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Transcript

Where Does All the Money Go? · Two Point Perspective

• 0:00
  My family always asks me, do you think you could sell your horse and make money?
• 0:04
  And the answer is, maybe if I sold her fairly soon and the market was right, maybe I could.
• 0:12
  But that's not why I bought her.
• 0:13
  I bought her to ride.
• 0:15
  So the longer I keep her, the more I spend on her.
• 0:19
  Her board training, vet bills showing, of course, and eventually, just because she gets older, her resale value is probably going to go the other way.
• 0:31
  But that's a very different equation from parts of the jumper world where there's at least the possibility of winning enough money to make a dent in what all of this costs.
• 0:42
  And yet the horse industry itself is huge.
• 0:47
  So if there is this much money in this sport, why is it still so hard for people to afford to participate?
• 0:55
  And now that outside investors are interested too, what exactly are they seeing?
• 1:01
  This is two point perspective.
• 1:03
  Two riders with different viewpoints from different generations talking about the same sport.
• 1:11
  I think the hard part is that we look at all of this and just think, this is expensive.
• 1:15
  We know what board costs, we know what horse shows cost, and we know what happens when the bet comes.
• 1:20
  An investor can look at those same numbers and also see a business opportunity.
• 1:24
  And when you really look at those numbers, it's enormous.
• 1:28
  The American Horse Council puts the total impact of the US horse industry at about 177 billion.
• 1:38
  But this is the part that's important.
• 1:40
  That doesn't mean that there's 177 billion in profit floating around the horse business.
• 1:47
  No, because a huge amount of that money is somebody paying somebody else.
• 1:52
  And you pay the barn, you have the employees, the hay, the grain.
• 1:56
  The horse show pays staff and rents equipment.
• 1:58
  And veterinary practices have payroll, they have equipment, they have medication and vehicles.
• 2:03
  It's economic activity which is different than just a massive huge profit.
• 2:08
  And let's not forget the actual value that the horses hold, which makes much.
• 2:13
  More sense when you think about what we actually see.
• 2:17
  For example, I just went to a show.
• 2:18
  It was an A show, but all I did was two USHJ practice classes and the adult amateur division.
• 2:27
  And my show bill was $881.
• 2:31
  That didn't include any training fees I hauled myself and that didn't include my hotel or meals.
• 2:39
  So another writer could have easily have spent 1500 or $2000 in the same weekend.
• 2:45
  So if you multiply that by everybody at the show, there's obviously a lot of money changing hands, but I guess the show also has bills too.
• 2:55
  Sure.
• 2:55
  And they have a lot of them.
• 2:56
  And I, I don't Think that we can just graze over that fact and say, oh, horses are, you know, horseshoes are expensive, there is overhead and you've got to pay for a well run show.
• 3:05
  But sometimes I think we see our bill and just assume that the person we're paying has to be doing really well.
• 3:10
  And maybe that's true and maybe it's not, but everybody's gotta get paid.
• 3:15
  And there's another part of my horse show bill that we haven't even talked about, which is the USEF fees.
• 3:21
  Because if I want to compete at a rated show, I'm paying my membership, I'm paying USEF fees at the show, my horse has to be recorded, and I have to pay a membership fee to the ushja.
• 3:35
  And none of those fees by themselves are necessarily enormous, but in the end, they all add up.
• 3:42
  Oh, yeah, sure.
• 3:42
  And Yousef is a nonprofit, and that doesn't necessarily mean just because they're a nonprofit that there isn't money being made.
• 3:49
  However, it still has employees and it has programs to run and it has to have reserves and investments and it can bring in more than it spends in a particular year.
• 3:59
  The difference is that there aren't owners and shareholders taking the earnings out of the company.
• 4:03
  I've worked side by side some of the, like Yousef program employees, and they're wonderful, amazing people and they put a lot of work and a lot of effort into the finals and the programs that they put on.
• 4:16
  So it's.
• 4:17
  It's hard as a competitor and an owner to feel like you're pouring all of this money in to it.
• 4:22
  But I also have seen firsthand just how hard those people work to put on an event that we get to enjoy.
• 4:30
  And Yousef obviously is a fairly large organization.
• 4:35
  And for example, in 2025, the budget was about $38.7 million.
• 4:42
  So membership dues and fees were just a little over a quarter of that.
• 4:47
  And then there were the competition fees, the drugs and medication fee sponsorships, and I guess some other sources of revenue.
