Hi, I’m fairly new on here (and also wishing I hadn’t chosen such a stupid username) and I have a question:
Does anyone here work in horse transport and, if so, how do they find the business?
The reason I ask is that I’m converting a truck to a horsebox for my own private use, but I do have half an eye on a possible change of career in the future. I understand (I think) the O licence requirements etc and think I could satisfy them, but wonder if it would be feasible to earn a living running a small business in this specialised area.
private horse owners won’t pay enough to keep you in business - Racehorses are the only way to go!!
Ladytrucker knows more about it than me, I just do the odd horse job most of my work is cattle and sheep
Cheers for that Denis. Thats exactly the kind of advice I’m looking for. I’d always assumed that private owners would be good, because you probably wouldn’t have many cash flow problems with them. Certainly every time I’ve moved my own horse I coughed up in cash on the day of the move.
Is racehorse work difficult to break into? Just imagined it might be a bit of a closed shop.
I like your user name, it’s a bit clever or I’m a bit thick as I didn’t get it at first.
I know there are one or two people round here who run horse boxes as a business, but I think they have other forms of income.
However I think Racehorses might be a bit of a closed shop, but a market you could look at is livery yards. Many of the people who own horses at these don’t own boxes, but have to beg or hire trailers. If a few of them were going to a show then it might work out cheaper to hire a truck and driver for the day. I think the money would be there as these people (mainly Women) spend more on thier horses than they do themselves and are normally in good jobs with good pay. Ladytrucker is the person to talk to.
ERF, Wind & Fire:
Cheers for that Denis. Thats exactly the kind of advice I’m looking for. I’d always assumed that private owners would be good, because you probably wouldn’t have many cash flow problems with them. Certainly every time I’ve moved my own horse I coughed up in cash on the day of the move.
It depends how many friends they have with a 4x4 and trailer most round here faint when I quote them a quid a mile +VAT both ways
obviously if you’ve got enough to make up loads then it gets cheaper - but in my case that doesn’t happen very often!!
I did have a nice thing going, collecting horses to take to the abattoir near Bristol, but that relocated near Taunton so most take them in their trailers now ( except the squeamish ones)
I also make a point of NEVER doing shows/Competitions etc - too much waiting around to be worth the bother
There is a horse transporter near here with 4-5 lorries on the road, most of his work is racing, racehorse sales, in this country, Ireland and the odd trip into europe - any private stuff has to fit in with that.
Is racehorse work difficult to break into? Just imagined it might be a bit of a closed shop.
I’ve never done any, but I haven’t really tried I would imagine you are right you need to know the right people
Thanks again. It was livery yard work I was mainly thinking of, as thats the horsey area I’m familiar with. I think it might well depend on setting up in an area affluent enough to own horses, but not so affluent that they’ve all got their own box or trailer.
setting up in an area affluent enough to own horses, but not so affluent that they’ve all got their own box or trailer.
Its not a case of that ERF. More to the point that anyone who competes anything like regularly will have their own transport as it is too expensive to hire on a regular basis. Affluence doesnt come into it. We all go without other things or do stupid jobs like driving trucks to pay for the ponies and box
The racehorse game is very much a closed shop. Most trainers have their own transport and would only use the established firms who know the job for the spare work. The insurance for transporting such valuable animals would also make this expensive for a single operator. National transport is done mainly by 3 or 4 established firms who can do shared loads etc to keep the cost down. Local work is then down to tranporting animals to vets and vet hospitals in an emergency, shows and competitions (but see denis’s comments about the endless waiting) and work for a recovery firm.
This is simply my view as a horse owner and lorry driver. Ladytrucker is the real expert on this having worked in the industry. But I can tell you it would have to be a pretty special occasion for me to pay for transport. I would rather lose the entry fees that pay in excess of £100 to go to one show, and that would be a fairly local one.
Did somebody call■■?
Hi ERF, welcome to Tnet.
Like many specialised areas of the industry there are many closed doors, racehorse trainers do tend to run their own wagons to races but there are flights carrying large numbers of racehorses and breeding stock arriving and leaving all the time. Contractors are used for this and you see a regular bunch of lads at the airports, the polo pony season is usually very busy and its all hands on deck. This type of work is usually handled by a specialist firm who book the applicable wagons for the job. Walldalls are a main player in this game and if you would like a contact number then please pm me. There is better paid work but this is the bread and butter that will keep your wagon on the road, a growing market for re-location pays better but is less consistant. Many people have their hands full with the house move and prefer to trust their stock to a specialist, there is a fair amount of re-location work running into europe and it is possible to back load to the UK from various european airports. It is important though to make sure that whoever is driving your wagon is very experienced in both driving and horse management because the value of the stock you will come across runs into 100,000’s of pounds. A specific company has the monopoly on military work so this is pretty much impossible to break into.
If there is anything else you would like to know then please just ask and I will try to help.
