The groups that raise commitments and money to buy the nearly 300 champion animals exhibited by youth at the Fort Worth Stock Show & Rodeo are coming into their stretch run before the Feb. 7 Junior Sale of Champions auction.
Bidders spent more than a record $10 million — largely organized by the nonprofit Fort Worth Stock Show Syndicate — on 292 champion steers, barrow pigs, goats and lambs shown at last year’s auction. Total bidding has rocketed up in recent years, as more donors come on board and push up prices at the auction, which anchors the stock show.
“I just remember the days of the Syndicate being rallied (to bid) on the last 20 animals because we’re trying to keep the price at $2 (per pound), and now the price is hovering at $10 a pound” for steers, said Eddie Arguijo, the Syndicate chairman and a beer salesman who has the H-E-B team lead for MillerCoors.
“It says a lot for this community, and it says a lot for our sponsors and our members,” he said. “It’s just impressive. It never ceases to amaze me.”
At least six nonprofits raise commitments and money for the auction. Besides the Syndicate, whose members refer to themselves as “Brothers in Beef,” the others are Women Steering Business, Band of Barrows, Tallest Hog at the Trough, Ladies on the Lamb and the U Ol’ Goat Committee.
The Syndicate and Tallest Hog recruit buyers, but don’t purchase the animals as organizations. Women Steering Business, Band of Barrows, Ladies on the Lamb and U Ol’ Goat Committee raise money and buy the animals. All proceeds from the sale go to the youth exhibitors.
Officers and directors for five of the groups spoke to the Report for this story. Representatives of U Ol’ Goat could not be reached.
The organizations recruit throughout the year and accelerate efforts the last few weeks before the Junior Sale of Champions. However, not all bidders are organized by those groups.
This year, the Syndicate has somewhere “north” of 300 commitments so far, Arguijo said. Although its members are focused on the steers, they buy other animals in the auction as well.
Even if the nonprofit group leaders sense they’ve raised enough for the sale, they don’t know how much bidders plan to spend, and surprises aren’t unusual.
Last year, for example, Vaden’s Acoustics & Drywall Inc. bought the grand champion steer for $375,000, a huge sum, but short of 2023’s record of $440,000 for the grand champion steer purchased by the Higginbotham insurance brokerage and benefits firm.
Longtime Syndicate member Shane Vaden had purchased steers at previous stock show auctions. He told reporters after his winning bid last year that he notified Syndicate leadership of his plan, but Arguijo said nobody knew whether to take him seriously at first.
“He just looked more serious than normal,” Arguijo said. “So I knew he was up to something. We were just excited he was getting competitive in the bidding. And when it started getting to a very uncomfortable number, we just kept looking (at him), kind of in shock.”
During last year’s auction, Women Steering Business bid up to as much as $250,000 for the grand champion and reserve grand champion steers (the latter sold for $300,000 to Ed and Sasha Bass). The group then opted to spread its money out among as many exhibitors as possible, said Becky Renfro Borbolla, co-founder of Women Steering Business. Both the grand champion and reserve were shown by young women.
The organization spent $260,000 at last year’s sale, supporting five exhibitors.
“We’ve actually gotten to where we like to spread the money out over numerous young ladies,” said Renfro Borbolla, senior vice president of family-owned Renfro Foods. “If we don’t get the grand champion or reserve, we spread the money out, which is our target. It’s become very expensive to be in that arena, but it’s great for the young people.”
Women Steering Business, founded in 2013, has spent a total $2.6 million at the Junior Sale of Champions, Renfro Borbolla said. It annually has 100-125 members, requiring a minimum $1,000 to become a member.
The group will likely spend about $300,000 this year, including $30,000 during the annual Tarrant County Jr. Livestock Association Show, she said. “We never know what we’re going to buy until we get to the sale.”
The steers dominate the Junior Sale of Champions, which also includes 12 barrows, 10 lambs and six goats annually. Overall, youth entries in the four shows this year total 3,392 steers, 1,963 barrows, 1,582 lambs and 1,131 goats, the Stock Show said. The number of champion animals advancing to the auction remains at about 300 annually.
In the pig arena, Standard Meat Co. and its Syracuse Sausage unit and Double Eagle Energy typically buy the grand and reserve champions — $140,000 and $150,000 last year, respectively — without being organized by the barrow affinity groups. That allows Band of Barrows and Tallest Hog at the Trough to focus on the 10 remaining barrows.
“We try to help the 10 other pigs, because the purchase price falls off substantially after the grand and reserve,” said Whitney Cardwell, an attorney for Happy State Bank in Fort Worth and co-founder of Band of Barrows. “And so, last year, we purchased four of the 10 other pigs and spent $87,500.”
Band of Barrows is the youngest of the six bidding groups, having formed in 2019 by founders who recognized the barrows sold for far less than the steers, Cardwell said.
Through last year, Band of Barrows spent $296,000 to buy 16 barrows at the Junior Sale of Champions and a total of $319,000 at the auction, including money spent on other animals, Cardwell said.
Band of Barrows raised $50,000 of its spend right before last year’s auction. Now the group is rallying again after postponing a summer fundraiser in the wake of the deadly Central Texas flooding.
“We just felt it wasn’t appropriate at the time” to fundraise, Cardwell said.
The nonprofit is working on getting the word out about Band of Barrows, including donating to the stock show’s premium fund for youth exhibitors who don’t advance to the Junior Sale of Champions.
“People are still learning who we are, so we’re kind of just trying to really develop,” Cardwell said.
Gary Ray, owner of the MODCO — “My Own Damn Company” — Insurance Agency in Fort Worth, said he hopes the barrows in this year’s auction bring more than $500,000, which would be a substantial increase from last year’s $425,000.
Ray and Realtor Bobby Norris co-founded Tallest Hog at the Trough 16 years ago after another pig affinity group shut down. Tallest Hog recruits bidders for the Junior Sale of Champions, but doesn’t raise money.
“What we do is get people to come out and spend their money,” he said.
So far, everything looks good for this year’s sale, Ray said.
“We still need some more buyers,” he said. “We’ve got six or seven committed. We’ve got some good buyers coming in to buy pigs that have never bought (before).”
Meanwhile, Ladies on the Lamb spent about $220,000 at last year’s auction, including buying the grand champion for $100,000 and the reserve champion for $85,000, teaming with Andrews Distributing to buy the second animal.
For this year’s sale “as far as commitments from our members, money is streaming in right now,” group president Kim Johnson said. “It really is well what our goals are individually.”
At last year’s auction, the 26-year-old organization purchased six lambs.
“We only bought two lambs (that first year),” Johnson said. “That just gives you some perspective on how things have changed.”
Disclosure: Higginbotham has been a financial supporter of the Fort Worth Report.
Scott Nishimura is senior editor for local government accountability at the Fort Worth Report. Reach him at scott.nishimura@fortworthreport.org.
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Great Job Scott Nishimura & the Team @ Fort Worth Report for sharing this story.
