Brighthill Farm have come up with a unique offering for breeders leading into the new breeding season.
In response to the COVID-19 pandemic, the Waikato farm has elected to reduce the service fees of all three of their stallions and offer two payment options to breeders.
“We are all looking at the times in front of us and everything is uncertain,” Brighthill Farm principal Nick King said.
“Our primary thinking behind it was really to help people keep breeding mares.
“As we all know breeding mares is a project where you don’t reap the rewards until sometimes two years later.
“It’s a long-term project and we are all very hopeful in the next couple of years we will be in good shape.
“It’s how you can assist breeders getting through these years, so we sat down with our stallion owners and came up with this initiative.
“We lowered service fees on all three stallions and set-up two payment options for people.
“One is a 10 percent discount on payment of 42 days (positive pregnancy test) or a payment plan breaking the payments up to six equal payments over six months.
“We are trying to make it as cost-effective as we could for them to keep going and breeding their mares.”
Four-time Group One winner Preferment’s fee has been lowered from $12,500+gst to $9,500+gst, while Group One performer Eminent’s fee has been reduced from $8,000+gst to $7,500+gst, and Dalghar’s fee has been lowered from $5,000+gst to $3,000+gst.
“We have got a lovely selection of stallions, we are very confident they are busy stallions,” King said.
“Preferment has averaged 114 mares every year he has stood so far and Eminent bred to 114 mares in his first season last year.
“The new initiatives are a way we could encourage people to keep breeding their mares and just get through this tricky time and hopefully at the far side we will all see the results.”
King is confident breeders will be able to get through these uncertain times, and he said the timing of the crisis still gives plenty of breeders time to make decisions prior to the upcoming breeding season.
“They are such a resilient bunch,” King said. “We did an awful amount of pedigree matings over the lockdown period and the phone and emails were pretty active.
“That’s one thing about our industry is that we are all resilient through difficult times and that is a positive.
“By the time we get around to our breeding season, and we have got another three months to go, people will have a far clearer idea of where the world is heading by then.
“So the timing from that perspective is really good.”
