“We’ll get the ‘nod’ much quicker having sellers back in the mart,” Carlow Mart Manager Jimmy Walsh said yesterday as he welcomed buyers back into the ring.

The mart, which celebrated 60 years in operation last year, held a calf and cattle sale yesterday.

“It’s not a huge sale, as we’ve had very big numbers of stock all the way along and we’re over the hump now, especially with calves. There are maybe 250 calves today where we had sales of 400-600 calves in recent weeks.”

The last few months of online-only sales have seen Jimmy behave like a school master, he admits, keeping the mart going as it grappled with online-only sales. “Buyers, in fairness, have shown a very reasonable level of co-operation all along.

“Since Christmas, it has been stressful for mart to operate and keep within the rules but the vast majority of people, selling especially, have co-operated so well. We never had an issue with someone selling stock wanting to stay on site. The biggest issue is getting the ‘OK’ afterwards as they are watching the sale on the phone, so it can be difficult to get through to them.

“Online sales though have been brilliant for marts. While it does slow down the sale, in an average cattle sale we’d sell 50-70 lots an hour, the old-fashioned way, but with online only selling it was adding another 20-30 seconds to each sale, so a three-hour sale became a four-hour sale and a four-hour sale could take five-and-a-half hours.

 “That said, the trade has been phenomenal in the last three months, especially the last two months and marts have been seeing upwards of 90pc clearance.

“It’s been really difficult on office staff, working longer hours, especially on sales days. There is a real uplift in attitude and behaviour and we’re looking forward to a bit of banter and quicker sales.”

According to Jimmy, Covid lockdown has been more significant on marts than foot-and-mouth. “Foot-and-mouth was nothing compared to this, it was over in three months.”

The only positive, he says, has been the move to online sales. “Online bidding is a huge positive, if there is one good thing out of this, it’s that. I would have been conservative about it in the beginning, but it exposes your stock to a larger audience and brought people back into sales who could not attend marts. I know the older people are not as comfortable with it but you would be surprised how quickly they adapt to it.

“Buyers are sharp people. They have a natural gift for adapting and they have done that.

“The profile of the mart is more upfront and competition between us is good. If one mart sets a good standard, others will try to get to it and online sales can only get better as the technology and camera work improves.”

However, the social side of the mart has taken a savage knock and it’s here to stay, he says. “We are actively discriminating against people who are not doing business.”