Can I realistically expect to be taken seriously as a client if I don't do training board?

[mvp]

@soloudinhere

I guess I don’t understand the proposed alternative.

You could argue that the occasional availability of the trainer brings additional boarders in, maybe, but maybe also not, especially if the place is full.

So the facility owner is supposed to let the trainer make money off her facility out of the goodness of her heart?

You rent a chair in a salon. You rent a storefront if you want a storefront. But you don’t have to rent an arena if you need an arena?

I could see the case for a reduced ring fee for a boarder, but it’s really a tax on the instructor, not the boarder. It’s the trainer renting the facility for that time for the purposes of generating income. Profit sharing, if you will. The instructor could choose not to pass that on, but of course most do.

The BO already rented her arena to her boarders for all the riding they would do. To now rent it to the pro is renting it out again a second time for the same ride, same boarder and same hour. This is not like renting out a salon chair where the store owner has not been paid until she is paid once by the stylist.

If I were a boarder and asked to pay a ring fee for my lesson, I’d want the arena to myself. That would make sense, right? After all, I had already paid to ride in the arena with nothing special when I paid my board bill at the beginning of the month. So what extra am I getting now? And again, if the fee gets passed on to me, as it will because perhaps my pro would find a place I could haul to and not pay a fee, so she says “stay home and pay your BO’s fee or haul to me; your choice.”

You also didn’t address/don’t value what a traveling pro brings to a BO in the form of engaged, safe-riding boarders.

I do understand that fee charged to an “outside trainer” if there is an in-house trainer. After all, that pro would like to have a captive audience in her set of boarders who really don’t generate any profit.

[lenapesadie]

@mvp

The BO already rented her arena to her boarders for all the riding they would do. To now rent it to the pro is renting it out again a second time for the same ride, same boarder and same hour. This is not like renting out a salon chair where the store owner has not been paid until she is paid once by the stylist.

If I were a boarder and asked to pay a ring fee for my lesson, I’d want the arena to myself. That would make sense, right? After all, I had already paid to ride in the arena with nothing special when I paid my board bill at the beginning of the month. So what extra am I getting now? And again, if the fee gets passed on to me, as it will because perhaps my pro would find a place I could haul to and not pay a fee, so she says “stay home and pay your BO’s fee or haul to me; your choice.”

You also didn’t address/don’t value what a traveling pro brings to a BO in the form of engaged, safe-riding boarders.

I do understand that fee charged to an “outside trainer” if there is an in-house trainer. After all, that pro would like to have a captive audience in her set of boarders who really don’t generate any profit.

I agree. And would like to add my own thoughts as well.

I know it’s fairly standard to charge a ring fee for an outside trainer, but it’s a bit insulting to me as the boarder. I am already paying to use the arena. So having a lady stand on the ground and call out tips costs extra? I can not see any way that me lessoning as opposed to riding on my own increases costs that need to be recouped by the barn. As you say, if I need to pay a ring fee I’d expect to have the arena to myself. In turn, as a boarder nothing pisses me off more than wanting to ride and the arena being closed.

I would understand if a facility was owned or completely leased by a trainer. Or if a ring fee is collected for riders that don’t board at the facility. Or trainers barring outside trainers completely. But for a general boarding facility?

Barns certainly aren’t charging the vet, farrier, chiropractor, masseuse, saddle fitter to come work on my horse. Why is the trainer any different?

[Scribbler]

It is true that a lesson takes up more space in an arena than just a person schooling. You can have several people schooling but then add a lesson and things get way more complicated. All the other riders have to listen to the coach calling out to the student, and the student needs to be able to ride patterns on cue. Often the student is being asked to ride a little outside their comfort zone. And if the student is paying $75 an hour for a good outside coach to visit, that student doesn’t enjoy having other riders blundering into their path. I personally would not choose to ride in an arena with a lesson happening, if I have a choice. So perhaps it is fair to charge a ring fee for the nuisance value of having more lessons going on. My coach pays the ring fee, doesn’t pass on the charge. Others download it directly to client.

[Snowdenfarm]

Most business owners have been customers. But most customers have not been business owners, particularly not business owners of private recreational properties. We own two properties which are not horse-related, but similar in many ways. We tend to charge extra for activities for any of the following reasons:

1. It costs us either directly or in time/labor/depreciation
2. It increases liability
3. Has an impact on other customers
4. We don’t have a good reason, but it rubs us the wrong way and want to limit/discourage it

You will notice that neither what is fair nor what is profitable are on the list. Some things that we, as customers ourselves, know would make our customers happy do not make us happy as owners. These are not arms-length businesses selling widgets to strangers where profit is the primary concern. They are also not public facilities. These are private recreational properties that charge customers to use them to a limited degree – our personal happiness is our primary concern since profit is limited at best. If what makes the owner happy causes him/her to lose enough of their customers, they will have to decide whether to accept less happiness – or to keep their recreational property in a way that they personally are able to enjoy, but support it with a traditional job (or business) with better pay and even benefits! What happened for us is that the customers that didn’t like our rules/fees left and new customers who specifically liked our rules/fees came in. We have a ten-year waiting list on both properties.

tl/dr: No point complaining, bad mouthing or even trying to understand or change policies. Private property owners get to arbitrarily call the shots in a way that makes them happy. Shop for a barn that makes you happy. There are always pros and cons to each barn – either decide to be happy with the rules at your current barn or pick the one that has the combination that makes you happiest. After all, happiness is what you are looking for as well.

