EQ S C I E N C E
CLICK, VIEW, AND SHOP CLICK, VIEW, AND SHOP: Discover an easier way to buy your next horse.
O
nline shopping is here to stay, giving customers ease and convenience, so why not transfer that to the horse world? One of the most exciting horse tech categories I’ve seen over the past year is in the buying and selling of horses. Take a moment to explore the latest digital solutions in your horse search.
BY JULIANA CHAPMAN
standards, partnering with vet clinics with impeccable reputations, the best transport companies, and the best dealers. “We are your one-stop-shop, an automated purchasing process on one platform. The platform is also designed to serve as a digital agency, a new channel of sales that allows you to showcase your horse to a larger market while being able to make money,” Marie pointed out. “When it comes to new enhancements, our aim is to make Bridl the biggest equine trade marketplace in the world. At the moment, we are focused on show jumping, but in the future we are looking to add other disciplines and segments of the market.”
Bridl: An Essential Equine Marketplace
Officially launched in February 2021, Bridl is a sales platform that brings transparency and ease to the buying and selling of sport horses, backed by experts who have years of experience. “Our aim is truly to make the entire process of buying and selling horses simple and secure,” said Marie Marks, Founder and CEO of Bridl. “We want every type of exclusive and high-quality equine transactions to pass through Bridl. It’s an aggressive goal—but we think we have what it takes to solve these issues, and we have a high-quality network.” The Bridl team aims to work with exclusive clientele, so it is extremely important for them to maintain high
Horse Match: A Modern Way to Shop for Horses and Essentials
Horse Match is an app that works like the popular dating app, Tinder: swipe right for ones you like, and swipe left for ones you don’t. “We wanted to provide our customers the ability to
88 | EQ UE S T R I A N L I V IN G | S EP TEMB ER/ OC TOB ER | 2022
leverage user-friendly technology and offer robust features,” shared CEO and co-founder, Summer Gentry along with Michael Upchurch, COO and co-founder. You can create a profile to help find the type of horses you are looking for, so owners get more qualified buyers. “We are always working on adding more horses to the site, and we incorporated a “featured horse of the week” to help drive engagement,” said Summer. “We launched Horse Match in January 2021 using the latest technology and invested in cloud service providers for our applications and website,” said Michael. Michael stressed the importance of employing industry-leading security. Currently the app is free, but the future model includes sellers buying ad space through a subscription in addition to bulk pricing. “The horse world has relied on wordof-mouth for selling horses for a long time, and there is a stigma with sellers trying to sell for more than what the horse is worth. With that said, we decided to set up a rating system,” said Summer. “Buyers can rate sellers and vice versa. It’s time we added more transparency to the process.” Continued on page 90