Anderson County Livestock Exchange Hosts Grand Opening
Stockman’s Café also Open
By Will Johnson
Messenger Reporter
ELKHART – Following the Grand Opening of the Anderson County Livestock Exchange Wednesday morning, The Messenger sat down with co-owners Kirk Smith and Dr. Jim Peters to discuss the sale barn part of the operation, Stockman’s Café and why they decided to pursue this business endeavor.
“We opened up on Jan. 15 and we did and did 450 head (of cattle) in the first week. We did really well. There were tons of local cattle people bringing cows. Then, the rain hit us. Every single Tuesday and Wednesday it was like a solid monsoon-like rain,” Smith said.
When the rain finally let up, Smith said the sale barn was running between 250 and 300 head of cattle through the auction.
“Yesterday (Wednesday, March 11) we did about 290. That’s about a 70 percent increase of what this sale barn was running before we purchased it. It’s mainly local support. When I say local support, I don’t just mean from Anderson County. We are getting a ton of cattle from Grapeland. We have one of the best facilities in East Texas but before we got here, there were issues and it just wasn’t run correctly,” he explained.
Smith said the approach he and Peters have adopted is to cater to the seller.
“It is a unique perspective in the auction business. When we bought this, everybody said you have to take care of the buyer. Well, I used to be a wholesale car buyer for years. I didn’t go to places because they wanted me to come there, I went because there were a lot of cars to buy,” he explained.
“I would rather have 10 head,” he added, “from 100 local ranchers than 1,000 head from one guy. This is for the community including Slocum, Montalba, Grapeland and even Crockett.”
Asked how the two brothers-in-law came to buy the livestock exchange, Smith laughed and said it happened in two days.
He said he was at another business in Anderson County when the business owner came in and said he had just lost an account because the ACLE had just closed.
“We have close to 300 head and we were planning on selling them here. I called Jim, we came up here and finally got in touch with the owner and he said he wanted to sell it. We really made a deal in about two days. Our passion was we felt the community should have an auction barn. We talked to a lot of the buyers and sellers around here and they told us about the problems,” Smith said.
“They were all fixable,” Peters said.
The auction begins at 10 am on Wednesdays with sheep and goats. This is followed by the cattle auction which begins at noon.
As the conversation continued, Smith said he and Peters had been in the cloud-computing business in Houston since 2009. He said he had told the employees at their company the one thing that would set them apart from their competition would be the service they provided.
With the discussion turning to service, Stockman’s Café, located inside of the Livestock Exchange, became the topic de jour.
“The restaurant is rockin,’” Peters said. “It’s doing phenomenal. We blew through the pro forma by $10,000 in the first month. It’s been really good.”
The restaurant is open 7 am – 9 pm Monday through Saturday and 11 am until 3 pm on Sunday.
“Everyone thinks it’s a buffet for lunch but it’s not. It’s a hot table, similar to a cafeteria. You come in, sit down and the wait staff will tell you what’s on the hot line and if that’s what you want, they’ll bring it to you,” Smith said.
The Café has a menu chock full of breakfast, lunch and dinner items. Among the more interesting items are the shrimp and grits, fried pickles and Filthy Philly Steak Fries. Of course, it also has favorites like a chicken-fried steak which is perhaps one of the best in the area.
Breakfast is served from 7 am until 10:30 am and the breakfast steam table is priced at $6.99. A la Carte items are also available. Lunch is served from 11 am until 3 pm and dinner service begins after that.
Will Johnson may be reached via e-mail at [email protected].
