- 🥑 Where are all the health + wellness brands? We’ll cut to the punch line – equestrians need your electrolyte salts and green supplements too.
- 📲 Facebook: The equestrian industry’s BFF + worst enemy. We’ve all heard tales of lost businesses. Come on, Zuck, pick up your phone and help them out.
- 🩺 From the experts at Zoetis: Biosecurity & Fly Control Tips From an Equine Veterinarian.
- 🎬 Final Foals: Check them out at the end of this edition.
Before we jump into it, are you an event organizer looking to host your next clinic or horse show?
Pegasus is the first modern horse show entry system that makes it easy to run an event from start to finish. You can accept online entry registrations, receive digital signatures for your event paperwork, as well as manage the logistics, scoring, and scheduling of your event.
Run better horse shows with the Pegasus Event Management System at www.thepegasus.app.
Where are all the Health + Wellness Brands Targeting Equestrians?
The equestrian market is 95% women, who engage in physical work in harsh outdoor conditions. So where are all the health and energy brands?
The equestrian market is underdeveloped. Let’s break down the opportunity:
Who are the customers?
- Horseback riders – there are a LOT of them. We’re talking in the tens of millions.
- They’re 95% women in English riding and about 50% women in western riding.
- They all engage in a physically demanding activity on a daily basis.
- Since this physical activity occurs outside, they’re exposed to the elements.
- They can compete for decades, unlike most other sports where you eventually age out.
- And alas, they spend money. Especially if it gives them a competitive edge in the ring.
So what is the opportunity?
- Physical training: riders need to keep themself in shape and recover from injuries.
- Health supplements: for both riders and horses – to stay healthy to compete.
- Sustenance: riding outside for hours in the summer heat requires the need for energy and electrolytes.
- Apparel: riders wear similar things – you don’t need that many SKUs if you are an apparel company.
Here’s what companies should take note of:
- Fitness influencers: sell an online training package optimized for equestrian fitness.
- Health supplements: Think Athletic Greens – riders would embrace daily greens on their way to the barn each morning.
- Sustenance: DrinkLMNT, Liquid I.V… it’s hot out there, and riders need salts.
- Apparel, such as Lululemon. Many riders wear athleisure while riding or doing barn chores. It makes sense: they’re comfortable, they’re breathable, and they’re stretchy. Why don’t athletic brands lean in and really start to advertise to the space?
When it comes to marketing, the more niched down the demographic is, the better. It makes it easier to write ads, position them, and distribute them.
The equestrian industry is one of the most pure demographics out there, and it’s untapped and global.
BRB, off to start a Shopify store… or maybe we already have?
Biosecurity & Fly Control Tips From an Equine Veterinarian
Do you plan to travel with your horse(s) this spring and summer? Dr. Holly J. Helbig, equine technical services veterinarian, Zoetis, has tips to help prevent the spread of infectious equine diseases. It’s also a key time of year to think about preventative fly control measures to help prevent summer sores.
Facebook: The Equestrian Industry’s BFF + Worst Enemy
The majority of businesses in the equestrian space are small services businesses like training barns, boarding barns and horse sales agents. There is a real world aspect to their business that anchors them to a geographic location, and limits the area to source new business from.
This is why Facebook is, for most equestrian businesses, their best friend. Facebook groups that serve a particular region generate a sales channel through which all these service-type businesses can source new clients. For example, the group Atlanta Equestrians is a great place for trainers and boarding barns to connect directly with equestrians in the Atlanta area. Seems obvious, right?
Where Facebook becomes the enemy is its policies. As a platform designed to help all, it must create polices that pertain to all. And so content that results in the sale of animals is taken down and often the account involved is blocked – if not deleted all together – a policy designed to prevent illegal trafficking of animals.
Very often, however, accounts are banned for breaking the rules for related behavior – such as selling horses. And famously, there is no help line for Facebook. Judgements are rarely overturned, and if they are, it takes months. If you can get Mark Zuckerberg on the phone, do let us know.
So if equestrians build their business on top of Facebook, they run the risk of a moderator banning their account – and their business, customers, communications channels, content, etc. are all wiped out overnight. And there is no recourse. They have to build up their audience from scratch. So what’s the point? Equestrians need an alternative. They need a ‘safe-space’ (dare I use that term) to conduct their business that won’t lump them in with animal trafficking businesses.
If this resonates with you, you’ll probably like the new Pegasus vendor and sponsor features dropping next quarter.
🐴 This Week’s Final Foals
🤠 This new report shows that the equine industry contributes $12.3 billion to the Texas economy.
Could there be the first-ever all-female Olympic show jumping team?
👯♀️ TikTok trend, but make it equestrian. These horses are Pegasus-paid actors.
Every equestrian competitor knows, a great performance horse score requires the right balance of preparation, feel, and focus. It also requires a happy, healthy horse.
Zoetis has been supporting horses, riders, and veterinarians for more than 70 years. From regenerative medicine devices like Pro-Stride® APS, to expert-recommended Quest Gel® (moxidectin), Zoetis is always by your side in the barn, down the centerline, and everywhere in between.
Visit ZoetisEquine.com or follow Zoetis on Instagram and Facebook for more information on their expert-informed horse care solutions.
Don’t forget to hydrate,
The Oxer by Pegasus
