Two web-based livestock marketing services in Alberta have announced plans to merge operations into a single full-service online location.
Direct Livestock Marketing Services, owned by Alberta’s Nilsson Bros. and based in Edmonton, announced a merger Friday with Western Livestock Exchange of Rochester, Alta., about 100 km north of Edmonton.
“With this merger, DLMS will now offer full purebred sale services through the network of markets and live on-location sales, bringing all aspects of livestock marketing together through one online location,” the companies said in a release.
Read Also
Feed Grains Weekly: Price likely to keep stepping back
As the harvest in southern Alberta presses on, a broker said that is one of the factors pulling feed prices lower in the region. Darcy Haley, vice-president of Ag Value Brokers in Lethbridge, added that lower cattle numbers in feedlots, plentiful amounts of grass for cattle to graze and a lacklustre export market also weighed on feed prices.
Both companies’ marketing services will now be handled under the DLMS banner at that company’s website. “Current customers of Western Livestock Exchange can expect the same high level of service that they have come to expect, just under a different name,” the company said.
“We are very pleased with this merger, and feel this will add value to the purebred industry by bringing commercial producers together with purebred producers, a natural fit,” said Mark Shologan, the president of Western Livestock Exchange, who will now head up DLMS’s purebred division.
DLMS, which offers weekly direct off-farm sales and daily pre-sort sales by way of a network of livestock markets and agents across the three Prairie provinces, said its auctions have been developed to be like a live cattle auction and can include features such as instant bidding, streaming audio of a live auctioneer and live video.
Western Livestock Exchange bills itself as a “real-time” online livestock marketing operation, dedicated to promotion and marketing of purebred and specialty livestock through sales and events hosted live online.
