The stock horse people also seem to have a chute fee. What is that?
As it was explained to me from the stallion manager, an “off day collection fee” is when you absolutely need the collection on a day that they don’t offer the collection. If the stallion’s schedule is M-W-F and you need a T-Th-Sat collection its double the cost or whatever extra charge they added.
Semen handing fees irritate me, especially when it’s a high unexpected cost to get seamen shipped. So lesson learned… Ask questions such as “how much will it cost me to ship the semen after I buy it?” Check it out before you buy so there aren’t any surprises.
I didn’t bid on a stallion in an auction because of the $500 collection fee.
From the SO end, we had to go to $275 last year to cover our costs of lab supplies and staff. We have the collection fee broken out from the stud fee as the stallions were not 100% owned by us and worked out for the books. It makes sense to charge shipping charges as that can vary. Clients were asking me about including the first collection fee in the stud fee and that could make sense. Maybe in the future. We do offer discounts to return clients, quality mares and multiple mares. Collect any day that Fedex ships or if someone wants to pick it up. Offer our stallions in auctions. And this weekend we have them in the New England Stallion show and giving discounts there.
Recently we had a surprise collection call and we hadn’t finished setting up the new lab at riders barn. My phantom at home was buried in snow/ice still and stripped down to metal be recovered. My hsuband got out the backhoe and dug it out. The memory foam came off my bed and a tarp, voila new cover. Rider drove the stallion up here over an hour away. Tada! I think that is worth the $275.
Plus one thing to look at in the collection fee. It does cover the costs of disposables. You can keep the collection fee down using the equitainers but they cost more to ship and you have to ship back.
Booking fees make no sense to me at all. But, seems to be standard. I just say it is included.
Well done, MG!
I have to ask, though - did you put the mattress back on your bed afterwards?
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Nope! Used it for Dante MG today. I’m just going to use it for the replacement foam now and then cover it. If anyone has good places to find material for it, let me know. The vinyl is not heavy enough and thinking about going with some leather maybe. Less abrasive on them too
Kathy
Well, I can look at it from both sides. As a mare owner, I get really ticked off with exorbitant fees and nitpicky fees - a fee for this, that, the other and hidden way down deep amongst the verbiage yet another fee for something else, add them up and kerpowie you’ve got some serious FEES. M-W-F collections make me hesitate, although having been a stallion owner in the past, I can understand that SOME stallions really do need those days off to keep good sperm counts. But, most good stallions should be quite fine with 5 collections a week. I also grind my teeth at booking fees for return visits (aka the following year).
What really bugs me bonnet is when the stallion contract tells me how I should be performing healthcare for my mare after she is pregnant, i.e. such as demanding vaccinations at 3, 6, 7, 9 and deworming at x, y or z times. Quite frankly, the SO does not know my mare’s health history and I feel they should stay out of it. There really are some horses who are deadly allergic to these things and a mare owner should not be punished if the mare can’t take the medicine to meet those terms - it’s a contract I will not even finish reading. Making recommendations is okay, but making it part of the terms is not.
It’s been a number of years since my stallion died, but I can’t believe some of the dribbly extras I’ve seen come through on contracts. I never charged any of that and certainly never charged a return booking fee. I tossed quite a number of contracts into the trash because of it.
My great-auntie used to have a sign in the bathroom - “No job is done until the paperwork is complete”.
It kinda applies to the breeding world. “No job is done… until the foal is born healthy”.
PS - Stallion Owners - - if you DON"T SHIP to certain parts of the world, i.e. you live in the USA and you cannot/do not ship to Canada, then KINDLY PLEASE STATE IT ON YOUR STALLION’S PAGE, nice and clearly! Please be considerate of everyone’s time and just be up front about it.
[QUOTE=Majestic Gaits;7497946]
From the SO end, we had to go to $275 last year to cover our costs of lab supplies and staff. We have the collection fee broken out from the stud fee as the stallions were not 100% owned by us and worked out for the books. [/QUOTE]
I certainly don’t disagree that there are hard costs to collecting a stallion. However, in Europe there are no collection fees and they too have to pay supplies and staff. How does their business model allow that? It feels to me that “collection fees” are an American idea and I don’t know where that originates. I wish that the first collection was included in the stud fee.
