MURRAYLANDS lamb producers John and Helen McGorman and their sons Alex and Paul have embraced the growing trend among farmers to adopt a paddock-to-plate marketing strategy and sell direct to consumers.
Earlier this year, the 120-year-old mixed farming business launched its new lamb brand, Thornby Grain Fed Lamb, to differentiate their product and promote their sustainable farming practices.
The McGorman family, Sanderston, is already tasting success delivering online and phone orders to the doors of a growing number of customers in Adelaide, Barossa, Fleurieu Peninsula and the Lower North on a fortnightly basis.
They have their own refrigerated van or arrange pick-up from their recently purchased butcher shop.
To build brand recognition, Thornby Grain Fed Lamb has had a permanent stall at the weekly Barossa Farmers Market since August. They received good feedback for their individual trays of meat, such as loin chops and roasts.
In October, they took on another ambitious project, buying Tanunda-based butcher shop Thorns Quality Meats and renamed it Thornby Fine Meats.
This provided them with a retail outlet and two skilled butchers to cut up lambs to customers' requirements.
Paul says establishing a branded lamb product was a natural progression after succeeding in year-round turn-off of fresh, premium-quality lamb from the family's feedlot at Sanderston.
The 3000-head capacity feedlot was set up 15 years ago as an opportunistic facility enabling the McGormans to finish their own lambs and buy in a few extras during periods of high lamb returns.
Another motive for establishing the feedlot was the need to quarantine all sheep for 40 days before moving them between properties and out of the Broomrape Control Zone, in which the Sanderston property is located.
In the past two years they have placed increasing emphasis on the feedlot - grain finishing about 12,000 Merino lambs, first and second-cross lambs a year.
The McGormans run their own flock of 1600 SAMM-White Suffolk breeding ewes at a second property at Coonalpyn with staggered lambings between April and September.
Developing good relationships with stock agents across the State has assisted in year-round supply of the large number of lambs they need to buy each year.
Many of these lambs have been sourced on-farm or through Auctions Plus from as far as Western Australia and New South Wales, and when time permits, they also attend Dublin or Mount Pleasant markets looking for suitable lambs.
The majority of the McGormans' finished lambs are still sold over-the-hooks to export buyers but they are now using 12 to 15 lambs a week, processed at Menzels Meats at Kapunda for Thornby Grain Fed Lamb.
Lambs enter the feedlot at around 35kg liveweight (5-6 months of age) and depending on which market they are for, they are sold at either 22 or 24-26kg carcase weight.
"The second-cross lambs have a bit more fat but they also have a higher dressing percentage at the abattoir at around 52pc compared with 45pc for the first-crosses," he said.
Paul says the evolution of the brand has been a slow process requiring considerable product research including navigating their way around other websites and ordering meat online.
* Full Livestock report in Stock Journal, January 6 issue.
