An alter AND asking about a friends situation …
So Schleese. What is with the customer service??? Buy a new saddle - $$$$ - arrives and doesn’t fit horse or rider after 9 months and several fitting appointments - $$$. Ride pain free my foot. Is this just a scam, like it looks? Or will they get it right eventually? bite my tongue or tell her to cut bait and demand a refund? This is crazy. This is in MA if it matters…
I’ve seen this story repeat multiple times. And heard many Schleese users complain how hard their horses are to fit.
In the meantime, no barns I know using other brands of saddles have a barn full of horses with sore backs. On the other hand, when they DO fit, everyone I know with one absolutely loves it. Just getting one which fits is hard.
I’ve heard customer service cautionary tales but at the same time, I own a Schleese and have never had a poor experience in three years.
I have heard this same story dozens of times. Poor fit on a “custom”'saddle and zero customer service support. I guess that’s why there are so many cheap used Schleeses on the market 
I knew someone who had an issue with her Schleese, and was getting nowhere with customer service calls, emails, etc. She was eventually told that her stirrup leathers were causing the unusual wear on the saddle flaps, so sorry, not their fault! :rolleyes: It looked to me like the leather was delaminating.
I noticed that there was a half day fitting with Jochen Himself not too far away. I suggested she just show up with the saddle (and leathers!) and ask him if that was the sort of quality they were standing behind. 
She did actually call to schedule a slot, and ended up with the saddle going back up to Canada to be fixed, for a second time.
Loves the saddle, happy with the fit, not so thrilled with after-care once she paid for it. YMMV.
No one in my barn is riding in one, as far as I know.
My experience with Schleese has been great. They had a booth at a large show where I was showing, and a demo saddle I was interested in. This was for a horse that had repeatedly been hard to fit. The rep custom adjusted the saddle and did some re-flocking there on site and let me try it all fitted to my horse before I had to commit to buying it. This was on a first/second level 7 year old. One year later, as a third level horse with considerably more muscling, the saddle was no longer fitting well (which is to be expected.) A Schleese fitter comes to my area 3 - 4 times a year. I was able to schedule a fitting, got it adjusted, and it is again fitting beautifully. Both of the fitters I worked with were knowledgeable and easy to work with. The saddle was already broken in when I got it (demo model). It still looks practically new after a year and a half (and I am not known for taking great care of my tack.)
thanks for responses and PMs. sure seem like a lot of lemons. Glad for the lucky ones!
My Schleese saved my FEI horse’s career- despite numerous attempts to find him a saddle his entire life, at 17 he was so lame from injuries from saddles that I was retiring him.
Jochen said it would give me 5 more years with him, and at 20, I just got my silver on him, and although I don’t think I will show him anymore, as it is just too hard on him now, I ride him 5 times a week, and yesterday we had a lovely piaffe and passage tour. He’s absolutely sound as he can be at that age.
On the other hand, I don’t particularly love the saddle, and I was utterly INCENSED when it was 6 months old that the stitching failed on a large part of the flap, and I WAS CHARGED $550 TO FIX IT.
So much for standing behind your quality, eh?
I use a local saddle fitter, and have never, ever gone back to Schleese for anything.
I would never, on my life, purchase a new saddle from Schleese again. There are plenty of used ones anyway, probably from other screwed over customers.
Also, I have a Wave, and every 3 months this saddle needs to be adjusted on my 20 year old horse!! He certainly doesn’t change that much, but the way the saddle is built, the flocking just compresses, and voila! I find myself sitting on the cantle again.
Also, it has had to be stitched up again.
This saddle is a maintenance nightmare, and if I didn’t have a fitter that could stop by whenever I needed service, I would be pulling my hair out.
So, quality? Mediocre.
On the other hand, my horse is sound, loves his saddle, and it definitely prolonged his career beyond all expectations.
Mixed bag all around.