• 4:55
  So when people complain about membership fees or horse recordings or something on the show bill, I think we forget that, as you said, Yousef has expenses too.
• 5:06
  Well, drug testing alone is expensive.
• 5:08
  They collected about 5.8 million in drugs and medication fees last year.
• 5:12
  And Yousef says that money goes back into running that program.
• 5:16
  Right.
• 5:17
  And obviously drug testing matters, sure, rules matter, safety matters.
• 5:22
  Those are all things that you would expect a national governing body to provide.
• 5:27
  But that doesn't mean members are going to agree with every rule or every program or every decision about how the money is spent.
• 5:36
  And sure, when people see some of the executive compensations, they're going to ask questions about that, too, regardless of, you know, how hard they work.
• 5:46
  There's another part of the drug testing business that I didn't realize either.
• 5:50
  Yousef outsources the actual laboratory testing to the University of Kentucky, and that laboratory also serves other equine clients.
• 6:01
  Yousef itself paid about 2.36 million for its lab contract last year.
• 6:07
  And then this year, Yousef bought an ownership stake in Equa Ratings through a for profit subsidy.
• 6:16
  So calling it a nonprofit doesn't mean that there isn't a fairly sophisticated financial operation, because clearly there is.
• 6:25
  It has membership and competition, revenue, outside revenue, investments and reserves, and it's making business decisions intended to strengthen the organization financially.
• 6:38
  Sure.
• 6:38
  And that doesn't necessarily mean that your membership fee bought that investment.
• 6:43
  Yousef says it used earnings from its investment portfolio.
• 6:47
  But it does show that nonprofit doesn't mean that there isn't financial strategy involved.
• 6:52
  Right.
• 6:53
  And I'm not saying Yousef shouldn't have reserves or shouldn't pay good people or shouldn't invest money.
• 6:59
  My question's a lot simpler.
• 7:01
  To your point.
• 7:02
  Transparency.
• 7:03
  Can the show explain its fees?
• 7:05
  Can Yousef explain its fees?
• 7:08
  My trainer has to explain her bill, and the vet explains his bill, and the hotel explains why rooms cost more.
• 7:17
  So everybody can have a perfectly legitimate reason for what they're charging me, but I can still reach a point where I can't afford that total.
• 7:27
  Well, right.
• 7:27
  I mean, that's the difference.
• 7:28
  Nobody has to be doing anything wrong for the total to become or feel like it's too much.
• 7:34
  Yes, because everybody's looking at a piece of their bill.
• 7:37
  Nobody's looking at the entire thing from my side and asking whether I can still pay all of it.
• 7:44
  Right.
• 7:44
  And it isn't just the horse shows.
• 7:46
  I mean, look at tack and clothing.
• 7:48
  We all know what we spend there.
• 7:50
  And you'd think a big national retailer selling to this particular customer would.
• 7:57
  Would have a.
• 7:58
  Have to be a pretty good business.
• 8:01
  So what happened to Dover?
• 8:04
  That really surprised me because if you'd asked me which equestrian company ought to be able to make money, Dover salary would have been pretty high on my list.
• 8:16
  I mean, they were.
• 8:16
  They had locations everywhere.
• 8:18
  They had the stores, the catalog, the website.
• 8:21
  All of us bought stuff from them.
• 8:24
  I had no idea.
• 8:25
  But Dover was bought by a private equity firm in 2022 with plans to grow the company.
• 8:32
  And then it took on additional financing, and within four years, it collapsed.
• 8:39
  Well, and I think we have to be careful there because we don't know enough to say private equity caused Dover to fail.
• 8:44
  No, we can't say that.
• 8:46
  But what we can say is that Dover had a very recognizable brand.
• 8:51
  A national customer base.
• 8:53
  Absolutely.
• 8:53
  And customers who spend a lot of money.
• 8:56
  And that still wasn't enough to make the company work in the form that it was in.
• 9:01
  So I don't get it.
• 9:03
  But clearly Equestrians didn't suddenly stop needing stuff.
• 9:07
  Well, I can tell you one thing is that it's going to be sorely missed here in Charlottesville.
• 9:12
  Retail is itself is expensive.
• 9:14
  You have to have inventory, stores, leases, employees, shipping and warehousing.
• 9:20
  And you're buying merchandise before you even sell it.
• 9:22
  And you've got to fill the store, you've got to fill the space.
• 9:24
  And so the overhead of that is pretty substantial.
• 9:28
  And you can have a lot of sales but still have a business that's struggling.
• 9:31
  I mean, the money that has to go out before you start making any is a lot.
