Coup d'etat at stockyards ends 72-year rule

It's not the OK Corral, but a showdown is under way among area cattlemen.

Jackie Moore, the new owner of the Southwest Regional Stockyards, will soon be competing with some of the very cattle commission companies that he ousted from the yard if Jack Frost has anything to say about it.

Frost, co-owner of National Commission Company, didn't take kindly to news that his company's contract, which ends Jan. 31, also won't be renewed by Moore. The contract for Gammon and Crain Commission Company, which also expires Jan. 31, won't be renewed, nor will that of Ozark Livestock, which expires March 1. Both National and Ozark have operated at the Springfield stockyards since 1929.

"We're not very happy about it," said Frost, whose company was shut out when Ted Richter sold the stockyard to Moore Dec. 11. As a stopgap, Frost and his partners have purchased the Lebanon Stockyards, where they held their second sale Jan. 13 of 1,400 cattle.

A new stockyard will be built by Frost and his business partners Jack Creed, Ed Ford, and Pete Summers along with Joe Gammon and Kelly Crain. Its placement, between Springfield and Mount Vernon, allows it to compete with Moore's Joplin stockyard on I-44 between Mount Vernon and Joplin.

Moore said he booted out the commission companies after "we tried to work out a plan where it would be beneficial to them and the yard company," but couldn't.

The previous contract paid the commission companies $5.50 per head while $6.25 went to the stockyard. Moore said that wasn't enough to keep the stockyard in the black. Now the yard keeps the entire $11.75.

"It's a numbers game ... just a business decision" Moore added. And the numbers are high. Last year at the Joplin stockyard, Moore moved 300,000 head. It's the second largest stockyards in the world by numbers, Moore said.

"There are livestock marketers and feed lot operators. There's a difference. We're livestock marketers," Moore said.

With the acquisition of the Springfield stockyards, Moore hopes to attract more of the sellers to the east of Springfield who may not want to go all the way to his Joplin stockyard.

"Our purpose is to serve the cattle customer," said Steve Owens, Moore's administrative partner. With more cattle in one place, "we bring more buying power to the customer," Owens added. They hope the combined lots will attract 30,000 sellers this year, 8,000 of them to the Springfield stockyard.

Moore said, "We've seen vertical integration in every other segment of our industry. If you are able to compete (for) the corporates, you're going to have to supply the numbers they need for their operations. To get corporates to come and do business with you, you need to get more and more cattle."

Corporate buyers purchase 3,500 to 4,000 head a day, he said.

Springfield's lot buckled under the competition for sellers. Moore attributes part of it to the new sale barn he built in 1995 on I-44, as well as competition from lots in Tulsa, Kansas, Arkansas, West Plains, Humansville and Lebanon.

Urbanization has led to the development of those regional stockyards, Frost said.

The land previously occupied by big-city stockyards is more valuable for residential development. Chicago's and Kansas City's stockyards shut down within the past five years, he said. St. Louis had its last sale within the last few months.

Moore further eliminated competition when he bought the Four-States Stockyard in Diamond and sold it to Cecil White, who only sells horses through that facility.

The remaining large competition was the Springfield facility, which sold about 130,000 cattle last year.

Frost's firm grossed about $302,000 from the sale of 55,000 of those cattle.