How to make money in eventing

[Scribbler]

@ladyj79

I wouldn’t say being a coach is the payoff, selling horses is the payoff, even for those at the top (who need to earn money). Being a coach just gives you a better chance at a built in market.

Ah, good point.

[merrygoround]

[h=2]How to make money in eventing[/h] :lol::lol::lol::lol::lol::lol::no::no:

Yes you can make money teaching, training and flipping horses but you need to be well, totally and successfully involved in the sport. And very knowledgeable.

[BoringEventer]

@mollyf97

I’d like to get back into eventing, but am not sure how/if you make money if you place at an event? As a barrel racer, I’m used to making back much more than my total investment at each rodeo, so switching to eventing I need to know how prizes work first. Do they pay money to certain placings at events? Is there a percentage of the entries that go to a money pot for winners? Any relevant information on the topinion would be much appreciated.

thanks in advance!

Aaah, yeah, no that’s not really a thing. There are some upper level events with decent prizes, sure, but you’re going to spend waaaaay more than the top prize trying to move up the levels to get there anyway.

But let’s talk about why eventing as a whole lacks prizes beyond some pretty ribbons. It’s because eventing is insanely expensive to host - as in the USEA estimates the average cost of hosting an event is $36,000. The bulk of that goes to pay for officials and staff, followed by course designers, hospitality/volunteers, safety, advertising, and prizes.

That estimate doesn’t necessarily include the cost of owning enough land to host an event, construction for amenities such as wash racks, permanent stabling or rented temporary stabling, golf cart rentals, contracts with food vendors, building permanent arenas for dressage and stadium, extra grounds care such as aerating cross country courses, and so on. Nor does it necessarily address the biggest expense of initially building a cross country course. In order to run beginner novice through prelim an event needs approximately 100 fences, building a full course for recognized events could easily cost you $150,000 or more.

So even by the time you’ve finished paying for entry fees and stabling, more than a few events may not have even finished paying off the cost of hosting the event, and they probably haven’t made enough of a profit to finish paying off other costs. So there isn’t any money left over from the entry fees in order to provide prize money to competitors. With all the money event hosts have to pay for other requirements, there usually isn’t a whole lot left over to even spend on ribbons. If events are capable of providing more prizes than just ribbons they either do so at their own further loss in profits or because someone donated said prizes to them.

If you want to make money in eventing, you’ll have to do so by selling horses, training, coaching, or otherwise convincing people to give you money because you aren’t going to get it from the shows themselves.

(see http://useventing.com/sites/default/files/USEA%20Entry%20Fees%20Presentation.pdf for USEA powerpoint on cost of events)

[OTTB_FTW]

Quit.