Agent laments loss of handshake deals for livestock

Liveweight or truck weight selling has spelled the end of sealing a livestock deal with a handshake.

Sealing a livestock deal down on the farm with a handshake is rapidly becoming a thing of the past - the introduction of liveweight or truck weight selling has seen to that.

Independent Whanganui livestock commentator David Cotton said it was one of the more significant changes he has seen in decades.

"One major change I have seen in my 40 years of trading livestock is the selling based on a per kilogram price," Mr Cotton said.

David Cotton

"Today most private livestock sales are based on liveweight or truck weight of the livestock. As I have said before, I personally believe this has flattened the market prices, but there is another side-effect.

"As a young agent I would drive out to the farm, draft the livestock into saleable lines, agree with the vendor on a quote price, then find a buyer who would often visit the farm with me to inspect the livestock.

"In some cases redraft the stock for sale and negotiate the price - the good old days of the haggling - with the final component of the deal to shake hands as a man's handshake was his word.

"My livestock manager back then, Ted Wilson, told me as a young agent a good lawyer can get you out of a contract, but no one can get you out of a handshake, that has given your word on a deal."

Then there was often one more step in the deal, off for a coffee and scones, or if later in the day a beer or three, Mr Cotton said.

"I'm not condoning drink-driving, but I can't remember many stock agents having car accidents, which is a miracle when I look back on it."

His point was the strong relationship formed between vendor and purchaser and often the same buyer would purchase the farmers' livestock annually.

"Today we gain agreement on the per kg price, but the purchaser seldom inspects the livestock for sale hence no handshake these days - that's when the fun begins and deals break down.

"The carrier is late or early to pick up and the livestock is lighter or heavier than quoted. I often get quoted lines of livestock at an average weight only to find the average weight is correct, but the livestock is poorly drafted with a huge range in weights and type. Anyone can put a per kg price on livestock and weigh the truck, but it takes a stockman to draft them, value and sell them correctly, but that's another story."

Several examples last week highlighted his concerns.

"A buyer agreed on per kg price to purchase cattle on Thursday night with delivery the following week, only to find the Feilding cattle market came back on the Friday, so Sunday night he pulls out of the deal.

So is the future of livestock trading going to be contracts only now? It's hard to shake
hands over the phone.

"Then there was the time when a farmer weighed lambs on-farm at 20kg to 28kg for an average of 25.3kg. The purchaser's carrier did not pick up for seven days as he wanted to get a backload to cheapen his costs, which was fine with vendor.

"However, the truck weight came in at 27.8kg and the buyer said 'you quoted 25kg so I weighed the lambs on my farm scales the next day at 23.8kg.'

"The purchaser decided he now wanted to pay his farm weight and not the truck weight he agreed over the phone.

"If these buyers had eyeballed the owner of the livestock and agreed on farm with a price the carrier could be late or early, or the market could be up or down at the Feilding Sale and we would still have had a happy buyer and a happy vendor based on a handshake.

"So is the future of livestock trading going to be contracts only now? It's hard to shake hands over the phone," Mr Cotton lamented.¦