听In the aftermath of the foot and mouth outbreak in 2001, former operators, Penrith 草榴社区 and Kidds, decided the mart was no longer viable and should be closed.
This did not go down well with local farmers who got together to form a partnership and agreed a lease on the premises, pledged funding and engaged staff with the opening sale taking place in October 2002.
Since then the mart has gone from strength to strength and now has 300 members, 99% of which are local farming families and a board of 10, who are all market customers.
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David Crowden, chairman and market manager, has been with the mart since the very early days.
He says: "We were all delighted to be even nominated for the Auction Mart of the Year award, but to win was just tremendous. The team was very excited and had a great time at the awards evening.
"The success of the mart is very much down to a whole team effort with every single member of staff contributing to the success of the mart. Many of them have been here from the start, including office manager, Jenny Sayer, and yard foreman, Martin Hall.
"We also have a great young team of auctioneers who are very talented and enthusiastic and put customer service at the heart of everything they do.
The mart hosts some of the biggest sales in the country attracting buyers and sellers from all parts of the UK and Southern Ireland.
There are weekly sales of prime lambs and cast ewes and ram, fortnightly sales of prime cattle, cast cows and bulls, store lambs and calves and stirks with monthly dairy sales.
In addition, there are seasonal sales of breeding sheep and cattle and weekly collections of light lambs at certain times of year.
A huge area of growth has been the quarterly machinery, implement and work tool sale which regularly attracts more than 2000 entries.
Over the years there has been investment in infrastructure and technology with extra penning created, roofing of almost the entire mart and a refurbishment of the mart caf茅, The Gavel, and adjoining function room.
But the mart is not just a place to do business. It is a real social hub for the local rural community where they can meet up with like-minded people and enjoy the facilities.
Mr Crowden says: "When the mart was established 23 years ago our motto was 鈥槻萘裆缜� Working for 草榴社区' and I think we have successfully achieved this and we look forward to continuing to do so."
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