Honestly? I’ve looked at them and waaaaaaay prefer my Ecogold pad. And Ecogold’s customer service is amazing.
That sucks you’ve had such a bad experience. I will say that my experience service-wise has been great. I placed my order through Equus Tack (local business) and they ordered my custom pad for me, told me 6-7 weeks. A couple weeks later, I saw that the Hunter pad was cut much smaller than I originally thought, so I called up Equus and asked if it was possible to switch to the Jumper pad or if they’d already started. Abbie at Equus got on the phone with Jack and had it fixed by the next day. It did push out my estimated wait time by a week or two (still haven’t received the pad, but I’m not expecting it for another 2-3 weeks) but I was very pleased with the responsiveness and willingness to alter my order, despite the fact that I made the mistake, not them.
Not that my experience invalidates yours, or that we can even be certain that it’ll turn out well for me…but I did want to put in my two cents.
[QUOTE=woodhillsmanhattan;7557028]
It seems like a cool product but I just don’t get the hype. I love the customization and all that jazz but think I will wait about a year until similar products come on the market for less $$ :lol:. I too think they seem bulky though. I ride in a square pad, thinline pad, and a pommel pad and am good to go. So I don’t have the half pad fetish that some people have 
(I saved that for my collection of horse boots and bits).
I am all for supporting small businesses, but it seems like they need to get their act together.[/QUOTE]
You don’t have to wait a year…
http://greenhawk.com/wdItemDesc.asp?strilhID=Web&strmdNumber=RIE5348&stricSKU=RIE5348
And different coloured covers, non custom
http://greenhawk.com/wdItemDesc.asp?strilhID=Web&strmdNumber=RIE6763&stricSKU=RIE6763
[QUOTE=AffirmedHope;7557014]
I believe it’s similar to a Thinline, as in it absorbs shock and reduces friction. I also think it’s more “malleable” and it fills in any spaces that might create pressure points.[/QUOTE]
Yes, but a thin line (I have a thin line ultra I purchased for $1 at a tack sale:eek: what a deal!), is 3/16 of an inch thick (the regular ones are 1/4 of an inch). I feel that they do not really change the fit of the saddle due to their slimness.
I have never seen an Ogilvy up close and in person. Do they squish down super thin, a 1/4 like a thinline?
In pictures I have seen they LOOK thick - like an inch thick, but do they squish way down?
[QUOTE=Appsolute;7557056]
Yes, but a thin line (I have a thin line ultra I purchased for $1 at a tack sale:eek: what a deal!), is 3/16 of an inch thick (the regular ones are 1/4 of an inch). I feel that they do not really change the fit of the saddle due to their slimness.
I have never seen an Ogilvy up close and in person. Do they squish down super thin, a 1/4 like a thinline?
In pictures I have seen they LOOK thick - like an inch thick, but do they squish way down?[/QUOTE]
They’re made with memory foam, which in my experience, can usually be squished down pretty flat.
[QUOTE=Appsolute;7557056]
Yes, but a thin line (I have a thin line ultra I purchased for $1 at a tack sale:eek: what a deal!), is 3/16 of an inch thick (the regular ones are 1/4 of an inch). I feel that they do not really change the fit of the saddle due to their slimness.
I have never seen an Ogilvy up close and in person. Do they squish down super thin, a 1/4 like a thinline?
In pictures I have seen they LOOK thick - like an inch thick, but do they squish way down?[/QUOTE]
There is now a 1" and a 1 1/4" for the regular half pad, which are said to squish down to 1/8" due to the memory foam. The gummy half pad I believe, is 1/2".
[QUOTE=AffirmedHope;7557062]
They’re made with memory foam, which in my experience, can usually be squished down pretty flat.[/QUOTE]
IME they squish down pretty flat. I think it’s a great pad if you ride a lot of horses. I usually use my own saddle on my rides unless one is super giant or narrow so I think it would come in handy to have a pad that squishes down where the saddle already fits and sort of expand to fill up small gaps and imperfections in fit. That is supposedly what the Ogilvy does, in addition to shock support.
Okay thanks! Some day I might have to give into my desire for a pretty pad 
the thinline works well, but isn’t very exciting and most saddles tend to bridge a tiny bit on my horse, so, an Ogilvy might work well - I had just always assumed that they looked too thick!
I just ordered my from Farm House Tack as well with no problems. Granted it was a recent order but it was way cheaper than Smartpak (I LOVE Smartpak) and includes the custom colors, plus free shipping.
I had started my order through the actual website but they wanted $20 to ship, so I went through a middle man and got free shipping!
A friend of mine has one and she said that when you tack a horse up and look at it it does look big and fluffy but you actually have to sit in it for it to condense to fit the horse and saddle. I got mine due to saddle fit and sensitive back and have heard big raves about how beneficial these pads are for both the horse and riders backs.
I definitely did a lot of research before ordering as I noticed the popularity of the pads and wanted to be sure they truly did what they say versus being a fad or fashion statement!
[QUOTE=woodhillsmanhattan;7557028]
I am all for supporting small businesses, but it seems like they need to get their act together.[/QUOTE]
Exactly, this seems so wrong. Go with Smartpak!
