AUCTIONSPLUS is preparing for a bumper few months, with the company's wool recess sale in July anticipated to continue the online system's record-breaking run of sales.
The July recess sale - held while the physical market is in recess - has become one of the strongest selling periods for online wool auctions, but following strong market conditions wool market operator Tom Rookyard said the online auction would be searching to secure wool for its recess sale.
"During last year's July feature sales 3744 bales were offered on AuctionsPlus Wool, with 225 different grower brands on offer from 14 different brokers," Mr Rookyard said.
He said online sales during the recess period sustained the market as the wool industry looked for product to ship overseas while the traditional market had shut down.
Last year's top price from Elders Sydney was for a stylish Merino weaner fleece lot branded Norton/Walcha which measured 15.7 microns, three per cent vegetable matter, 72.6pc yield, 92 milimetres and 38 newtons per kilotex and which was sold for 1041 cents a kilogram greasy or 1433c/kg clean. From early April to mid-May the online wool auction sold 6312 bales in five weeks, with the firming physical market encouraging buyers to bid online.
The buoyed wool market conditions on May 6 saw more than 600 bales sold online during the first hour of the physical auction in Sydney and Melbourne as buyers and exporters scrambled to secure supplies as the market rose.
In the past 10 months Wooltrade has sold $36 million in growers' wool or more than 24,000 bales averaging $1445 per bale.
AuctionsPlus chief executive Anna Speer said the Wooltrade arm of the online auctions had become a force in the traditional physical wool auctions' July recess, providing exporters with 24-hour-a-day, seven-day-a-week access to wool.
"Wooltrade has, on average, 8000-14,000 bales on offer," Ms Speer said.
"In the past two months a sharp lift in demand and decreasing supply have led to a reduction in available wool on Wooltrade.
"Wooltrade sold half of its available catalogue over just four weeks in April and May, with more than 4500 bales selling in that time."
Since taking the reins last year Ms Speer has been an active promoter of auctions' competitiveness and transparency.
With growth in direct contracts for livestock, she said the auction system needed to become proactive in ensuring it was not a secondary channel.
"The system currently offers about 2,200,000 sheep and 250,000 head of cattle per annum," she said.
"I can see us transacting hundreds of thousands of bales of wool, with the potential to trade the entire clip provided we get the process right.
"Growers are the real influencers.
"As AuctionsPlus for livestock has shown, there is a hunger for change in the way we transact and woolgrowers should be crying out for increased buyers, reduced costs and more competition for their wool."