Saddle sales help (or commiseration)

[Bristol_Bay]

Three summers ago, I taught summer school specifically to earn enough money to buy a custom saddle. Bla, bla, bla, now that saddle doesn’t fit me (never really fit my horse perfectly, either.)

I then underwent a painful professional experience (teaching middle school :eek:) to buy another expensive French saddle. Voltaire doesn’t take CWD in trade, so I’m stuck trying to sell it.

I tried Redwood Tack, but she turned it down because she doesn’t have a market for it. This is the panel. If anyone can explain what the numbers mean, that would help me describe it to find the right buyer.

Is eBay the best I can do? [ATTACH=JSON]{“data-align”:“none”,“data-size”:“medium”,“data-attachmentid”:10407665}[/ATTACH]

[buschkn]

SE02 is the model, 17.5 is size 3C is the flap and I think TR are the panels but I don’t remember what specifically that is. I think you will have better luck getting the information you need by changing the title of your thread maybe to something like “help deciphering CWD flap” ? Good luck! I’m in a similar situation. I’m surprised Voltaire won’t take them in trade since they are a big competitor and it would look good if they were selling a bunch of used CWD’s and showing that people are trading them in. Who knows.

[OnDeck]

The market is pretty saturated with used CWDs for whatever reason… I suspect because many people have experiences similar to yours concerning the fitting.

Ebay is an option. I never had much luck with facebook groups but they’re worth a shot. There are other websites that will consign the saddle for you but not many buy them outright like Redwood Tack will. Honestly, I’ve had the most luck selling higher priced items by posting them on my personal Facebook page instead of a sale group. It’s much easier if a friend of a friend is interested, or someone you can meet at a horse show, etc.

[TatteredDaydreamer]

Try maybe Double Oak tack? She will occasionally take trades and has several Voltaires listed. I’m hopefully sending mine in for as a trade in.

[ExpialidociousOTTB]

Also consider asking Maryland Tack Exhange, High End Used Saddles, Fine Used Saddles? Unfortunately, I don’t know anything about the flap - maybe email Leah back from Redwood, and ask her what she can tell you about the stamp?

[vxf111]

RT is the cutout for extra room in the shoulder.

Why does CWD change the serial number nomenclature seemingly every 5 minutes? WHY?

This seems like a saleable saddle, depending on price. I see this type all the time on FB. ALLLLLL the time…

[bip]

@vxf111

This seems like a saleable saddle, depending on price. I see this type all the time on FB. ALLLLLL the time…

That might be the problem. I’m kicking myself for dropping $4400 on a new dressage saddle when I got my youngish horse a year and a half ago. Her back has now changed enough that I can’t use it, and suddenly there are a million of the identical saddle up for sale everywhere. Seems like everyone bought one of these at the same time I did. It’s still in basically new condition and I will be lucky to get 1/3 what I paid out of it. Sigh.

It’s frustrating because I do my best not to be penny wise and pound foolish, to buy quality equipment. But paying $4-6k for something that lasts less than 2 years, then has little value and is a hassle to sell is demoralizing. Last time I paid this much for a saddle was 10 years ago and I still have it and it has fit almost every horse I’ve had during that time at one point or another.

[painthunter]

High Line tack (Fine Line mentioned above is also her less high-end brand saddles) and Suzy Shearer are great to deal with. She sold an Antares for me (quickly and has one of the lower consignment rates). I know she has Voltaire’s from time to time and does take trade-ins, but she does a good consignment business!

[Bristol_Bay]

Honestly, I would have kept it if I didn’t realize I needed a larger seat and wider twist. As far as trading it in, I already ordered a new Voltaire that will be here in the next two weeks.

220 means foam was added to lift the saddle up off the withers without interfering with the balance. This is apparently what is so custom about this saddle.

Thank you for all your suggestions. I will email some of the places mentioned to see what the prospects are for selling it that way.

[Against_All_Odds1]

220 is actually 20mils of foam added to the entire panel from front to back. That’s a lot of lift!

710 is 10mils of foam cut from the added 20 mils in the front of the panel (to, I guess, drop it down a bit up front)

You have a semi deeps seat made in 2016. I think those are the only missing details from what others have said.

[elizabethhund]

Try “high end used saddles” online. They do a great job…sold my saddles quickly with a reasonable commission.

[vxf111]

@bip

That might be the problem. I’m kicking myself for dropping $4400 on a new dressage saddle when I got my youngish horse a year and a half ago. Her back has now changed enough that I can’t use it, and suddenly there are a million of the identical saddle up for sale everywhere. Seems like everyone bought one of these at the same time I did. It’s still in basically new condition and I will be lucky to get 1/3 what I paid out of it. Sigh.

It’s frustrating because I do my best not to be penny wise and pound foolish, to buy quality equipment. But paying $4-6k for something that lasts less than 2 years, then has little value and is a hassle to sell is demoralizing. Last time I paid this much for a saddle was 10 years ago and I still have it and it has fit almost every horse I’ve had during that time at one point or another.

