MARKETING METHODS.

Auckland Star, Volume LXVII, Issue 205, 29 August 1936, Page 8

MARKETING METHODS.

GLASGOW LIVESTOCK MARKETS

Glasgow's population is greater than that of the whole of New Zealand, but the saleyards of Glasgow are not a circumstance to those of Westfield or of the Christcliurch yards at Addington, writes a New Zealander now in Scotland. The area covered in the West of Scotland's capital is not half that of either of New Zealand's two biggest markets, and the number of stock passing through is still less than that proportion. The Glasgow organisation is primarily a fat stock market supplying the city's meat, and it handles by no means the whole of the supply. Quantities come through other Scottish markets and many butchers, especially in the working class districts, sell a lot of imported meat. The selling arrangements are quite different both here and at Addington from those employed in the Scottish market. In Glasgow the firms do not draw for order of selling, but sell simultaneously. JL'lius, when the sheep sale starts at 10.30 a.m. all the auctioneers begin selling.

Owing to the climate, the yards have to be roofed. Each firm has its own arena for selling cattle —quite small affairs which are ranged on either side of the market, with the pens for pigs, sheep and calves between —each arena a separate building with raised seat* for buyers round a central ring. a beast enters the ring it is put in a pen resting on a weighbridge, and its weight registered on a big dial, visible to all the buyers. Only one beast is brought in at a time, so that all its points can be easily appraised.

All this is very different from our local methods. Here cattle are crowded, three and four in a pen, and the buyers must trust their own judgment in estimating the weight of the beast under the hammer. In addition to knowing the weight, the Glasgow buyer has a clear view of each animal when it is alone in the ring. In selling sheep the Glasgow auctioneers do not get up on the rails as they do here. The pens are there made of iron, not of wood, and the auctioneer and his assistants would need to be experts in the tight rope act to walk along the rails. The auctioneer stands inside the pen with a knot of buyers round him, thus making the sale look more like a private, affair between the auctioneer and his little following, rather than a public auction.

As at Westfield, the Glasgow saleyarcLs adjoin the city abattoirs—an obvious advantage which is lacking at Christchureli. Some years ago there was agitation to have them shifted from Addington to Hornby, partly to be handier to the city abattoirs. But the main reason given was that the yards were too close to the city and should be shifted in the interests of public health. This argument finds no support in Glasgow, where the market is only a mile from the centre of the city and in the midst of a populous district.