Livery yard & riding school owners

Slightly different, we are primarily a stud, but also school horses for people and offer boarding (UK full livery) .
We started by attaching ourselves to my fathers business (A stud, but for driving horses, whereas we are performance PRE and QHs), to use his facilities and advertise on his website, so I'd guess the equivalent for you would be to rent all or part of a more established yard until you have and established clientele?
 
Livery yard owner here.
1st of all sort out premises - we moved my horses on whilst part of the stables were still being buillt but it gave us extra time to work things out etc. Then had a mass advertising campaign - we used to do tours! would meet 3 potential clients in the local pub car park plus whoever they brought with them (1 once brought her entire yard with her!) and then they would follow us up (had electric gates etc so was easier to do it like that), filled up the stables, had far too much grass so took on extra grass liveries....
held a show a few years later to help people realise we are not that far away - as we are 4 miles from the edge of town many assume we are too far away - until we get them to actually drive it and realise what facilities they can get for an extra 7 minutes drive!
then ticked over for nearly 10 years this april - in which time we have put in an outdoor (pretty much a waste of money as most use the indoor anyway), have had all sorts of issues with liveries/horses/suppliers/farmers over the years.
But all in all - its not been that bad :)

thats really the short version but if there is anything specific you want to know feel free to ask :)
 
for my familys riding school, we moved into the area, put loads of stables up and a menage for our personal horses. everyone noticed, asked if we did riding lessons, and the rest is history! its good as we can keep all the old ponies we used to learn to ride on, then bring in horses that we've bred, as they come through.
 
We're currently setting up a small yard to do DIY and part livery. Initially we were just looking for somewhere to have the horses at home but realised it's actually cheaper and easier (around here anyway!) to find somewhere with 50+ acres than it is to get the coveted 'equestrian property' with 10-15. There's also not many places around here with decent facilities so we're hoping to fill a gap. :) We're in the process of putting up some extra stables in a barn and will be installing an outdoor arena as soon as we get planning permission. I think the most important thing is finding the right place - we spent nearly 3 years renting and looked at around 20 properties before we found the right one. A sympathetic bank manager is also pretty important - unless you're lucky enough to have the money there already!
 
We found our premises by a lucky stumble!
In farmers guardian someone was selling 40 acres of land, we called to say we were interested - but not in all of it but if someone else enquired who also didnt want as much we could maybe split it. He asked what we wanted it for and it would have just been for our owm horses.
We had a call a couple of weeks later and he asked us to go and see him as he had an idea.... we went down and he offered to build us a yard in one of the building, there were already 3 large boxes outside and an indoor. Initially we walked away as the rent he wanted was CRAZY money but again, he called us back a couple of weeks later and renegociated so we thought why not try it!
It is so much better than we could have ever hoped for as we can have all year grazing - something yards in my area dont have. Plus with an indoor! Over the years we have had another 3 boxes put in another building, then another 4 added on.
I dread the day we no longer have the place as the man has it (main house, helicopter hangers, cottages, outbuildings, stables, and land) for sale :( the positive is that its on the market for £4.5 million and well, if i had a lottery win i dont think i would pay that for the place.

Other people who i know who have yards have all found them via word of mouth - one yard that changes hands a lot is normally advertised locally but it does always seem to change hands but i think for the rent they have it for, its hard to make it pay hence people give up after a while.
 
We are in the process of doing this at the moment! Spent several years looking, saw lots of unsuitable properties. Finally found one last year that will work for us (with a LOT of upgrading/start up costs) and hoping to open our doors (gates?!) at the beginning of May. We spent years trawling the equestrian estate agents and local rural estate agents as well. Also auction sites, agricultural property sites etc (even ebay!!). Estate agents also have off-market properties that you can ask about but we never had any joy using this approach. However, for the property we are finally purchasing, we found it by word of mouth in the end. Also spent years working on a business plan - very important if you intend to borrow from the bank.
 
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