Although Nessa is right saying that anybody attending loads of horse shows will have transport sorted, not everybody who has a horse at livery attends loads of shows and they can’t justify the expense of owning a horse box. This seems to be the case at my mothers yard and on the rare occassions they want to go to a show they have to borrow or hire her trailer (depending how generous she’s feeling at the time ) and due to it’s size find a 4x4 to pull it. However there have been times when a few of them have got together and paid for a horse box.
Saying this I think it would be difficult to make a living just out of transporting horses, but I do know of somebody who runs a truck with a demountable body and swaps between horse boxes and flatbeds.
"A specific company has the monopoly on military work so this is pretty much impossible to break into.
Would that be John Parker? I’m military, and he moved my horse to and from Cyprus when the postings came up. I’ll have to admit that it was the experience of that posting that gave me the initial idea for this.
As an aside, I’ve already had other serving soldiers asking me to move their horses on posting, which I had to decline as the truck’s not finished and, of course, the O licence thingy.
muckles:
Saying this I think it would be difficult to make a living just out of transporting horses, but I do know of somebody who runs a truck with a demountable body and swaps between horse boxes and flatbeds.
Now this is where I either sound really clever or show what a naive fool I am!
I’ve designed and am building the conversion myself and I need it to also be able to move my 3 very poor excuses for classic cars (all in various states of disrepair), and be able to take all my stuff on posting, preferably on pallets. So the partitions are all on runners and can be run up to the bulkhead or removed completely. The ramp is designed to be used at two different lengths, one giving a low break over angle. The ramp can also be swung away, in much the same way as a 2 way window, to allow access for forklifts. The truck will also have a winch (as my cars keep breaking down).
The upshot of all that is the possibility of diversifying into covered car transport or general work when not moving horses. Again, do you think this is feasible or am I just dreaming?
ERF, Wind & Fire:
[The upshot of all that is the possibility of diversifying into covered car transport or general work when not moving horses. Again, do you think this is feasible or am I just dreaming?
You need to think of a good way of cleaning the box, as not everybody likes the smell of horses, think of you make it to complicated it’ll end up not doing anything properly.
Although one thing you have is contacts who need horses relocated, might be a good start.
P.S. I don’t think you are like the 4x2 thread, because you are thinking the problems through before you commit yourself.
This is just one option I’m considering for when my military career comes to its end, which isn’t for a while yet. If do start up as an OD I will have a slight advantage in that the truck is completely paid for and my pension can take care of the mortgage, but the bottom line is, well, just that - the bottom line. If it can’t be made to work as a viable business that I can earn a living from, it won’t be happening.
As an outsider to the industry at the moment, I get the impression that some budding owner drivers think its all about running trucks and transport, when from what I can see its really about running a business.
Mind you, if you think transport is over regulated and unfairly given a bad image in the media (which I do), you should see my other career option, which is to continue working in my current specialisation - explosives. Now that that is a mess of legislation and bad press!
ERF, Wind & Fire:
Mind you, if you think transport is over regulated and unfairly given a bad image in the media (which I do), you should see my other career option, which is to continue working in my current specialisation - explosives. Now that that is a mess of legislation and bad press!
You could always Dolittle (as in Castle Coombe/ Sir Ran)
"A specific company has the monopoly on military work so this is pretty much impossible to break into.
Would that be John Parker? I’m military, and he moved my horse to and from Cyprus when the postings came up. I’ll have to admit that it was the experience of that posting that gave me the initial idea for this.
As an aside, I’ve already had other serving soldiers asking me to move their horses on posting, which I had to decline as the truck’s not finished and, of course, the O licence thingy.
I know John Parker but what I meant by military work was shifting the household cavalry and Herendon are the only wagons you will see in knightsbridge!
Can’t add anything at all to this debate except to say if you are an explosive expert, why not find out if Ian Young knows anything about horse transport. Could be a (commercial) marriage made in heaven
As regards your username, it is quite clever apart from the fact that I’ve never heard anybody with any experience in this industry pronounce that truck name any other than ee-ar-eff. Now if you could come up with something like MAN & Machine, then you could be onto a winner .
I will re-inforce one piece of advice though,
Muckles:
You need to think of a good way of cleaning the box, as not everybody likes the smell of horses, think of you make it to complicated it’ll end up not doing anything properly.
and reckon that you would be better off with a proper demount system, ie seperate purpose-built bodies rather than a jack-of-all-trades master-of-none affair.
ERF, Wind & Fire:
Mind you, if you think transport is over regulated and unfairly given a bad image in the media (which I do), you should see my other career option, which is to continue working in my current specialisation - explosives. Now that that is a mess of legislation and bad press!
Spardo:
As regards your username, it is quite clever apart from the fact that I’ve never heard anybody with any experience in this industry pronounce that truck name any other than ee-ar-eff. Now if you could come up with something like MAN & Machine, then you could be onto a winner .
Funny …as I always say ‘em-ay-en’ when it comes to MAN.
Do lots of people just say ‘man’, as in male person?
) and due to it’s size find a 4x4 to pull it. However there have been times when a few of them have got together and paid for a horse box.
