Beef price tracker 2

Has anyone ever talked to a factory agent without being told they're being done a favour??? I think it's a form of Tourette's or verbal tic with them. Every second sentence has to have "favour" in it 😀

As above that sounds a fair price provided there averaging close on 550kg fresh weight. Working back from there to a mart weight of 520kg @ €1500 is €2.89 a kilo. When you take mart seller's commission and haulage into account you're probably talking about the bones of €40 on those sort of stock (€25 commission and €10-€15 haulage) plus €10 buyers commission and haulage home. All combined that's an additional 10c-12c a kilo at least and he'll need north of €3 a kilo or €60 more a piece in the ring to equal €1500 at home.

Provided you're fairly accurate with the weights then I'd consider €1500 across the board a fair price for both parties. It's a fair touch for a mixed bag but that's the way the world is gone atm and if you were happy with his stock in previous years then it's better the devil you know.

If there 550kg on farm then they'd be roughly 520kg after a few hours transport/mart. There's almost 40kg of a difference in those weights (558kg would be touching 600kg on farm). When stock are touching €3 a kilo then every kilo adds up. Having them 40kg heavier at €3 a kilo is €120 and that's the difference in €1500 and €1630.

There's a difference in fresh weights and mart weights and some lad's overlook it. In the US they apply the term "shrinkage" and allow a certain percentage discounted on live weight weigh-ins to account for it. There's a further difference in certain marts due to how long the cattle are standing around before sale. If cattle are booked in prior to sale day and the numbers allocated the real cute lads don't bring them in until shortly before they go through the ring. There's a big difference between them and similar cattle sold in a mart that allocates the numbers as they come in and stock could be standing in a queue for half a day before they even enter the mart.

What age of a bull is he? You can still sell him in the mart regardless provided he's in 12 month test as was always the case in recent year's. The new 6 months testing regulations are only an issue if the purchaser intends to keep him for breeding or other than slaughter in the short-term. If he's a cull bull or not an overly fancy sort of a lad there's a good chance he'll go either direct to slaughter or for a short fattening period and then slaughter. Therefore the new testing rules won't make any difference and won't affect his value either.

If someone was interested in keeping him for breeding then it would be an advantage to have him 6 months tested as otherwise the next owner will have to do that after purchase. That may or may not be an issue for whoever is interested but I could see it putting a potential buyer off him. However it depends on the day and the majority of bulls I see sold in general mart sales seldom make much more than there beef/store value especially outside of the main service season.