I had Jochen himself do a fitting for me a few years ago with my previous horse. When it finally arrived, it was a terrible fit. No less than 6 experienced dressage riders (including my trainer) said it did not fit the horse. My horse also voted for it being a bad fit. It looked like it was made for a different horse. It rocked terribly and could not have been fixed by simple adjustment of the flocking.
After multiple conversations with Schlesse, I asked for my money back. Although they did guarantee they could make it fit (by possibly sending another saddle), I had no faith that would actually take place given how bad the first fit was.
I have no idea how a saddle could have come out so badly with Jochen having done all the measurements himself. I was there to see exactly what he did, so somewhere somebody screwed up. At ~$5k that shouldn’t happen though.
I had a semi custom Passier fitted by Jochem 25 years ago. Had it restuffed a couple of times but never had a problem with it, neither did my horse. Unfortunately it did not fit my current horse. It is still in very good condition and I am able to sell it.
I did use a different fitter this time but only because of convenience. I bought an Equipe for a difficult horse to fit. So far so good.
Ironic. I’ve been a loyal Schleese customer for 20 years and been relatively satisfied with fit and function. Until yesterday, I would have said customer service has treated me very well … but after sending the saddle for repairs that required factory work to fit a new horse, I’m still waiting. It wasn’t sent when promised and took a week for them to find it had gone missing. A week later, CS committed to sending a new saddle, same model, with all adjustments. It was supposed to be sent Friday and arrive Tuesday by express shipping. I learned yesterday that the original saddle was found and that caused further delay in shipping … so I’m still waiting. A little aggravated.
I’ve been happy with Schleese over the years - I have had them work on a few used Regals and was always happy with the results. I used a few other fitters through the years with disastrous results and have gone back with Schleese for my hard to fit mare. Schleese has gone above and beyond with customer service - I was able to demo their saddle for FOUR months until I was sure it was a good fit for her and myself.
Wonder why this is such a mixed bag? I’ve also been a happy schleese owner and have several. Never had less than stellar service.
[QUOTE=Magicboy;8813295]
Wonder why this is such a mixed bag? I’ve also been a happy schleese owner and have several. Never had less than stellar service.[/QUOTE]
IME, the problem is that if you look at any brand of saddle, they use the same tree shape in all their models (unless they specify that they have a “cob” tree or a “draft” tree, etc).
There are a lot of dimensions to saddle fit in addition to gullet width. There is the back to front curve, and the top to bottom drape, of the panels.
These are determined by the shape of the tree itself, and can only be altered a certain amount by torquing the gullet in a press, or altering the panel stuffing. You have to start out with a saddle in which the tree is a good match for your horse’s back.
This means that not every brand will fit every horse, and that no horse is going to fit every brand. You need to find the brand that is the best basic match for your horse.
(Humans have the same issue with specific brands of running shoe, jeans, or riding breeches :). Some people just never fit some brands)
From what I’ve observed, the saddle reps for the various brands have a vested interest in promising that their saddle can be made to fit your horse. Schleese is active at my barn, so I’ve been a bystander in watching this play out with a couple of friends. But I doubt the problem is limited to Schleese.
So, if your horse is a good basic match for the Schleese tree, you will get a good fit, and have a great Schleese experience. If your horse is not a good basic match, and the rep claims to be able to fit the saddle to any horse, and you go through with the deal, you will never get an optimum fit. You will have bridging, rocking, saddle tilting forward, endless visits and tweaks, and never make it work.
Same as if you bought any other saddle that was a bad match for your horse.
That said, a barn friend bought a Schleese, went through the whole fitting process. IMO, judging from the sweat marks on her saddle pad, the saddle was bridging significantly, but I long ago learned to MYOB 
and that the more expensive the purchase, the more you have to keep your mouth shut.
