I wanted to post some of the things that I learned at the seminar we went to Sat night. A few things I found interesting.
This from the marketing guy, who by the way is an agent that helps people buy and sell their horses. He said an agent should get between 10-20% of the selling price. Factor in if he keeps the horse at his place, how far he has to haul the horse to show it. He hauls horses from Mo. to Ca. (where the market value is higher), at a cost of $2800 per head.
He said, on average, you should not breed to sale yearlings unless you know you can get at least 3X the stud fee for a yearling and 2X for a weanling. Brood mares he prices at 3X the price of what that mares foals are selling for. (that one seemed a bit high to me)
This guy also has a high end auction sale at his place. He holds auctions several times a year, and it costs $250 to run your horses thru his barn. He recommends that people do not go thru his barn if they are going to be asking less then $2500 for their horse.
He is also an appraiser of a horse, helps people set a proper price for their horse. He was interesting.
The guy from Purina basically stuck to how Purina runs their Horse feed mills. There were a few things he told us I found interesting.
There is an ingredient called Ionophore (and that is spelled correctly altho my spell check has underlined it:), that is used in cattle feed but is toxic to horses and it doesn't take very much at all to affect a horse. Purina horse mills, according to this guy, are the only mills of horse feed that are Ionophore FREE. The other makers of horse feed are Ionophore SAFE. Which means, they do produce cattle feed at the same mill as their horse feed, but they have a flushing system to the equipment that cleans well enough that it is not a problem. At the Purina Horse Feed mills cattle feed is not made. I'd be interested to know how true his "Purina is the only Ionophore free horse mills".
He also said that Purina is the only horse feed mill that competes in the same Oat buying field as Quaker Oats and General Mills.
Anyway, I found all this interesting.
Becky
It sounds interesting.... Horses are hard to figure out a price for, it's interesting to hear how he arrives at a figure.
So - what is this Ionophore stuff for?
The prices sound right to me, at least that's what I've always based things on.