• 9:36
  And what happened after Dover failed makes that even more interesting.
• 9:41
  Greenhawk has taken over 10 of the old Dover locations.
• 9:44
  I actually saw some ads where they're opening up a couple very soon.
• 9:49
  And they didn't take the Dover Company, the old inventory, and certainly not the Dover name.
• 9:55
  But they chose 10 stores, they negotiated new leases and they're reopening them as Greenhawk stores with new merchandise.
• 10:05
  So the market for a tax store is apparently still there.
• 10:09
  Very much so.
• 10:09
  The our Charlottesville location is one of them.
• 10:12
  But they didn't take every store.
• 10:14
  Greenhawk took the locations that they wanted.
• 10:16
  And Greenhawk is family owned versus equity or private equity invested.
• 10:23
  They already opened a US Store and spent a couple of years learning the market.
• 10:28
  Then Dover failed and they chose 10 locations they thought they could make work.
• 10:33
  So again, the tax door business didn't disappear.
• 10:37
  The old company failed and somebody else decided that selected pieces of that business still made sense.
• 10:44
  Which tells you that what the customer pays and what the business makes are two totally different numbers.
• 10:48
  And that's what finally made the private equity make a little more sense to me.
• 10:52
  I think I assumed that investors come into an industry because all the businesses in it are already making huge profits.
• 11:01
  But that isn't necessarily what they're looking for, is it?
• 11:06
  I mean, I wouldn't think so.
• 11:07
  They can look at a company and believe that they can grow it and change the way it's run or combine it with something else and reduce costs and develop part of that business that hasn't Been making as much
• 11:17
  money as it, you know, as it could.
• 11:19
  They're investing because they believe that they can make the company worth more.
• 11:22
  It's just, you know, and we should.
• 11:24
  Probably explain private equity plainly because not everybody listening to this spends their day reading the financial news news.
• 11:33
  Maybe we should with the business that we're in.
• 11:36
  But a private equity firm raises money from investors and uses that money to buy or invest in companies.
• 11:45
  So the goal is to make those companies more valuable and ultimately earn a return.
• 11:51
  The investment can also give a business money to expand, upgrade technology, buy another company, or do something that it couldn't have afforded on its own, which can, you know, ultimately be a good thing for the company.
• 12:03
  If you, if you wanted to grow and you need capital, somebody's got to provide it.
• 12:07
  But that investor expects to make money, too.
• 12:11
  So we've added another financial interest that has to be satisfied.
• 12:15
  So here's where I could get lost.
• 12:17
  We're already talking about riders struggling with the cost, horse businesses that can have high revenue without huge profit and a governing body that has its own expenses and financial needs.
• 12:32
  And investors are still saying, we think there's an opportunity here.
• 12:37
  What do they think they can do differently?
• 12:40
  I just wonder what they're seeing that we aren't.
• 12:44
  Well, there isn't just one kind of outside investment coming into the sport either.
• 12:48
  No.
• 12:48
  Take cvc.
• 12:50
  And if you've never heard of cvc, it's a huge global investment company.
• 12:55
  It manages private money and it invests in businesses it believes it can grow.
• 13:02
  It already has major sports investments in things like professional tennis, rugby, and European soccer.
• 13:09
  And CDC has now agreed to buy a controlling interest in Equine Network.
• 13:17
  And Equine Network isn't just a publication.
• 13:19
  It has events and memberships, media businesses in several parts of the equestrian sport.
• 13:24
  So CVC isn't looking at some little horse magazine and deciding it wants to own 1.
• 13:29
  Exactly.
• 13:30
  CVC estimates that the part of the equestrian industry Equine Network serves being competitions, events, memberships and media is about a $2.5 billion market.
• 13:45
  So they aren't saying Equine Network itself is worth 2.5 billion.
• 13:50
  They're saying there's a very large amount of business being done in the areas where Equine Network already operates.
• 13:58
  And they believe clearly there's more of that business that they can capture.
• 14:03
  Right.
• 14:04
  That could be sponsorship or maybe it's media or more events or memberships.
• 14:08
  They, you know, maybe it's.
• 14:09
  They can do more or grow the audience.
• 14:11
  The Equine Network already Has there are ways to grow without simply charging the same rider another fee.
• 14:18
  And I sure hope that's what happens, because horse people are already paying for almost everything.
• 14:25
  We pay to own the horse, to train it, to ship it, show it.
• 14:29
  And then half the time, we're the audience, too.
