We had a tremendous event experience at the Equine Affaire in Springfield MA on November 7 through November 10.
The USMMA had our first presence at this event this year. This was a huge show with large crowds every day! New England is great horse country and we took the opportunity to try to boost our numbers there in the region. There are 2 Mangalarga Marchadors in New England: one in Maine, a gelding named Chama Lustre do Lucero with Cyndy Falvey an one in Massachusetts, a 3 year old mare named Rio Dulce de los Cielos with Tom Marcos of Tom’s Horsemanship. Tom and Dulce came to the show! “Dulce” as she is called had just shipped late this summer from Rancho de los Cielos, Riverside, CA all across the country. Tom brought her to the expo and she did everything she was asked, even though it was all new to her. Not yet started under saddle, her demo times were all done in hand, and she attracted many admirers. We encouraged people to visit Dulce in the barn and of course, when she stayed with us at the USMMA booth. She was a big hit there – very sweet, very pretty and loved the people who visited!
Lynn Kelley, our Treasurer. was the lead for the event. Lynn will be writing more about the event in the USMMA Quarterly journal with even more photos. The USMMA created and manned a 10 x 20 booth in the BREED BUILDING. The booth consisted of tables with flyers, business cards and information to hand out, a 10 x 10 movie screen and a 10 x 10 horse stall. We estimate that about 1,000 people came through the breed building and stopped at the booth. Only a handful of people had ever heard about the Mangalarga Marchador breed so we talked to a lot of people! We created Marchador bags with information that we gave to people who were interested in learning more. Breeders and members had submitted business cards and flyers and we had printed our USMMA brochure of FAQs about the Marchador breed and our 2019 USMMA Breeder’s List. We handed out over 150 of these bags!
Of the 150 people who took the Marchador bags, some of them gave us their contact information for the raffle and a follow-up call or email. Lynn Kelley will be heading that effort as well. We promised only one contact unless they wanted more information.
We have 2 new Marchador videos that we played at the event booth along with the 2018 videos created by Randy Conilogue, using member photos. We will add these new videos on youtube under the USMMA account, so you can use them or show them off to your friends!
Thanks to Lynn for a successful event and to all the people who contributed to the raffle, sending in materials or providing the actual Marchador horse! Their names are listed below:
Booth Help – Preparing or Manning the Booth
- Lynn Kelley
- Katie Baily
- Megan Baily
- Jane Newpeck
- Jo Kennedy
- Kim Hexter
- Adrienne Scheck
With the Raffle Prizes
- Rancho de los Cielos, CA
- Saint Horse Marchadores, SC
- Summerwind Marchadors, AZ
- Canadian Marchadores, BC Canada
Getting a Marchador THERE
- Rancho de los Cielos, CA
- Tom’s Horsemanship, MA
Tom Marcos of Tom’s Horsemanship, Hudson, MA did all the work to prepare, train and present the mare Rio Dulce de los Cielos! Great job and much appreciated!!
This event may have been our best event in 2019 for promoting and spreading the word about the Mangalarga Marchador horse! Because New England is a small area, we spoke to people from several states (CT, RI, NY, MA, NH, VT, ME) and Canada.
Together with the January Horse Illustrated issue, we seem poised for a great year in 2020! Marchador ON!