Leadline Bows!

[lindsay.anne]

My cousin began making themed bows for her daughter. (With some convincing from me :lol:) She has now began to dabble into the horse world to help offset the price of lessons for her daughter. She has a few questions for me to help with her bows to make them appealing!

Would you rather a hair tie bow or a bow with a clip?

Long tails or short tails?

Elaborate bow or simple bows?

General one-color theme (mostly blue) or two-toned (pink & green)

HERE is an example of a simple-ish bow with long tails that she’s made.

Any feedback would be a lot of help!

[Renn_aissance]

Those are cute!

Keep the tails short. Long tails can obscure the rider’s number.

[RiderWriter]

I don’t have a lead-liner or pony kid, but I can tell you that your cousin is definitely on the right track - that is a SUPER-cute and classy bow! Very nice work. I hope her business prospers.

[DejaVu]

That bow is adorable! I think short tails that are elaborate are nice. Any color scheme would work!

[TaterTotTB]

That is really nice! I second the short tails thing, because of not wanting to cover the number. Those will probably sell like crazy, and not just with the lead line crowd, the short stirrup-ers and walk trotters will in all likelihood snap them up, too. When I was little, I know my Mom always made my bows with hair elastics and it seemed to work well. Also, I think ones that are super cute and elaborate like the picture you posted will sell well.

[HJStyleReport]

you can search etsy and I think there’s a lady called Bows to the Shows, she has lots of pics on Facebook. I’m new to the pony mom role but I think short/no tails are for the littlest kids, long tails are for olders?

[englishivy]

Just throwing my 2 cents in here.

My daughter did not get much hair until she was around 4 when I could FINALLY put a little braid with bows that just stuck out from under her helmet.

All the show bows were HUGE and wouldn’t work. I mean, it was ridiculous. So I decided to make some for her that were much smaller. I also put them on a pony tail holder to make it easier to stay on the braids; all the other bows had aligator clips which wouldn’t hold in her fine hair.

So I highly recommend making various sizes with different ways to adhere it to the braid, particularly since she wants to appeal to lead line kids who may, like my daughter, not have tons of hair.

Here are her Halloween bows I made that are the smallest ones I made; they are 4" long and 1" wide at the widest part.

[sara]

Oh my gosh, those make me wish I was still little enough to ride in lead line or short stirrup! Definitely on the right track. I love the pattern backing with the solid color ribbon. I agree with sticking mainly with shorter tails and also in making different sizes - there are sometimes 3 yr olds in lead line and bows for their braids would be too small for a 6 yr old in walk/trot and vice versa. Tell her to keep it up though!! She could probably sell some just by having a little booth at local shows to get started and get the word out in the local community.

[lindsay.anne]

Thank you everyone for the feedback and tips!

I’ll definitely pass on to her to make different size tails. (She said she can always shorten and heat close the longer tail ones to cater to someone). And different ways to tie/clip into child’s hair.

Anyone observed more popular colors in your area? I seem to see lots of pink & blue, any other colors popping up?