Scottish Eventers - 2013?

[Roasted Chestnuts]

Such a shame though about those being cancelled

My nearest would be drumclog and oatridge for the little un if we get out hunting this winter, if not then might just be unaff ODEs for us with maybe a bash at 80t at drumclog so HOPEFULLY we won't lose that one as well

 

[dominobrown]

Would any of you say these events are under-supported?
Personally I think BE needs to pull there finger out and get more events spread more evenly over the country, or charge a smaller membership fee for those in the north and scotland.
I

 

[Jnhuk]

Would any of you say these events are under-supported?
Personally I think BE needs to pull there finger out and get more events spread more evenly over the country, or charge a smaller membership fee for those in the north and scotland.
I

I think the events in the far north of Scotland struggle for numbers like Burgie. However, a group of local BEers travelled the near five hour drive up there for wee Burgie and spent the weekend having lots of fun in glorious weather so sometimes it does work out but you are more likely to do that when there is a gathering of friends to make it a fun weekend away but that presumes that you can take the Friday off work to allow you to travel up there.

If you look at the BE events in map view, it shows up very clearly the sparseness of events - south west - cornwall/devon, wales, lancashire and scotland. There don't seem to be ANY events in North Ireland - this surprised me! British Eventing will soon need to be renamed to English Eventing!

 

[wench]

The events in NI are run under Eventing Ireland.

 

[Gamebird]

Well James Oakden has certainly had an interesting idea in H&H today - £100 entry/£20 start fee for BE90/100 and £150 entry/£25 start fee for Novice .

I wonder how many of the Oakden family's numerous eventers would still get runs at that price? Mine certainly wouldn't. It may make the sums add up but not if everyone stops competing.

 

[bogpony]

Well James Oakden has certainly had an interesting idea in H&H today - £100 entry/£20 start fee for BE90/100 and £150 entry/£25 start fee for Novice .

I wonder how many of the Oakden family's numerous eventers would still get runs at that price? Mine certainly wouldn't. It may make the sums add up but not if everyone stops competing.

Certainly interesting...I can't say I'd like to see entry fees go up whatsoever, but we are in the very serious position in Scotland that we stand to lose all our events if things do not improve economically or if BE don't pull their finger out and shoulder the financial risk of volunteer committees running on little/no money.

Would I pay more? Yes, but it would mean prioritising where I compete and ultimately supporting fewer events... But I'd rather do this than have no competitions at all.
Surely the best scenario is for competitors to be able to afford to support all of Scotland's competitions - how do we get that??

Sadly I don't think half the BE competitors have an iota of an idea how much work is ploughed into events by volunteers for no money whatsoever - I also don't think BE has any idea how things actually work in Scotland compared to the commercial enterprises driving the sport in England.

 

[DarkHorseB]

Well James Oakden has certainly had an interesting idea in H&H today - £100 entry/£20 start fee for BE90/100 and £150 entry/£25 start fee for Novice .

I wonder how many of the Oakden family's numerous eventers would still get runs at that price? Mine certainly wouldn't. It may make the sums add up but not if everyone stops competing.

No I cannot see any way (short of a lottery win) that I would be eventing at £175 for a Novice. Add on top an average diesel spend an outing of say £75 and you are looking at £250 a run.

As a one horse amateur with a youngish horse I think both of us go better when we have had a few runs close together and as bogpony says only alternative would be to go out far less - I'd be looking at 6 runs at very most. I would worry about how well a true amateur with only a horse or two could keep their eye in and look to progress at this kind of cost. You'd have to be seriously wealthy or sponsored. I bet at these kind of prices owners would be scaling back horses too. The only way these kind of prices could work is if there were a load of new events local to me and I was going to save a fortune in diesel! I would be definitely switching to pure SJ and dressage if a move like that was on the cards and have fun going XC schooling several times a year instead I think.

 

[Jnhuk]

Well James Oakden has certainly had an interesting idea in H&H today - £100 entry/£20 start fee for BE90/100 and £150 entry/£25 start fee for Novice .

I wonder how many of the Oakden family's numerous eventers would still get runs at that price? Mine certainly wouldn't. It may make the sums add up but not if everyone stops competing.

Not seen the article yet but I can't believe those prices.

Will they get enough folks compete at those prices do you think? The facebook survey double amount of folks answered no than yes to the following question "Given the recent loss of key venues in Scotland's BE calendar, would you be willing to pay increased entry fees to help safeguard the future of eventing competitions?"

Eventing may become beyond the hard working amateur trying to compete.

Not happy

 

[MagicMelon]

I think BE need to seriously look at the 'max 4 day ticket ' rule for Scottish riders. I have 2 horses so faced with a £350 bill to register for BE. I think in Scotland a 'pay per use' ie ticket system would recognise that we have much fewer opportunities to compete than those in England and allow us to pay accordingly.

If this rule is not changed then more people turning to tickets will lower entries and jeopardise the success of events

Good idea. Dont see why they have that rule anyway.

James Oakdens idea of £175 for a novice is absolutely ridiculous. Novice is still very much in reach of your everyday amateur so this is seriously pricing a lot of them out of it (myself included). All equestrian sports have been desperately trying to shake off the "rich person only hobby" image, yet if they make it THIS expensive then its going backwards to that again! What a joke. BS for me next year and maybe some RC ODE's instead!

As someone has said, we DO struggle for numbers up here for events like Burgie (although Aswanley was very well subscribed but then its that little bit closer for southern folk I guess). We struggle, not because there arent enough riders up here who want to do it (we've got a huge equestrian population here!), but simply because IMO they are going into BS or BD instead because there's not enough events BE to bother, so its a difficult one...

Does anyone else know what other countries membership and entry fees are for eventing? Would be interesting to compare.

 

[wench]

Think EI's prices are similiar to BE. And you also have to volenteer (or provide a volenteer) for a certain amount of events.

 

[AnShanDan]

I think events would be even less profitable if entries were increased by so much.

Total revenue is equal to price (the entry fee) times quantity (number of competitors), determining which changes more (price or quantity) as a result of a price increase will determine whether total revenue will increase or decrease . This is the elasticity of demand. Basically it measures the responsiveness of the quantity demanded to a change in price. Things like bread are price inelastic (it is a necessity, takes up a small proportion of your income, not many substitutes, etc), cigarettes are price inelastic (they are addictive!) on the other hand luxury holidays are price elastic.

Horse trials entries are likely to be price elastic (only reason it might not be so elastic is that eventing is addictive too ) which means a significant increase in price will inevitably lead to a decrease in total revenue,especially in the long run as people change to other disciplines.

This will mean even less profit for events and more will disappear.

At the lower levels (90, 100) it is feasible to just enter a few per year and still be competitive/safe, plus at these levels there are some PC and RC events.

At Novice and above you just can't do this: you need to get out and get the runs to progress safely, especially with a young horse. So areas where events are very thin on the ground at even more at risk.

The overall effect of hiking prices by as much as James' is suggesting would not work, maybe he is playing devil's advocate?

 

[bogpony]

I agree AnShanDan....

But sadly you need to factor in that we're also talking about a supply and demand scenario...and right now, whilst we have the demand (competitors wanting to compete), we are being increasingly stripped of the supply (the competitions to actually go to)...

The supply and demand issue could well bring your scenario back to the inelastic - although I suspect entries would certainly take a hit for the first year or so.
It's not like we actually have that much in the way of BS in central scotland anyway...

Let's hope BE comes up with some better solutions to help organisers and competitors out.