One trading partner

Press, 6 August 1976, Page 8

One trading partner

Mr J. H. Gemmell, of U.E.B. Industries, and formerly the company’s wool manager. argued persuasively in favour of selling to the one organisation or re-seller, when he addressed Drysdale growers in Christchurch this week.

Until this year, the Drysdale clip was purchased by U.E.8., but it is now being handled by the Wool Marketing Corporation. Mr Gemmell’s advice to growers, in summary’, was that they should find a good trading partner, selling at a price satisfactory to both.

Under this system, the buyer would promote the growers’ product, “ut if you sell only to the highest man on the day, he will promote himself, not your product. And if he finds he can buy woo! 5c cheaper somewhere else, he will not be there to buy your wool,” Mr Gemmell said.

He went on to say that the definition of a good deal was a transaction beneficial to both parties; yet the wool trade was the only field which did not work on this principle — it sold to the highest buyer on the day. Mr Gemmell said the motor trade, for instance, could not work on this principle — it would go broke. The chairman of the Drysdale Carpet Wool Cooperative Society, Ltd (Mr H. M. Linklater) did not adopt Mr Gemmell’s view. In the past, he said, the user fixed the price after negotiations win the growers.

He hoped that growers would continue to suply j U.E.. “’But if we deliber- i ately reduce the price of our wool, it means less for the growers,” he said. ‘‘Unless instructed by you (the growers) we will get as much as we can.”

The Wool Marketing Corporation began to uplift wool from Drysdale grow-

ers in January, and to the end of May had purchased 1794 bales, of which it had resold 745. Wool had been sold to two New Zealand mills, and 270 bales to three New Zealand exporting firms, according to a spokesman for the corporation (Mr Charles Hall). The wool sold to the exporters was destined for Australia.

Of particular interest was the demand from Japan, and after negotiations, C. Itoh and Company had been appointed the sole selling agent in that country. Itoh and Company, he added, were the largest importers of wool into Japan, and the largest trading organisation in the world. Mr Hall urged growers to keep their wool true to type. He was at Waihi recently and was concerned at the fineness of some wool, particularly the oddments.

Mr Hall gave a very I favourable picture of price trends. Since the last sale in May, prices had risen about 16c a kilogram, or 6 per cent. Recently the cor-j poration had made a sale of coarse Drysdale at 303c| clean, which was 20c above the May average. Drysdale growers, he added, were faring well, compared with other crossbred wool growers. In May, Drysdale growers were receiving 258 c a kg; other crosssbred growers 241 c.