Tongues are wagging but mouths are watering over lamb cutlets verging on the $100/kg mark at a high end retailer in Sydney.
The prestigious Victor Churchill butchery in Woollahra has been selling the high marbling Kinross Station Hampshire Down lamb cutlets for $99.90 a kilogram, setting a new milestone for Australian lamb.
The Bull family's Lambpro seedstock business based at Holbrook, NSW has been selling the product under the Kinross Station prefix since 2019.
Hamphsire Downs have been in Australia since the 1860s but numbers of the black-faced breed dwindled, with Kinross Station working to benchmark the breed for marbling between 2016 and 2019.
Lambpro general manager Tom Bull said the product had previously been retailing at Victor Churchill for $79/kg and they hadn't witnessed any downside to the recent price increase.
"It's important to remember the same outlet has numerous lines of Wagyu beef retailing at between $200-$300 so $100/kg for lamb isn't out of the ball park for customers looking for a premium product," he said.
"The backbone of the Kinross Station program is marbling.
"Marbling and consumer experience go hand in hand, and our breeding program is unmatched in genetic investment over the past decade.
"Nearly every breed has claimed to be the 'Wagyu' of the sheep industry, however delivering a premium product 52 weeks a year is what counts.
"We also are on the menus of many of Sydney's top restaurants. Chefs are chasing premium products with provenance and Kinross Station has filled a gap in the market."
Mr Bull said most brands source a range of lambs from a cross section of breeds, and feeding regimes.
"This approach doesn't offer the same consistency of high end beef," he said.
"By using consistent high marbling genetics, and consistent feed regimes, adds cost but delivers.
"To go to these lengths you need to be rewarded otherwise it's a loss making exercise.
"The prestige pricing highlights the uber premium nature of the product to customers."
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Mr Bull believes that over the next decade lamb will follow beef to a branded market with segmentation based on quality.
"Beef has revolutionised particularly on the back of the Wagyu and Angus juggernauts," he said.
"There is no reason lamb can't achieve the price points of beef of over $200/kg but we think there is still genetic work to do to create the value proposition to consumers.
"Our entire Lambpro business model is positioning clients for this progression with progeny testing ongoing to look for outliers for marbling.
"It's an exciting time for clients, and in 2022 eight per cent of our clients' one million lambs produced will end up in high value supply chains.
"The aim is to keep building this annually, and working with various processors to develop a win win scenario."
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