If you sell beef by the whole, half, or quarter, you already know the butchering isn't the hard part — the processor handles that. The hard part is the cut sheet: getting every customer to tell you how they want their animal broken down, and getting that answer to the processor before the kill date. Miss one, and you're standing in the barn on pickup day holding someone's quarter with no idea whether they wanted roasts or more ground.
This guide covers what a cut sheet actually is, the decisions that go on it, the two numbers that confuse every first-time buyer, and how to stop collecting cut sheets by text message.
What a cut sheet is
A cut sheet is the customer's instructions to the butcher: for the portion of the animal they bought, how should it be cut, wrapped, and labeled? One animal can be butchered a dozen different ways, and the processor won't guess. They cut from a sheet.
A share without a cut sheet is a half-finished sale. The customer has paid (or committed), the animal is booked, but until that sheet reaches the processor, nothing can actually be cut. That's why the cut sheet — not the payment — is the thing that holds up pickup day.
Why the cut sheet is the part that bites you
The butchering is outsourced. The cut sheet is not. It's on you to collect one from every single buyer, and that turns into the worst kind of admin:
- You email a blank cut sheet after someone reserves. Some reply the same day. Some reply the night before drop-off. Some never reply, and you're guessing on their behalf.
- First-timers don't understand the form, so they email back questions instead of answers, and now it's a conversation.
- You end up with cut sheets in your inbox, in text threads, on paper by the fridge — and then you have to re-type all of them into one list for the processor.
- The processor needs that list with names and cuts, but not with what anyone paid. So you build a second document by hand.
None of this is the sale. It's the paperwork around the sale, and for a dozen shares it can eat an evening. The fix isn't a better spreadsheet — it's collecting the cut sheet at the same moment someone reserves, so it's never separate from the order in the first place.
What actually goes on a cut sheet
Here's the part to put in front of a first-time buyer, because these are the decisions they'll have to make. The specifics vary by processor, but almost every beef cut sheet asks for:
- Steak thickness. Usually 3/4", 1", or 1-1/2". Thicker steaks mean fewer of them.
- Steaks per package. Two is standard for a couple; a family might want four.
- Roast size. Small (2–3 lb) or large (4–5 lb). This is the biggest lever on how much ends up as roast versus ground.
- Ground beef package size. One pound or two, and how many pounds total — because roasts and stew meat a buyer declines all get ground instead.
- Bone-in or boneless. Bone-in has more flavor and less take-home weight. Boneless is the opposite.
- The "specialty" cuts. Brisket whole or cut, soup bones, short ribs, stew meat, and the organ meats (liver, heart, tongue, oxtail) — kept or passed.
The single most useful thing you can tell a first-time buyer: almost every choice is a trade-off against ground beef. Decline the roasts, want thinner steaks, pass on the stew meat — it all becomes ground. That one sentence answers half the questions you'd otherwise field by email.
The two numbers that confuse everyone: hanging weight and take-home
This is the other question every first-timer asks, and it's worth getting ahead of on your farm page. There are three different weights, and buyers conflate them:
- Live weight — the animal on the hoof.
- Hanging weight (also "carcass" or "dressed" weight) — after the hide, head, and organs are removed. Typically about 60–65% of live weight. Most farms price shares on this number.
- Take-home weight — the packaged meat the customer actually carries out, after aging, trimming, and the bone-in/boneless choices on their cut sheet. Typically around 40% of live weight — roughly 60–65% of the hanging weight.
Telling buyers this up front prevents the pickup-day complaint that always starts with "I paid for 200 pounds, why is this box only..." They paid on hanging weight; the box is take-home. Same animal, two different numbers, and the gap is bones, fat, and aging — not a shortage.
How to collect it without the chase
In TallyTill's Animal Shares, the cut sheet isn't a separate step you do after the sale — it's part of the reservation.
- When a customer reserves online from your farm page, they pick their size (Whole, Half, Quarter, or whatever you named it) and type their cut sheet instructions right there, before they're confirmed. No blank form to email, no follow-up.
- When you take the order yourself — someone calls, or stops by — you use Take a reservation, pick the customer and size, and enter their cut sheet in the same screen.
Either way, the cut sheet is stored against that customer, tied to that animal. You never re-type it.
A lot in TallyTill is one animal going to the processor on one date, with a Reservations close date you set before processing day. That cutoff isn't just tidy — for custom-exempt meat it's a legal requirement that the share is sold before slaughter, so the system stops taking new reservations the moment that date passes.
Then, when it's time:
- Processor list prints every confirmed buyer's name and cut sheet with no prices on it at all — the document the butcher actually needs, without exposing what anyone paid.
- Pickup sheet prints the same people with their phone, size, hanging weight, cut sheet, and balance, so you can check cuts and collect any balance as they load the truck.
If you sell by hanging weight, nobody is charged until after the animal is weighed: you enter the real weight off the processor's sheet, click Charge accounts, and the math is rate × weight. There's no estimate field and no "deposit" line to reconcile later — every charge is either the price of a size or a clearly-labeled fee.
Pork, lamb, and goat work the same way
Nothing above is beef-specific. A hog gets a cut sheet too — chops bone-in or boneless, whole hams or sliced, bacon thickness, sausage seasoning, lard rendered or not. Lamb and goat the same. In TallyTill a lot is just "one animal," so a pork half and a beef quarter are the same workflow: reserve, capture the cut sheet, confirm, weigh in if you price by weight, print the two lists, hand over the meat.
Common mistakes to avoid
- Collecting cut sheets after you confirm the sale. Capture them at reservation. A sale without a cut sheet is a job you haven't finished.
- Pricing on take-home weight. Price on hanging weight (the standard) and say so plainly, or you'll under-charge and spend pickup day explaining the difference.
- Handing the processor your pickup sheet. It has dollar amounts on it. Print the price-free Processor list instead.
- Leaving reservations open past the kill date. For custom-exempt meat the share has to be sold before slaughter — set the close date earlier than processing day on purpose.
Get your first lot set up
If you're still running shares out of a spreadsheet and your inbox, the cut-sheet chase is the thing worth fixing first. TallyTill's Stand plan is free, with no card required to start, so you can set up a lot, list your Whole/Half/Quarter sizes, and share the reservation link with your waitlist before your next processing date — and let each buyer type their own cut sheet when they claim a share.
Create a free account and add your first animal lot, or read the full Meat & Animal Shares manual to see every screen first.