When DiFelice had her two children, she quit riding to take care of them. But when she started riding again two years ago, she remembered her love for the sport. And the confirmation of that love compelled her to finish Allpony within half a year.
“Whenever my kids were in preschool or in the evenings when they were just hanging out,” DiFelice said, “and I didn’t really need to be with them at that moment, I was on the computer creating all of this.”
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According to the British Equestrian Trade Association (BETA), the overall number of horse riders has fallen from 3.5 million in 2011 to 2.7 million in the U.K. in 2015. That has to do with the fact that people aren’t owning horses anymore, either.
Packaged Facts, a leading publisher in market research for consumer goods, estimated that the U.S. equine market generated $23.4 billion in 2016 — a 2.7 percent decrease from 2012 — and will drop even further to $20.3 billion by 2020. And while new horses aren’t registered as often, the cost of keeping a horse, such as paying for its feed and care, are going up.
For Fédération Equestre Internationale (FEI) trainer, Brooke Doss, the average cost to take care of a horse with stall boarding can range from $500 to $800 a month. To purchase a horse, it can cost anywhere from $2,000 to $20,000 depending on the breed, discipline, size and age of the horse.
“It’s financially challenging to be an equestrian,” Doss said.
Over the past three months, Allpony has generated over 1,400 new visitors, which is 86 percent of the website’s users. This only serves to highlight how her website is still growing and breaking through in the community and across the globe — five percent of these users coming from Great Britain.
And if it doesn’t do just that, computer scientist and UNC-Chapel Hill professor Tessa Joseph-Nicholas says the easy navigations and contemporary, modern look of the website will still attract those with a love for horses.
“With a site like this, you’ve got a sort of built-in niche audience, so I think it’s really going to depend on publicity, how you can get it out there,” Joseph-Nicholas said. “I mean the site itself won’t do anything until people find out about it.”
For now, DiFelice’s only marketing push is her copy editor, who proof reads her writing and finds investors for Allpony. But she hopes that by reaching out to horse-riding camps and stables, she can start spreading her business through word of mouth.