A NEW LIVEstock Pricing App is giving livestock producers access to a big range of spot and forward livestock prices with the touch of a button.
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One month on from the launch of the free app more than 1000 cattle, sheep and goat producers have signed up to check prices from feedlotters, processors and live exporters, in one location.
Users can also compare daily prices across states.
The LIVEstock Pricing App’s founder Rob Kelly who played a key role in developing CBH’s Daily Grain service, initially developed by Plum Grove, saw an opportunity, more than a decade later to replicate it for livestock.
“Meat & Livestock Australia publish saleyard prices from across the country and you can receive emails or get on their (processors) websites but there is nothing I could see that brings it all together,” he said.
Mr Kelly ,who hails from a farm at Kojunup in WA, hopes it will make day-to-day, on farm decisions easier about when to sell and even whether to trade crossbred or Merino lambs.
He estimates his App includes prices from about 70 per cent of WA’s processors and exporters in the app.
With major processors such as Teys Australia and Thomas Foods International publicly disclosing their grids he also has significant market information from the eastern states.
“They can look at the App and then just make a couple of extra phone calls, it saves (the producer) a lot of time,” he said.
Mr Kelly’s next step is building trust with buyers and helping break down barriers between sellers and buyers.
“A proportion are already publishing their grids on websites so our app gives producers a single place to view those. Processors that send their numbers out to agents and existing clients now have a platform that gives them real-time access to producers they don’t have an existing relationship with,” he said.
He said no buyers had been unsupportive but it did represent a change to how they have traditionally handled prices.
“Historically they’ve held them close to their chest but today prices are circulated quickly through email and social media,” he said.
“So many of them are getting on the front foot in terms of making sure that those prices are up to date. Our platform helps by giving them real-time access to producers with live prices, giving them some control back.”
Mr Kelly says agents should see the LIVEstock Pricing app as an additional tool rather than a threat to their business and encourages them to register as well.
“Graingrowers see grain prices every day online but still use grain marketing consultants, I don’t see it being any different with this,” he said.
“I like to think of it like a set of sheep scales which has made an agent’s job more efficient, the App can validates a lot of what they do.”
The App is available to download for both iPhone and android phones.
In the future Mr Kelly says he may consider a more comprehensive paid subscriber service but wants publicly available prices to remain free.