I don’t know that investing in a $$$ French saddle is ever a good investment if you plan to resell. People who want that type of saddle and usually very fickle about trends and the trends are ever changing. There was a moment when people would WRESTLE for a CWD. Then Voltaire came around and everyone changed course. There will be another “big thing” and everyone will switch alliances again. It’s all about what’s new/hot/high end/trending/status. So there’s always a big risk with this type of saddle that it will see a huge depreciation, unfortunately.

[Fig]

I am getting a better deal on consignment at my tack store (Chagrin Saddlery if you’re in the area) does a lot of saddle sales, than Redwood offered. They say they have a lot of people coming in right now for saddle purchases and they do a lot of online marketing. I tried for a month on Facebook and felt uncomfortable doing trials myself. I feel tack stores have more experience and backing if things go bad on a trial.

[akhunterrider]

I’m not familiar with CWD nomenclature, but as other have said resale value is not great. The problem that I have heard often is that the saddle is only as good as the rep/fitter. Many of the reps/fitters are not very good. Again, only speaking with second hand knowledge, as a custom saddle is not something I foresee being able to afford anytime soon.

All that said, I had a Voltaire 5 years ago that I had bought in demo conditions. Beautiful saddle, but really funky panel configuration. It was built way up to fill in hollows behind the shoulders. It was not the easiest sell because it was only going to fit a particular type of horse. When I message High End Used Saddles, she told me she could sell it, but it likely would not sell quickly due to the panel configuration. I would imagine you would run into a similar situation with your saddle. I ended up selling my saddle on ebay and made a bit less money due to the fees, but at least it was sold in a rather quick time frame.

[BAC]

I sold my friend’s Devoucoux through Cori at HighEndUsedSaddles.com and she will buy the saddle from you or sell it for you. My friend decided to have Cori buy it so that it was sold and she didn’t have to worry about anything happening to it during a trial. Cori was great to work with, and her commission was less than the others, I think it was 20%, whereas the others were charging 25-40%. Cori’s website also has an option to give you an estimate without having to ship the saddle to her. I emailed her pictures and she could see the saddle was in excellent condition and gave me a price based on the photos.

[LuvRedHeads]

You might try reaching out to Dina at https://olddominionsaddlery.com/. CWDs is very popular in the Northeast, and the market for used CWDs was (and still may be) very strong.

[Madison]

@Bristol Bay

Voltaire doesn’t take CWD in trade, so I’m stuck trying to sell it.

I realize this doesn’t help you now since you’ve already placed an order, but Voltaire DOES take CWD trade ins, my rep gave me a trade in quote on my CWD (which fit the vast majority of horses I’ve ridden, but not the horse I bought – of course!!) and I’ve seen CWD saddles in their used inventory at the Kentucky Three Day event. The value was low, so you are still better off selling yourself unless you need to immediately reduce the cash out of pocket needed for the new saddle, but it’s not a general rule that they won’t take CWD’s.

I would ask Leah at Redwood what it was specifically about your saddle that was the issue, that would be informative for your purposes. I would also try some of the other consignment shops, I can’t imagine that there is no market for this saddle, but the question may be how long it takes to find that buyer and at what price. If you are willing to sell it yourself, English Tack Trader and High End English Tack Facebook groups seem to get a lot of traffic on saddles. And, as an absolute last resort, if it turns out that panel configuration truly kills all resale options, you could have it repaneled to something standard by CWD for around $500 rather than being stuck with it.

[Bristol_Bay]

The issue is the amount of lift. Leah said she didn’t have the market for it.

The SoCal rep Antoine is the one who wouldn’t take it in trade. He’s moving up to management so he would know. Maybe that’s just around this area.

I have already spent $600 replacing the flaps. I’m not spending to replace the panels. There is a horse and rider this saddle fits, I think it will just take more time.

[Peggy]

Facebook groups. Thermal Classifieds. Blenheim Classifieds. Some of the local ones (there’s an Orange County group).

Put up a flyer at horse shows. If you’re on grounds, note that.

Thrifty Horse in Norco and other places that take used saddles. Might be worth a try taking it down to the Oaks the next few weeks and trying to pimp it to the various vendors there.

Is the padding behind the shoulders more compatible for a TB type horse? If so, you might have more luck at county and local shows and places that these people hang out.

[PonyPenny]

I was be really lucky. I have a 2003 Antares custom made to me and my horse at the time. It has the AO tree and it fits my current horse great. I paid $3,000 for it. My daughter bought a off the rack Spooner by Antares in 2017 and it also fit the same horse great. That saddle cost $3,000. This was after trying both Voltaire and CWD since they were push on her because trainers were sponsored by them. I guess Antares is the saddle for us. For years my daughter rode in a 2000 Beval Butet she bought of Ebay. She rode in it for years until she grew out of it. It fit everything from ponies to Watmbloods. She was a catch rider as a junior.She paid $1800 for that saddle 10 years ago.