Close price range for clip has gone

Press, 4 February 1986, Page 12

Close price range for clip has gone

PA Wellington Wool auction activity continues to highlight the combination of difficult international trading and indifferent wool growing weather for farmers, says the Council of Wool Exporters in its weekly wool sale preview. It says the close price range for the clip in recent years has now gone and a more discriminating retail consumer pays a premium for quality. This is translated to premiums for well-grown and presented clips at auction. Mr Blair Mcßae, of the carpetmaker, U.E.8., in Napier, said tufted carpete were now more a fashion market, where-de-mands for staple stability in high performance looms and subtle shadings must be met. “The auction will continue to seek out consistent lines and those growers will be rewarded,” he said. “Even two years ago there were conscious efforts being made to close the price gap between the more desirable wools and those

which were less readily marketable.

“With wools now selling freely right through their spectrum, lines from individual growers are being identified and rewarded for colour and consistency in sorting and presentation. It is most unlikely this trend will alter.” In the garment industry, where fashion reacts more rapidly to raw wool prices, European fashion houses quickly structured their promotion and marketing round the availability of cheap Australian fine wool back in September and October. That strategy has effectively clogged retail merchandising of traditional Shetland blends where Korea, Taiwan, China and Mauritius had built up production quite significantly over the last 18 months. Warehouses in the United States and Europe were pumped full of these “heavier” knitted garments. Softer and lighter woollens from Australian sources now sell at “dis-

Mr Alan Chapman, a specialist Shetland exporter at W and R Fletcher, Ltd, says this is the reason slipe wool prices have remained stable in a season where supply is dramatically (about 10 per cent) down. “Farmers are converting good pasture growth to lean meat and we expect the full weight of lambs’ wool now to come through in March-April rather than DecemberJanuary as normal,” he said. “The market continues to show reasonably steady demand for lambs’ wool.” The difficulty of marketing discoloured, unsound wool which is the legacy of wet weather and good pasture growth, is a pure reflection of the premiums paid in the market for good quality wool. It seems only the Poverty Bay hills are experiencing a dry summer this year. The market price for poorly presented and lesser wool drags at the auction.