• 14:32
  There's only so much more you can get from this same little person.
• 14:38
  Well, and I think that that's like a big topic of conversation right now that, that you were just saying is that it feels like you're getting double hit everywhere you turn.
• 14:47
  And at some point, people, you know, change what they're doing.
• 14:51
  They.
• 14:51
  They'll show less or they'll stay closer to home.
• 14:53
  They don't buy another horse.
• 14:54
  They cut their subscriptions to stuff.
• 14:56
  It's just, you feel like you're getting t single second or they leave.
• 15:01
  And I think.
• 15:02
  Right.
• 15:02
  That's the part of any discussion about growing the sport.
• 15:06
  That has to be included.
• 15:08
  Can you make an equestrian company more valuable without making riding or showing any more affordable?
• 15:18
  A company can grow its revenue.
• 15:20
  It can add events, it can sell more sponsorships or become worth more to its investors, but the rider may still be paying just as much, if not more, to participate.
• 15:31
  And those are two very different kinds of growth.
• 15:35
  And we don't know that an investor is promising to make the sport more affordable.
• 15:39
  Probably not, no.
• 15:42
  I'm sure that's not what they need to do for their clients.
• 15:45
  But affordability still matters to the sport because if the business gets bigger while the number of people who can afford to participate gets smaller, then sooner or later those two things will create a consequence.
• 16:00
  Well, the Premier Jumping League may be trying to solve a different part of the problem because they're looking for money outside of the competitors themselves.
• 16:07
  And that's really interesting.
• 16:09
  McCourt Global is backing the Premier Jumping League, which starts in 2027, and they've guaranteed 300 million in prize money over the first three seasons.
• 16:22
  100 million in the first season alone.
• 16:25
  And when I saw that number, I thought it sounded enormous.
• 16:28
  But then I started looking at what already happens in some of the Western sports.
• 16:34
  And the money there is on a completely different scale from what we're used to in hunters and equitation.
• 16:41
  The NRHA Futurity pays 350,000 to the Level 4 Open Champion and the total purse.
• 16:51
  And the prizes are more than 3.5 million in reigned cow horse.
• 16:57
  The 2025 Snafflebit Futurity Champion won 200,000.
• 17:03
  And the world Series of Team Roping in Las Vegas had an 18 million dollar total payout in 2025.
• 17:11
  Oh, yeah, big prize money already exists, there's no question about it.
• 17:14
  It's just not distributed in the same way across every discipline.
• 17:17
  I was just having a conversation with somebody who's in a Western discipline and they're feeling the rise in cost.
• 17:24
  But I do know, like in the non pro and in the lower levels, they still seem to have like a decent amount of prize money attached to a win.
• 17:34
  And I feel like that trickle down doesn't necessarily occur in our discipline.
• 17:39
  So like we have high dollar classes, but it's sort of like for the highest level of that particular group.
• 17:50
  Well, right.
• 17:50
  And I think that's what makes this interesting because other sports have figured out ways to support much bigger payouts, whether it's through sponsorships or breeding programs, different kind of entry structures, spectators, sales, whatever the mix is.
• 18:06
  So when Premier Jumping League talks about putting that kind of money into show jumping, maybe the question isn't whether horse sports can support big prize money.
• 18:19
  We already know parts of it can.
• 18:22
  Right.
• 18:22
  So the question is whether show jumping can build the business around it.
• 18:28
  They're trying to build a professional sports league, not another ordinary horse show.
• 18:34
  Right.
• 18:34
  And this actually reminds me a little of what happened with lacrosse.
• 18:39
  The Premier Lacrosse League started several years ago with outside investors and tried to do something very similar.
• 18:46
  Take a sport with a passionate following and turn the professional level into something a much bigger audience would watch.
• 18:55
  And apparently investors still believe in it.
• 18:57
  They just raised another hundred million this year and ESPN is both carrying the league and investing in it.
• 19:07
  Wow.
• 19:07
  And I mean, that doesn't necessarily mean that they've solved every part of that business yet either they've just managed to make make the professional lacrosse valuable enough that investors and a major broadcaster want to keep putting money into
• 19:19
  it.
• 19:19
  And Maybe that's what McCourt thinks is possible with show jumping.
• 19:23
  Not simply a more expensive horse show, but a sports property that eventually has value because people want to watch it.
• 19:31
  Right.
• 19:32
  Which means they need an audience, they need sponsors, they need people who aren't necessarily riders to care enough to watch it.