Ironically I would feel better paying a stud fee of $1750 with first collection included, than $1500 and no collection included. six of one, half dozen of the other I know, but psychologically somehow it makes a difference:)
[QUOTE=clint;7497239]
What, pray tell, is an off day collection fee?[/QUOTE]
an extra charge for collecting a stallion on a day other than when they normally do so … goes along with when SO only collects M/W/F
[QUOTE=Majestic Gaits;7499075]
Nope! Used it for Dante MG today. I’m just going to use it for the replacement foam now and then cover it. If anyone has good places to find material for it, let me know. The vinyl is not heavy enough and thinking about going with some leather maybe. Less abrasive on them too
Kathy[/QUOTE]
I read that someone bought a tanned cowhide and secured it with ratchet straps. Cowhides are relatively cheap around here. A lot of people use them for decorative floor coverings here. (belch)
This is such a good question but I’m beginning to think I’m the only person who is concerned about profit margins on the foal. Mares can be bred live cover quite successfully without out all of the fees etc. The Jockey Club only allows live cover. For the the sake of costs, genetic diversity and financial interests of the mare owners, this nickel dime operating needs to come to a halt. I personally don’t like to leave all of my money in the breeding barn. With the slump in prices for horses the current practice of fees and operating costs don’t serve mare owners at all. There are many good stallions at stud on family farms that don’t have all of the overhead expenses of stallion stations. The studs are comparable to most highly advertised stallions so that’s the route that I take.
@LeatherLover I don’t think you’re the only one looking at profit margins, but what you’re trying to produce matters. For example, I’m in an industry where young horse futurities are a big seller of foals. The earlier I can sell one, the less overhead I have. Selling a foal by a big name, more expensive stallion whose team has done a lot of marketing is WAY easier, faster, and produces a larger price tag than a foal by some backyard team doing live cover. While I can appreciate horses from these situations (my OG mare of 20 years is one of them)… the big money buyers typically do not. Which means as a breeder, I would have to hold on the the foal longer and get it through it’s ugly duckling years before people would take it seriously and that cuts into my profit margin.
To answer the OPs question, even though this got dredged up after seven years 
… I absolutely will stop working with stallions because their management team and/or financials are out of whack. I have two lovely fillies by a big name stallion who is fairly local to me in DFW. I bred a third, but lost the foal and dam in a horrible dystocic birth.
You have to twist his teams arm to provide you anything other than frozen semen (even though I’m local and can go pick it up), they charge 50-75% of the original fee on a rebreed for any reason (including death of the foal), and they’re just kind of checked out - but willing to take your credit card. No thanks. I’m of the others here in that even if it’s the worlds best foal, it’s not worth dealing with that kind of team year after year. I LOVE my two fillies by him and would love more; I just can’t handle the aggravation of working with his people - I relayed my experience to his owner one year, because she lives out of state, and got no response even though my message was marked as read. 
We started doing 1st collection included in the stud fee. That seems to work well. Kathy
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There are so many extra costs with collection and shipping, and dealing with possible shipping delays and possibly missing a cycle… I looked for stallions in my local area to eliminate some of the extra financial costs. Especially since I was breeding an older mare and knew it might take 3 tries to get a pregnancy, if at all. Bonus if the stallion owner has a very reasonable contract.
Collections and shipping can really add up. Read the fine print carefully.
I have. When every collection distributed has an extra ~$400 added due to an agency being used, I generally look at other options first.
To me, it’s just about marketing. And I don’t mean this in a negative way.
For example, let’s say a mare owner decides on a stud fee of $1,500 or less. That owner will not look at stallion who’s stud fee is more than $1,500. Once the mare owner decides on that stallion, then they might look at, and add, up all the fees and still decide the stallion is worth the extra cost. If all the fees were included in the stud fee that owner would never have looked at that stallion.
It’s up to the mare owner to add up ALL the fees required to get the mare inseminated. Add up all the fees if she doesn’t take the first or second time. Then decide.
Now, if the fees are hidden or difficult to calculate - that is a completely different issue!!!
Since the stallion owners with the low fees advertise them, I generally understand that they are a better deal for me. I like using US or Canada fresh, so this is just part of my check out for what’s available that I might want. Others can go ahead and pay each time the extra fees to get what they want.
Shall, Excellent point!
I have been following stallions, breeding fees, foal prices, in foal prices, yearling prices in AQHA show horses since the early '70’s. In the 70’s a stud fee was adjusted to reflect 1/3 of the predicted average foal value, (not the aberration high quality foal, but the going price for sales.) Stud fees of quality stallions would be $500, if the resulting foal should be worth $1500. Stud fees morphed into silliness with the marketing schemes that lead a mare owner to believe that a stud was siring 100% point earners in the foal crops (which was a smoke and mirrors trick via the use of slick marketing and exclusive futurities.) Horses were becoming less and less of a farm/rural hobby and were becoming popular with the urban riders. Then came the urban, unskilled/inexperienced monied interest who saw money in breeding show horses. These stallion owners had to hired skilled help for everything mare care, collection, shipping, etc, etc, thus came the outlandish stud fees. You can still find real horsemen, who are breeders with excellent stallions sans the baggage of paying for marketing, but they are few and far between.
