Buying Horse Training

What ever horse you pick to send off to the trainer, you are investing money into it's future abilities, and hopefully adding to it's potential worth. So you might ask yourself the question before you spend this money,"is this horse worth putting the money into?". Half of my client send me their children to school for as long as their budget will allow me to have them in class. The other half of my clients are sending me their invested "live stock", to add value to a marketable item in the competition arena and certainly at the registered sale, or at the time of liquidation.
I was tipped the other day when I trained a horse for a client and they paid me with a $10 tip added to the invoice. I was awakened to the idea again that I provide a service that could indeed be rated by my clients as very appreciated or not satisfactory. I have always looked at my job to teach horses how to act correctly around their owners and perform to their maximum level, as that of a school teacher. I'm sure my parents never tipped any of my school teachers, it was a job they were expected to perform because it was simply their job. Many folks now even send their dogs to a "school", and the dogs get grades, graduate, and move up into different classes. We must be talking about some real smart dogs. I would tip the dog trainer if he turned my mutt into a registered lab that could track and hunt anything. Do you tip a dog trainer who made a mean dog into a loyal animal that no longer bit your head off when you came home from work? He would be accomplishing more than I could get to happen with all the hours in a day working on it. That is why he has the job of training dogs right?
What horse in your barn are you sending off to the trainer to get more schooling. Your weanling, to get it started on it's halter training so you can show it as a yearling? Do you send the old horse in your barn off to get more schooling so it doesn't hurt it's self when you ask it to perform in the arena, or maybe showing it off in the local parade? It doesn't matter, what matters is that you have in your mind what it is you are doing. I have a client that sent a mustang paint filly to get broke. He just wants a horse to head steers in local jack-pot team-ropings. I ride it all winter and he puts his daughter on it at a pole-bending competition. ?+#*#?!!? The next horse this client sent me was another paint, this one is out of some good AQHA stock. The 3 year old filly caries her head low, lopes out slow and easy after three months of getting saddled, we'll only guess what she will get asked to do by it's owner. I would label this as a APHA client, however they do not know what APHA is. They just simply bought some horse training.
Do you ever go and get a hair cut when the beautician doesn't ask what you would like? If you are getting your hair cut just before you're getting an award, going to an important business venture, interview, or meeting the parents. There is meaning and reason for buying the service. I tell them I want you to turn me into Brad Pitt. No, When your hair messes up your day and won't any longer do what you want it to, you buy the service.
I can now see why I got that $10 dollar tip, when I finished the horse's hair cut, the owner liked how low maintenance his horse now was compared to before I started the service. They did more than just buy some horse training, they improved everyday life with their horse.
I have a training agreement for every horse I ride. Goals for your horse to improve on and Goals for the future of the horse are always the most difficult part for the owners to identify. I help them by showing them a few of the agreements forms on top of my pile. I encourage you to do this, don't even think about "buying horse training" just write down those goals for your student that is in school, dog, horse. I hope your goal in buying Horse Training isn't to change the horse's breeding.