• 19:37
  And I can understand why, if you're going to start trying to build a professional spectator sport out of one of our disciplines, you would start with show jumping.
• 19:48
  If you know absolutely nothing about horses, you can still understand it pretty quickly.
• 19:53
  There's a clock, there's faults, the rails stay up or they don't.
• 19:57
  And it's exciting to watch.
• 19:58
  We already know it can draw enormous crowds in Europe, but that doesn't Mean, you can simply bring great jumping to the United States and put it in a big arena and assume that people will come.
• 20:11
  We saw that happen this summer at the World cup finals in Fort Worth.
• 20:16
  Derek Braun and Split Rock put some of the best horses and riders in the world in a major arena.
• 20:23
  And some of the earlier sessions had a lot of empty seats.
• 20:27
  The championship sessions did much better, but it showed how hard it is to build that spectator audience here.
• 20:36
  And there's another problem.
• 20:37
  If you're trying to build an audience, people actually have to be able to watch it.
• 20:44
  I saw something from Equerry.
• 20:49
  I don't know how you say that, but looking at what it can cost to follow equestrian sport online, if you're subscribing to several of the major streaming services and buying individual event passes, they estimated you could spend €4
• 21:05
  or €500 a year just watching.
• 21:08
  That's a pretty big ask for somebody who isn't already a horse person.
• 21:12
  Oh, for sure.
• 21:13
  I mean, I think it's a big ask for somebody who is a horse person.
• 21:16
  If you're trying to create new fans, you probably don't want their first experience to be figuring out which subscription they need and whether or not they want to pay for it.
• 21:23
  I mean, if you think about, like, okay, my husband's.
• 21:26
  Okay, well, he's a bad example.
• 21:28
  He's into every sport that's ever on the tv.
• 21:31
  But if he was trying to get me to get into it, to watch it, whatever that sport may be, he doesn't want to spend 100, 250, 500 just to be like, sit down and watch this.
• 21:43
  It's really cool.
• 21:44
  Well, it's like, clip my horse is pretty expensive and okay, well, I pay for that.
• 21:50
  But you're a rider.
• 21:51
  You're not a new audience.
• 21:53
  That's what I'm saying.
• 21:54
  Yeah.
• 21:54
  Like, I wouldn't expect that somebody who didn't already know what they were watching, like, that would be like asking me to go buy a.
• 22:02
  A sports subscription so I could watch tennis on my phone.
• 22:07
  Like, I'm not going to do that.
• 22:08
  Right.
• 22:08
  And that's why I think the Premier Jumping League is trying to do more than just put on great jumping.
• 22:14
  They're trying to create teams that have personalities and rivalries, basically trying to give somebody who doesn't ride a reason to follow it.
• 22:23
  So maybe that's really what McCourt is betting on.
• 22:26
  We already have the sport.
• 22:28
  The question is whether they can build the audience.
• 22:32
  Well.
• 22:32
  And if somebody has never owned a horse, watches it, you've actually brought money into the sport from somebody who isn't also paying to compete.
• 22:39
  You have to think about a little bit of, like, McCourt, I feel like, is probably following a little bit of the blueprint that Taylor Sheridan has provided to people with the Run for the Million.
• 22:51
  I mean, everybody is like, super into Yellowstone and all of his other shows, and he's phenomenal.
• 22:56
  There's no.
• 22:56
  No doubt about the talent that he's done.
• 22:58
  But by doing what he has done, he has brought so many people who either haven't been exposed to horses in general or haven't even been.
• 23:08
  Maybe they are exposed to horses, but not exposed to raining and given them insight and followed these people.
• 23:14
  That makes it interesting.
• 23:15
  Like, oh, my gosh, look at these people's lives.
• 23:17
  Look at what they do.
• 23:18
  Look at them on the road.
• 23:19
  Let me learn about this.
• 23:20
  So then when the Run for the Million in Vegas finally comes on tv, I can watch it and I can know what's happening or, you know, have a general understanding of that knowledge.
• 23:31
  And I think, like, a lot of people got into it.
• 23:35
  I mean, a ton of people got into it.
• 23:37
  I loved it.
• 23:38
  I mean, I'm a bad example because I'm obsessed with Western.
• 23:41
  But.
• 23:42
  And raining.
• 23:43
  But.
• 23:43
  But we did something really cool there.
• 23:45
  But we badly need that because.
• 23:48
  Oh, yeah, the participant just can't keep financing everything.
• 23:53
  Right.
• 23:53
  And Wellington is another version of that.
