New blood at TBA South Africa

Hi all

I just wanted to say hi....I am the new guy at the TBA and would love to hear constructive comments and ideas on how we can improve our business and better service our breeders and buyers.

What I really want to know is how we can get more owners into the game?! We need to grow our beautiful sport and need to increase our owner base.

Look foward to hearing from you.

Tom

Hi Tom,we have mentioned this to a few people and I and many of the smaller buyers( that cannot just buy what they want at any price) would love to see an approximate reserve put on a board or something like that to stop us wasting our time looking at horses we cannot afford.It will save the breeders and ourselves time and messing the horses around being pulled in and out for nothing. Most breeders say they will tell you the reserve so put it up a few days before the sale.Probably help the sale go quicker too as the buyers would be close to the reserve when they start bidding.

Tom, good luck to you and the TBA.

You will read a lot of nonsense on these message boards, so I hope that you have a good filter and what Ernest Hemmingway described as the most essential talent for being a good writer: an automatic shit detector.

The post that starts off this thread is a prime example.

Horse auctions all over the world have been working just fine with reserve bids for centuries.

What the poster obviously needs to realize is that it is incumbent upon all attendees of a public auction to learn the game. I know that we are living in a dumbed-down society today in whch nobody seems to have the time or patience to apply the scholarship required to win at any game.

Buying a horse at public auction is a complicated game, but why shouldn't it be? Do you think that playing bridge or poker is simple? There are a lot of strategies to be learned, applied and considered.

Buying a horse at an auction and getting value is a difficult enterprise and apparently too daunting for some people.

I love the National Yearling Sale. Tell all the folks at the TBA to keep up the good work and good luck to you.

Finding new owners is the most difficult task in the world of racing. I have specialized in it for 4 decades.

Hint: it is not YOUR job. It is the job of racing associations. But they don't bother because they are more concerned with showing bingo, or dog races or go cart races or races from Mars, Jupiter and Pluto. As long as those that run racing worry more about the thickness of thier plush carpeting in their board rooms instead of attracting new customers, racing will continue its current slide into oblivion. This is a world wide problem, not an SA problem.

Barry we are attempting to help getting more people to the auction and I think most auction houses we agree that the number of people there have dropped. It is a world that has speeded up and with racing every day now many trainers cannot spend the days and time that you have to go through as many horses. Where you are looking from with your money to spend is very different to ours. The TBA is losing plenty commision from the smaller trainers and owners who would rather buy off the farms now as there when you walk on they say this horse is R40000 and that one is R250000 etc so you dont even bother if you havent the money. Tom wanted ideas and that is one that has been spoken about at length by many trainers.

i agree with you craig as it will help both buyer and seller in every way you look at it,,,if i like 2 lots and i know i wont get the 2nd one i will buy the 1st but if i dont know the reserve on the 2nd lot i will miss out on both if the 2nd one is my first pick of the 2

in my opinion trainers definately get the short end of the stick in sa..only passion for the game can make you train here...and they do not get enough credit for the fact that they are just about the only way owners are brought into the game here..trainers are the people who try to piece shares together in horses and often get new people involved!

ah yes the me myself and i king of the forum has hes say. we must all bow down

Dear Tom

Thank you for opening up the communication channel. This is a first good step. I agree with Mr Irwin's sentiments but would also add that unfortunately he has included himself in his own finger point in that with an attitude like his it is no wonder there is no new blood in racing. Any dumming down or help to change things that is forthcoming which would bring more owners, punters and industry participants into the game is valuable. It is a case of 'who needs who'.

What I would suggest to you Tom is to take a week and work your way through a couple of older posts on this site to get a feel for what people are generally unhappy about in racing. There have been some sincere posts which highlight the underlying problems and some good suggestions on how to fix it as well. Some of the problems belong on the TBA plate but it would be good if you could look at the whole picture and perhaps work into your plan of action some collaboration with all the industry players and agreement on a collective strategy for South Africa so as to overcome the dire straits and downward trend.

good luck.

Pirates what you have just written happened to me twice at one national sale. I was not amused especially when 1 of the 2 that went too much ended up in the breeders name when it ran. I could probably have bought both the 1st 2 that came up. Justinv I and most of my trainer friends have all had sleepless nights trying to put together horses that we have been left with. How many times has a trainer bought a horse and more importantly signed for it and then the prospective owner says he will take say 50%. You now have to run around trying to find guys to take the rest because you are liable.I bet 95% of trainers have had this. Training is not for the faint hearted.

craig i know what u saying..i was involved with cunha racing when we bought 5 or 6 from australia..owners were at the sale and agreed to purchasing a handful of horses..then when landing back in sa a few of them decided that they now only wanted to take half a share or none at all!!! what followed was months of trying to hustle literally millions from other or new owners!!

I am a big believer in collective strategies and energies as the answer to building up this industry -it has it's issues we all know that.

I want to sell more horses to both new and old owners on behalf of our breeders - I agree there are some serious obstacles to new owners from auction right through the entire racing experience.

I am going to help put some new ideas on the table for how racing bodies should be working together - teamwork is the only way to make this sport work properly again and I want to be part of the solution....

I am keen to talk to potential owners offline tom@tba.co.za to discuss some ideas I have on making their horse buying easy.

Auctions with reserves are done in other industries but have yet to take the racing world by storm - and won't for a while..

Trainers I am very keen to work with as they are the unsung hero's of our sport and need more support so once again email me to start a dialogue.

Issuing all buyers with a paddle number so as to see who is bidding genuinely and not just pushing the price up to an unrealistic price.

Bidding should start at the reserve (as at truck and cattle auctions) then if no bids all know that the reserve is too high.

Out back bidding should also be stopped so it is clear to interested buyers who the other bidders are.

Craig is right, most trainers can't spend so much time at sales anymore so an early reserve list, even published on the site, would save a lot of people a lot of time.