THE Spielvogel family have been growing ultrafine wool for 100 years, and were recently rewarded for their efforts, selling two bales at 4000c/kg.
Selling through agent David Pink, Barwon and Yarra Valley Wool Brokers, Tom and Sherrie Spielvogel, Morrisons, sold the 12.8 and 13.0 micron bales to Michael Kernan, ‘Segard Masurel Pty Ltd’.
Mr Spielvogel said while this isn’t the highest price they have ever sold wool for, it was a fantastic price to reach.
“It was a really good result, if we could get around that price all the time, we’d be in a very profitable position,” Mr Spielvogel said.
“At $40 a kilogram, we do really well, that works out to be about $100 a sheep, and that’s fantastic.”
He said they run things slightly differently on their sheep operation to most other woolgrowers.
“We shear our sheep when the wool’s the correct length, our Italian buyers want wool somewhere between 85-90 millimetres long, and that’s the one thing you have complete control over, so we make sure we get that right,” he said.
“It depends on the growth, sometimes we get the correct length in eight to nine months, but sometimes it might take 11 months to get that.”
He said it means they’re shearing nearly all the time.
“A lot of people can’t come to terms with how frequently we shear, but it’s actually not that difficult,” he said.
He said their wool has been getting progressively finer ever year.
“We have an extensive program of working on our rams, every ram is assessed for his micron, style, weight, and conformation, all the factors that make a good ram,” he said.
“Our micron has been decreasing, and we’ve maintained the cut, they cut just as much now, if not a fraction more.”
He said they have been trying to breed these sorts of sheep for 100 years.
“You never get to exactly where you want to be, but you can continue to strive for it,” he said.
“When I first started testing the rams, there was an enormous variation between my best ram and my worst ram, and now there’s only a very marginal difference, because of so many years of selection.”
Mr Spielvogel said he has always sold his wool to European buyers, and has many return clients.
“A lot of our buyers have bought from us before, they’ve seen the brand, they know the bloodlines, and they know that 100 years of breeding has gone into the wool,” he said.
“Michael Kernan, who bought our recent bales, nearly always buys our wool for good prices when he has a market for it, but he doesn’t always have a market for it.”
He said they try not to sell wool to a loss.
“We store our wool if there’s no market for it, this year I sold wool that I’ve had in storage for six years,” he said.
“It’s not worth selling it for average prices, we’ve got to get that $40 or $50 a kilogram, to make it worth the extra effort.”
He said given the current marketplace and seasonal conditions, he’s hoping these prices will become more commonplace.