• 23:57
  Modan is an international holding company based in Abu Dhabi, and it invests in things like real estate, hospitality, events and tourism.
• 24:06
  And it invested in Wellington Lifestyle Partners, and that investment includes Wellington International, but it also includes residential development, a hotel, shops, restaurants, and golf.
• 24:21
  Right.
• 24:21
  So they're not depending on only what happens at the horse show.
• 24:24
  People come to Wellington, they stay for weeks, they stay for months.
• 24:27
  Snowbirds.
• 24:28
  And then they're spending, you know, money the entire time that they're there.
• 24:31
  And Wellington International says it generates more than half a billion dollars a year in economic impact for Palm Beach County.
• 24:40
  And again, economic impact isn't profit.
• 24:44
  But you can understand why somebody in real estate and hospitality looks at all of those people coming into Wellington and sees a business opportun.
• 24:53
  Oh, yeah, and the World Equestrian center in Ocala is another example of that for sure.
• 24:57
  Yes.
• 24:57
  And I want to be careful because I don't know what the Roberts family actually makes.
• 25:02
  It is a private company, but we sure can see what they've built.
• 25:06
  Oh, yeah.
• 25:07
  I mean, there's horse shows, nearly 3,000 stalls, hotels, restaurants, retail expo centers and other events that they host that are completely Outside of the equine realm.
• 25:18
  So if I go to there to show, I can pay for a lot more than an injury fee without even leaving the property.
• 25:23
  Food, the restaurants, I mean, all of it.
• 25:26
  And they're using the facility for far more than just the horse shows, which.
• 25:30
  Gives the property a lot more ways to make money.
• 25:33
  And that brings me back to the question I started with.
• 25:37
  Can the horse industry grow without making participation that much more expensive?
• 25:43
  If more of that growth could come from outside of the riding community, then riders don't have to foot the entire bill.
• 25:51
  Well, and Dover shows the opposite side of it.
• 25:53
  Being big by itself isn't always enough.
• 25:55
  Greenhoff didn't take every Dover store.
• 25:58
  They chose just 10.
• 25:59
  Right.
• 26:00
  Well, the being bigger doesn't necessarily mean the business is healthier.
• 26:04
  And bringing in more money from outside doesn't guarantee that either.
• 26:08
  I think it shows that we can all be spending a fortune and still have businesses in the sport operating on pretty thin margins because so much of that money is going to right back out again.
• 26:19
  So then when an investor comes in because they think that they can improve those economics, sometimes they will and sometimes they won't.
• 26:25
  And I think that's really the problem.
• 26:28
  My trainer needs to have a good business.
• 26:30
  My veterinarian does, too.
• 26:32
  The horse show has to make enough money to come back next year.
• 26:36
  Yousef has to be able to run the sport.
• 26:39
  Tax doors have to survive.
• 26:41
  And if somebody comes in, invests money and builds something that works, I don't have a problem with them making money too.
• 26:49
  Right.
• 26:49
  But at some point, all of those businesses and organizations are looking for revenue, and a lot of that still comes from the same group of people, the riders and the owners.
• 27:03
  Right.
• 27:03
  Which is why that you can't really solve the affordability, or can't really solve affordability by looking at one fee and saying, well, that charge seems reasonable, you know, I mean, you could do that all day long.
• 27:15
  Right.
• 27:16
  And any one of those charges may make sense on its own, but the problem is what happens when you add them all together.
• 27:23
  Right.
• 27:24
  Everybody has costs they have to cover, but I'm still the person paying that total.
• 27:29
  Which is why the real question with all this new investment is whether it can bring money in from outside the people who are already funding the sport.
• 27:36
  Yes.
• 27:36
  And if they can bring in spectators, sponsors, media money, people who aren't already paying to own and show horses, that could help.
• 27:46
  But what worries me is if all this growth still ends up depending on getting more money from the same riders and owners who are already paying for everything.
• 27:59
  I don't know how much farther that can go.
• 28:01
  Well, and it's probably going to be different depending on the business, too.
• 28:04
  I think.
• 28:04
  So.
• 28:05
  I do understand that $177 billion number a little differently now.
• 28:12
  A lot of money can move through the horse industry, but it doesn't mean that everybody in it is making a lot of money.
• 28:20
  And yet some very sophisticated investors are looking at the same industry and saying they see an opportunity here.
• 28:29
  So what I'm curious about now is what do they see that the horse industry hasn't already figured out?
• 28:37
  Well, I think we're about to find out.
• 28:40
  So until next week, let's ride.