

“We need to have that number of walking animals because we off er fi ve walks a day in high season each lasting about 45 minutes. Some owners walk for longer but we choose to off er more frequent walks – up to fi ve, or we may increase this to six a day. This is because visitors like to spend a bit of time with us and then go off to do something else – we are best described as a half day attraction,” Neil added.

The limit for walkers is eight with another eight people allowed to accompany a walk. This is the number judged by risk assessment, and agreed by an insurance company, as safe.

“In practice it means we have a maximum of eight alpacas and sixteen people on a walk. That is the way we work because I want to avoid a situation where a family of fi ve for instance books one alpaca and tries to share it around – it just doesn’t work for us.

“The absolute maximum that works for us is one alpaca and one person sharing or accompanying that alpaca.

“For a hen party we must have two members of staff – and again that is what we have risk assessed as the right number and is also the number agreed by our insurers.

“We do have quite a lot of hen parties on the Isle of Wight and I like to think that for a hen party an alpaca walk is the highlight,” Neil said.

BAS welfare guidelines

West Wight’s walking herd of 30 is split into three groups of eight. Walks last 45 minutes but as five minutes is spent getting the group ready and another five minutes is spent taking photographs this means the alpacas walk for a maximum of about an hour and fifteen minutes in one day.

This is well within the guidance included in a BAS code of conduct for walks and treks, produced by Neil, together with Doug Steen (Teesdale Alpacas) and the Llama Society. It recommends a walking time limit of an hour and a half a day for an alpaca.

“If we are walking for longer then we take llamas because they will happily walk all day long and not worry about it. While alpacas are happy to walk it’s important that you don’t overwork them – they will get fed up.”

Neil’s 2021 business target was 800 walks and with more people choosing to holiday in the UK, and the Isle of Wight, this target was “easily reached”.

“We had the most amazing summer with staycations – we had the highest grossing summer by a long way. But we are a seasonal business and in November bookings dropped off a cliff but I’m hopeful they will pick up.”

Aside from the walks many people come to just visit the farm park and being able to feed grass pellets to the animals is a highlight. “We sold over 15,000 pots of grass pellets this year at £1 a pot so it is well worth doing,” Neil said.

Membership of the National Farm Attractions Network (NFAN) is also well worthwhile and according to Neil has been “one of the best things we have done since we started the business.”

“As a group they work fantastically together – they can help with risk assessments and certainly when you are dealing with food, and need to know about food hygiene rules, they are brilliant.”

When it comes to increasing revenue a gift shop “is a massive added value, and must have for any farm park or visitor attraction”.

The renamed Snouts and Tails country shop was recently relocated to ensure visitors must now walk through to enter the farm park and the move has been hugely successful as Neil and Michelle have trebled their turnover. Online sales have also increased.

“We try and be different and have an eclectic mix of stock. It’s not just all about alpacas – it’s a country gift store selling different gifts from all over the country and we try to stock fair trade items where we can.

“Our bestseller is socks and alpaca toys. Our website has also trebled in trade and has become massive. But our turnover over the last two years has trebled just by moving the shop and making sure people walk through it to enter the farm park.”

A café is also essential but it is an enterprise Neil and Michelle have not found easy. The goal for Llama Tree pizzeria this year, which has reopened under a new manager, is to build local clientele and increase turnover and profitability.

Essential licences

Before opening any business Neil advised owners to ensure they have the correct paperwork and have covered health and safety requirements for visitors. Essentials include:

• A local authority licence

• Risk assessment (consider professional assessors such as the National Farmers Union)

• Adequate insurance cover

• Food hygiene certificates and appropriate training in safe food handling for employees

• Handwashing stations and instruction signs.

And as a final thought Neil suggested that as more owners offer alpaca walks and experiences “it is important to keep them unique and exciting”. This means and considering other businesses in the area before starting out. “Please don’t set up two miles from someone else or you could take 50% of their trade.”