After a year, barn friend went to a riding clinic where the clinician pointed out that the seat was far too small; her butt was wedged right back into the cantle, no room to spare. Regular instructor had never commented on this in a year. Barn friend went back to Schleese rep and got an exchange for a different model with a bigger seat, no problem. So I think in this case, the “customer service” per se was excellent. It’s just that the basic fitting of horse and rider was not so great.
Barn friend went into deal determined she wanted a Schleese, and thinking (I am sure) that if she got the most expensive saddle out there, with the most attentive fitting service, all her problems would be solved.
I buy second hand saddles and have a good independent saddle fitter work on them. I don’t know what I would do if I were ever in a position to be buying a new saddle from a rep. I wouldn’t trust any rep to do the fitting, but the warranty might be void if I got the saddle altered by my own fitter. Good enough reason to keep buying second hand!
I would add that, when I read Joachim Schleese’s articles on saddle fit, they are very good and re-iterate what I’ve learned elsewhere. But the Schleese customer website itself rather mystifies the elements of saddle fit, and in effect says not to worry your pretty little head about saddle fit, leave it to us. They spend a lot of time discussing the rider’s fit, but very little discussing the elements of horse fit.
I’ve learned a lot both on-line on real saddle fit websites, and also working with the independent saddle fitter who makes paper tracings of the back, that I can take shopping with me and try out on saddles in the store, before I bring one home. This has saved a lot of running back and forth, since it lets you eliminate a lot of saddles that will never fit.
The saddle reps (of any company) don’t have any incentive to empower the customer to that extent.
A few years ago, a fellow boarder at my barn had a fitter out for her dressage and jumping saddles, only to find that both trees were broken (how does that even happen?). She was able to find a good replacement for the jumping saddle, but she loved her dressage saddle (Schleese) and opted to have Schleese put a new tree in.
Schleese took the saddle, had it for quite some time, and then had her pick it up when ready (we’re about an hour or so from them).
She tacked up her horse to go on a trail ride with me, then asked me to come over as the saddle looked very strange. They had installed a hoop tree into her saddle. Her horse is very clearly NOT a hoop tree shape and the Schleese rep who came out measured, etc before taking the saddle back to the shop.
I took photos for her of the saddle on her horse - the shape was laughingly wrong, so it was very very clear from photos what the problem was.
They wanted HER to drive all the way to their shop or pay for shipping to get it back there after THEY screwed up the saddle. I was really unimpressed. I have no idea if installing such a drastically different tree would affect the integrity of the saddle (installing then removing and re-installing a correct tree) but it wasn’t a cheap repair., and she was without her saddle yet again while it was fixed.
I’ve never had anything but a great experience with Schleese. Fitters were amazing, swapped out blocks for me at no charge and I loooooooove my Obrigado.
I had nothing but cr@p service from Schleese and their local “independent” fitter… my experience was a complete nightmare. I will never use them again.
And for the record, the same horse that the fitter claimed was a “really difficult fit” goes great now - in a Prestige that I bought off the rack. Go figure.
I wonder what kind of training they require for their fitters. The positive experiences seem to share an excellent fitter…I’ve used schleese saddles for years and have always been pleased but the fitters have been quite good, too. That would make a huge difference.
I wonder if any of the old threads about Schleese are still out here. It has been discussed many, many times. We’ve had Jochim’s wife posting out here in response. I do have to say, I had a major issue with them and was discussing it out here (again, many years ago), and because of the thread I finally was able to get a response and get things settled. Maybe that will work for you.
[QUOTE=Velvet;8814615]
…I do have to say, I had a major issue with them and was discussing it out here (again, many years ago), and because of the thread I finally was able to get a response and get things settled. Maybe that will work for you.[/QUOTE]
I won’t repeat my tale of woe about dealing with Schleese. The only way I got an appointment with Jochen at my barn (after he had done the measurements himself) was to tell the contact person that he could see me at my barn or see me in court. He came, made noises about how he knew exactly what the problem was, etc. Saddle was still a disaster and I ended up selling it.
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