[QUOTE=Spud&Saf;7557055]
You don’t have to wait a year…
http://greenhawk.com/wdItemDesc.asp?strilhID=Web&strmdNumber=RIE5348&stricSKU=RIE5348
And different coloured covers, non custom
http://greenhawk.com/wdItemDesc.asp?strilhID=Web&strmdNumber=RIE6763&stricSKU=RIE6763[/QUOTE]
Wow those look nice! Hmmmm. I did just get paid…:lol:
I also don’t understand 6-7 weeks for a custom half pad? A custom saddle takes 10 weeks…I feel like that’s a long time just for a half pad!
[QUOTE=Ibex;7557042]
Honestly? I’ve looked at them and waaaaaaay prefer my Ecogold pad. And Ecogold’s customer service is amazing.[/QUOTE]
I was just going to post the same thing! I can’t say enough good things about EcoGold.
[QUOTE=woodhillsmanhattan;7557091]
I also don’t understand 6-7 weeks for a custom half pad? A custom saddle takes 10 weeks…I feel like that’s a long time just for a half pad![/QUOTE]
What I was told was that normally it takes 4-5 including shipping, but that they are backed up at the moment. I didn’t mind when it was explained to me explicitly, but that’s just me. When you take into account the fact that the store I bought through has to receive the pad from Ogilvy before they ship to me, it doesn’t seem so unreasonable to me, anyway.
[QUOTE=Belmont;7556917]
My Ogilvy was just shipped a few days ago. Ogilvy is slammed. They were at Welly, Thermal, and Rolex. I’m sure they have more orders coming in than they were expecting, while also trying to help out people with problems. They are still a SMALL business.
I do agree that their customer service has been a little lacking, but I luckily had a middle man to talk to them about my pad. I just don’t think they were ready for all the success they are having.[/QUOTE]
I have a small business outside of my day job - it’s a one-woman deal, just me doing the work. When order volume starts to exceed my capacity to deliver a quality product in a timely manner, I raise my prices. I don’t want to compromise on quality (by bringing in others to do the work) or timing (by continuing to take orders but not being able to deliver for weeks) and disappoint customers.
I have raised my prices three times in the last two months.
I’m not saying raising prices is what should necessarily be done here, but if the company can neither keep up with production nor provide adequate service to communicate delays, is is clear they cannot handle the quantities ordered. The choices are to expand capacity to accommodate volume, raise prices to lower the volume, or do nothing. Hopefully doing nothing is not the plan.
Maybe if they were slammed from the winter circuits they should have waited until next year to go to Rolex…
This just sounds like a lot of miscommunication to me, and I’m a firm believer that there are two sides to every story. Given that Ogilvy’s have been huge in Ontario for a few years now and the fact that I haven’t heard of anyone having issues with the customer service before I will take this with a grain of salt.
I received one of my custom pads from them in less then 3 weeks, and I know many people who have ordered them through Blueberry Hill who have also been very pleased.
I’m sorry you had an awful experience but I really don’t think this is the norm for them.
[QUOTE=541hunter;7557104]
What I was told was that normally it takes 4-5 including shipping, but that they are backed up at the moment. I didn’t mind when it was explained to me explicitly, but that’s just me. When you take into account the fact that the store I bought through has to receive the pad from Ogilvy before they ship to me, it doesn’t seem so unreasonable to me, anyway.[/QUOTE]
Makes sense. I thought 6-7 weeks was the norm so that was misunderstanding on my part!. 4-5 weeks isn’t horrible at all if ordered indirectly.
[QUOTE=GoodTimes;7557125]
This just sounds like a lot of miscommunication to me, and I’m a firm believer that there are two sides to every story. Given that Ogilvy’s have been huge in Ontario for a few years now and the fact that I haven’t heard of anyone having issues with the customer service before I will take this with a grain of salt.
I received one of my custom pads from them in less then 3 weeks, and I know many people who have ordered them through Blueberry Hill who have also been very pleased.
I’m sorry you had an awful experience but I really don’t think this is the norm for them.[/QUOTE]
I doubt this is the norm either. But it’s still inexcusable.
Not responding to emails for a week? Because they were at Rolex? Where they were posting to Instagram/twitter multiple times a day? Not an excuse.
Telling me they were going to refund my money and still send me the pad? And then have the pad shipped back to them? That’s just for spite.
I never raised my voice, or said a negative word about their product to OE or on here, but they have A LOT to learn when it comes to running a company and customer relations.
Kristy Lake, who handles the Instagram/Twitter/Facebook, is employed only for social media and travelling to shows, I believe.
The actual business side is Jack & Jackie
You know, I’ve been on the fence about ordering one of these. No one I know has one for me to test out and I couldn’t decide if it was too fad-y or if it would actually be useful for me.
The whole first part of the post didn’t bother me too much because yes, there shouldn’t be a sacrafice in service because of traveling to the different shows, but I understand things like this can happen. I work in an office and as much as you try to prevent it once in a while things fall through the cracks. The more concerning part is taking back the customized pad that was already en-route. When a mistake is made that is not the customer’s fault an effort really should be made to fix it so posts like this don’t happen. All of us on the fencers who were just about to bite the bullet and order are taking a step back and re-thinking. Sorry for the disappointment you had to go through with that, definitely feel for you.
