Will it fit in my freezer?
Two questions come up before almost every first order: will it fit in my freezer, and how much meat do I actually end up with?
Quarter carcass: a small chest freezer, or roughly 2–3 drawers of adecent fridge-freezer. About 100L.
Half carcass: a medium chest freezer, 200–300L.
Whole carcass: a large chest freezer, 400L and up.
A quarter genuinely does fit in a couple of drawers of a decent fridge-freezer if you're organised about it, you don't need a second appliance to get started. A half is where a chest freezer stops being optional.
One thing that works in your favour: because your beef arrives fresh rather than frozen, you're packing flat bags and stacking them tightly, not fitting pre-frozen bricks around each other. It takes up noticeably less room than people expect.
If you're buying a freezer for this, a chest freezer is cheaper to buy and cheaper to run than an upright of the same capacity. It's a one-off cost that pays for itself over a couple of orders.
Live weight, dressed weight, boxed weight, what's the difference?
Packing it yourself and why we do it that way
This is the part worth understanding, because it's where most of the confusion about bulk beef comes from.
Live weight
What the animal weighs walking around the paddock. Our cattle are finished at 450–520kg live weight. You don't pay on this figure and neither does anyone else we've included it only so the numbers below make sense.
Dressed carcass weight
The weight after the hide, head and internal organs are removed. It still includes bone. This is what you pay on, and it's the industry standard right across Australia because it's measurable, consistent and fair to both sides.
Boxed weight
What actually goes in your freezer. It's typically around 30% less than dressed weight, and here's exactly where that 30% goes:
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Bone — removed where your cut sheet asks for it to be. Ask for everything boned out and your boxed weight drops further. That doesn't mean anything went missing; it means you chose steaks over T-bones.
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Trimming — fat and connective tissue the butcher takes off.
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Ageing — hanging the carcass loses moisture. This is not waste. It's the single biggest thing that makes beef tender and gives it flavour, and it costs us time and cold storage. We do it anyway.
Your beef comes bulk-packed by cut, in a sustainable cardboard carton from Menzel's, rather than individually portioned into retail-style packaging.
When you get it home, you divide your steaks, mince and sausages into the meal sizes that suit your household and freeze them.
It takes an hour at the kitchen bench, and it's deliberate. It means:
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You choose your portion sizes. Two steaks or six, 500g of mince or a kilo, sized to how your household actually eats, not how a machine decided.
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Far less packaging. No individual plastic trays, no polystyrene, no ice packs.
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Lower cost to you. Retail-style packing and portioning is a real cost, and it gets passed on. We'd rather not add it.
Roasts come pre-packed. Everything except the silverside is already cut that comes brined, and you can leave it whole or cut it to suit.
Practical tips for packing day
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Clear and pre-chill your freezer the day before
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Lay bags flat to freeze, then stack them upright like files once solid you'll fit noticeably more in
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Label everything with the cut and the date, or you'll be guessing in March
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Freeze mince and sausages first; they're what you'll reach for most
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Keep one or two steaks in the fridge for that night. You've earned them.
Ready to work out your size?
If you're still weighing up a quarter against a half, get in touch Mark's happy to talk it through. Or have a look at what's available on the next beef run.