[mvp]

@Snowdenfarm

Most business owners have been customers. But most customers have not been business owners, particularly not business owners of private recreational properties. We own two properties which are not horse-related, but similar in many ways. We tend to charge extra for activities for any of the following reasons:

1. It costs us either directly or in time/labor/depreciation
2. It increases liability
3. Has an impact on other customers
4. We don’t have a good reason, but it rubs us the wrong way and want to limit/discourage it

You will notice that neither what is fair nor what is profitable are on the list. Some things that we, as customers ourselves, know would make our customers happy do not make us happy as owners. These are not arms-length businesses selling widgets to strangers where profit is the primary concern. They are also not public facilities. These are private recreational properties that charge customers to use them to a limited degree – our personal happiness is our primary concern since profit is limited at best. If what makes the owner happy causes him/her to lose enough of their customers, they will have to decide whether to accept less happiness – or to keep their recreational property in a way that they personally are able to enjoy, but support it with a traditional job (or business) with better pay and even benefits! What happened for us is that the customers that didn’t like our rules/fees left and new customers who specifically liked our rules/fees came in. We have a ten-year waiting list on both properties.

tl/dr: No point complaining, bad mouthing or even trying to understand or change policies. Private property owners get to arbitrarily call the shots in a way that makes them happy. Shop for a barn that makes you happy. There are always pros and cons to each barn – either decide to be happy with the rules at your current barn or pick the one that has the combination that makes you happiest. After all, happiness is what you are looking for as well.

Yes, but this post explains why this business of horse training (and getting horse training) is tricky for the middle class:

1. The businesses of boarding and training are getting divided. Neither side makes money from the other doing what they are doing. In fact, for the boarding barn owner, it can cost them business if they allow pros to dominate the rings such that those not in training can’t get a circle in edgewise.

2. Everyone is getting poorer. That’s true for HOs, but it’s really true for trainers. If you don’t have enough money to buy a farm, your career is going to have some rough spots that the pros who own their farm don’t have. BOs are getting poorer, I suppose, but only because they price their board according to any factor other than what it costs to run their facility and make a worthwhile profit.

3. Those who can afford to own horses that they’d like to have in some kind of training program such that they got a lesson a week (at least), are becoming a smaller group. So if you are that one rider at a boarding barn full of those who just want to ride and don’t want to be “in the way” during your lesson, that’s going to be a tough sell to the BO, whose bread is buttered by those riders whose interests are contrary to that of the lesson-taking rider.

I have been on all three sides of this business-- BM, small-time pro and long-time amateur. Soon I’ll have a boarder or two and live in a development where my HOA fees pay to maintain community arenas. It’s a dinky and new development, so there hasn’t been a problem yet with lessons (of property owners) crowding out others. But we have some DQs who want their own exclusive hour in those rings (a practice which is not granted by our Covenents) and we have some pros moving in, so… we’ll see how this plays out. But it really helps to be able to see this from all three sides. And I’ll carve out a ring-sized riding paddock on my place as a hedge against something going wrong with sharing the arenas.

[eightpondfarm]

i’m new to dressage. It took some doing, and a couple of false starts, but I’ve found a good match coach for me. I don’t even know if she has her own board and train? I think maybe she takes in a select few outside horses, but i think she doesn’t have anyone go to her barn for lessons. I meet her at a boarding barn midway between her place and mine (about 1.5 hr drive for each of us) She’s a judge and competitor and even better than those two qualifiers, she is a good teacher. Also, she’s is completely at ease with me being on-the-spectrum. I haul in for a weekly lesson and am currently rotating my horses through to see which horse(s) will raise his/her hoof and volunteer to be a good little dressage horse. So far, i have two that i’ll continue to work with and we’ll just see how far they can go. I think my coach is enjoying my strange process. I took a tidy black to her last week and she told me at the end of the lesson that she had had fun… She likes him and one of my mares.

I have zero doubt that i have her undivided attention during my lessons. And that’s all i want/need. I don’t care much what she does with other people and their horses. I don’t need her love or friendship or anything (but i think maybe i have it anyway?)

She came out to my farm two weeks ago and gave private lessons to two of my friends on two of my rejected prospects to make sure they can handle them. (And these two horse/rider teams will be the first two on my little equine search and rescue training group. I have a lot of horses and a large farm for us to play ‘hide and go seek’ on. Plus, all three of us are 20 yr canine search specialists with DHS/FEMA, so we have some expertise… My spill-over horse plan is well underway.)