No Stupid Questions

Once Honey 2.0 comes out in 20 years, your stock in Honey 1.0 will be worthless :(

Having had a 50lb bucket of honey I can tell you that honey use goes up dramatically because you say to yourself "well I have so much I can just use it for this, and that, and a little more on my toast..." and then friends come around asking for a little here and a little there. Unless you can be super disciplined in a way that I cannot, 50 pounds will not last more that a couple years.

Beekeeper here. I won't comment on whether or not you should. But since I know a little about storing honey, here are some things to consider:

If you do this, you need to make sure it's sealed in airtight containers.

Part of what gives honey its antimicrobial properties (and long shelf life) is its low moisture content. But it's hygroscopic and will pull moisture directly from the air if exposed. After it pulls enough moisture, it can ferment, grow bacteria, or otherwise not be fit for normal consumption.

Also, honey can crystallize over time. This doesn't mean it's bad, but in order to re-liquify it, you'll need to heat it. So consider your storage container size and material carefully.

That said, 52 lbs is less than a 5 gallon bucket full (at roughly 12 lbs / gallon), so it shouldn't take an incredible amount of space if you choose to do it. Or, in smaller portions, a quart mason jar will hold about 3 lbs. So 2 cases (12 jars each) would exceed your quantity requirements, and be more manageable than a 60lb bucket.

Also if you can buy it in bulk at wholesale prices, it will be cheaper. Retail can be anywhere from $5-$20 per pound (depending on what/where) whereas the last I checked, wholesale prices were more like $1.50 - $3.50 per pound, depending on quantity.

Hope that helps.

All the honey I’ve ever bought has crystallized before I could get through the small bottle. Yeah, you can heat it, it’s a pain to have to deal with when I just want to use it. I’d rather buy what I need fresh.

Honey doesn't expire but it crystalises giving it a different texture. You'd also have to check in on what happens to decades old honey

If storage space were free and limitless, maybe. Honey keeps forever in principle but that doesn’t mean your barrel could never be contaminated, broken into by bugs or rodents, etc.

Personally, I enjoy buying different varieties of honey, especially as it’s a craft which has been getting more popular and really taking off in “local food” culture. I don’t want to commit to a barrel of any one thing, and I’m also fairly sure that the honey I could buy in a barrel is not going to be the one I’d most enjoy, but some over filtered, over processed stuff.

So I say nay.

Haven't seen this mentioned yet so:

The honey may not expire, but the container you store it in could. I'd be very concerned about plastic disintegrating and/or leeching into the honey. Glass would be better for that, but it's also really heavy compared to plastic, so you'd need more, smaller containers instead of one giant tub.

The bee die-offs, that one typically hears about, has nothing to do with honey bees. Honey bees don't show any signs of going extinct. Its may of the other bee species, which are dying off. And that is bad because of the species liking different specific plants, which often rely on this bee species to be pollinated.

I buy a 5 gallon bucket of honey once every 6ish years. It's one of the only sweeteners my wife can have so we use it in everything that needs a sweeter taste. I fill small 20oz jars with it and seal the bucket back up. It's a good investment because you can get it much much cheaper. I buy mine from Sleeping bear farms in Michigan.

Sure you could. But I'll offer a different perspective

All honey tastes different from different producers and areas, you'll be missing out on some wonderful honey flavors if you buy that much in bulk. If it's purely for sweetening, sure fine, do it. But if you want the flavor of honey, check out a farmers market and see what you'd be missing out on with bulk.

As a kid we had a neighbor that ran a bee-brothel and had hives all over the region. Since his hives would just sit on un-used corners of farmland, he would offer some honey annually as ‘rent’. (He was also generous with his boat so a couple waterskiing trips were also on the table).

We (2 parents, 4 kids) would get a 5 gallon can of honey every other year or so.

That has been over 45 years now and my father is still working through that supply. We put it in sealed mason jars and it has remained good all this time.

Honey can expire if not stored right.

A quick search suggests that the average American uses about 1.3 pounds of honey per year.

I think this is a case of people not eating honey and bringing the average way down.
My current SO puts honey in her tea and goes though about a pound and a half per month or about 18lbs per year.
It might sound like a lot but 24oz over an average of 30 days is less than an Oz of honey per day or 2 tablespoons across 4 cups of tea every day.

Do you actually eat 1.3 pounds a year tho? If so, then it does.

I clearly use more than the average amount of honey then. Most of it to make mead.

Do you really want to carry your lifetime supply of honey around with you every time you move apartment?

What other foodstuffs are you going to buy your lifetime supply of? Dried goods? Tins? You could get yourself a winnebago and fill it with all your lifetime's worth of food or something, which would make lugging it all around with you forever easier. Just hope nobody nicks it.

You're likely better off investing the same amount of money.

Buying it all now is betting that inflation will be higher than your investment return over the next 40 years. That's not a good bet unless the world literally collapses.

Lifetime supply of honey for me is one fairly small jar, except that one time I had a weird craving for honey in the comb, so I ordered a square of it and ate it like a sandwich. I guess I saw bears doing it and thought it looked tasty.

Honey can change consistency, depending on how it is packaged and stored. In addition, you have to consider the cost and risk of storing it. But if you think the bees are going to die off, it could be a lucrative investment.