With 2014 installment of the Alltech FEI World Equestrian Games come and gone in Normandy, Kentucky’s 2010 site — with its leadership in transition — is finding steady ground again and looking to leverage its capital assets
For equine event producer Tootie Bland, the Alltech FEI World Equestrian Games Kentucky 2010 — and the state-of-the-art indoor arena that was built for it at the Kentucky Horse Park — arrived at just the right time.
Bland, the producer of the Road to the Horse competition, billed as the world championship of colt starting, had a fondness for Kentucky and its horse culture long before 2010, she said. What she really needed, however, was a venue that could accommodate her burgeoning annual competition, a three-day competitive showcase of elite equine trainers and clinicians exhibiting their talents with previously untouched horses. The event, previously held in Murfreesboro, Tenn., was turning away more than 2,000 spectators every year because of a lack of seating capacity.
Bland flew to Kentucky to see the Horse Park’s $45-million indoor stadium while it was under construction in preparation for the World Equestrian Games (WEG), and she moved the Road to the Horse to the Kentucky venue in 2013. Since then, the event, which will be held at the Horse Park for the third time this March, has grown to fill Alltech Arena, with 8,000 to 9,000 people in attendance, from every state and 47 foreign countries, over its three-day duration.
“It just felt like it was the perfect fit and the perfect timing for us,” Bland said.
Road to the Horse is one of 90 equine special events, along with roughly 120 non-equine events, that took place at the Kentucky Horse Park in 2013, three years after the venue played host to the international equine community at WEG. A rough economy dealt a significant blow to the Park’s revenue starting in 2008, when the Park’s equine events numbered 63. In addition, the construction leading up to the Games led to significant downtime in 2010 that further reduced the Park’s revenue, but according to Alston Kerr, chair of the Kentucky Horse Park Commission, the Park’s financial picture has stabilized and shown good progress in 2013 and 2014.
Total revenues for the Horse Park in 2012 were $10,082,842, an increase of more than 50 percent over its 2005 revenue of $6,692,657. But increases in expenditures at the Horse Park rose proportionately, as well, during that time, from $9,078,281 in 2005 to $13,746,508 in 2012. Although official revenue numbers for the most recent year that ended June 30 have yet to be released, Kerr said initial figures point to a record annual revenue estimated at close to $11 million.
“We will end this year with the largest revenue we have ever had at the Park,” Kerr said. “The Park is in the best position it has been in to go forward into the future. … We are poised to remain the equine center of the international world.”
WEG was the impetus for roughly $85 million in construction projects at the Horse Park and brought an estimated economic impact of more than $200 million to the state, according to a study commissioned by the Commonwealth of Kentucky after the event. But the Horse Park itself did not derive the income from WEG that it would have hoped for, Kerr said, and expenses left in the wake of the Games had to be absorbed. After requesting and obtaining $3.5 million in additional funding from the General Assembly in 2012 to keep the Park running, the Horse Park created a business plan at the General Assembly’s request, aimed at ending the Park’s dependence on state money. The 2012 business plan delineated three major initiatives to enable the Horse Park to operate without the need for funding from the state: the construction of an on-site hotel, the expansion of its campground and financial support from the local community. Those initiatives are still part of the Park’s future plans, Kerr said, although they have yet to gain the significant traction and support needed at this point to move them into action. The expansion of the campground remains a priority in terms of capital improvement, Kerr said, but the plans for an on-site hotel have been tabled until a suitable business partnership opportunity can be identified. Kerr also said the Horse Park is continuing to build its support and relationships within Lexington’s hospitality industry.
At the same time, the Horse Park’s longtime executive director, John Nicholson, retired from his position in April, and the Park is currently searching for a new leader to take the reins.
“John Nicholson certainly was a visionary for the Park, and we took it from a mom-and-pop operation to the international scope that it is now,” Kerr said. “Now we need to take it one more step.”
That means further leveraging the opportunities available to capitalize on Alltech Arena and the Park’s additional new assets, while still remaining true to its mission as a Horse Park, Kerr said.
With roughly 5,500 permanent seats and more than 20,000 square feet of exhibit space, Alltech Arena now represents the city’s second largest convention space, behind the Lexington Center. Outside of its equine shows and competitions, the space has played host to events ranging from outdoor expos to weddings and high-school graduations. Kerr said the Horse Park is also looking into the possibility of hosting smaller concerts in the future as well.
We are always looking for new and better ways to utilize the Alltech Arena in the non-equine time and certainly in our downtime,” Kerr said.
The Horse Park is also working to improve its visitor experience and its role as a tourist attraction for the state and the region, Kerr said. Last year, the Horse Park had roughly 800,000 visitors and just over 18,000 competition horses on the property, which generated significant economic activity for the area, Kerr said. Kerr pointed to a recent equine event survey by the U.S. Equestrian Federation that found every horse on-site at an equine event property equated to an average of 3.2 hotel nights for the respective local communities.
That equine-oriented tourism focus is also what makes the Park attractive for the thousands of spectators of Road to the Horse, Bland said.
“I think what [the Horse Park] brings is the full experience,” Bland said. “The park is just not a big building out there that has an event. [Our fans] get to enjoy the full breadth of everything that the Horse Park has to offer, from the museum to other events, different trail rides and visits to the farms. It’s the total horse experience.”
The Kentucky Horse Park is the No. 1 tourist attraction for not only Lexington but also the entire Bluegrass region, and it is always at the top of the list in terms of the number of inquiries fielded by VisitLex, said Niki Heichelbech, VisitLex’s director of media services.
“It is definitely a big driver for tourism in central Kentucky,” Heichelbech said.
Heichelbech said the facilities are known in the horse world as being top-notch, but the Horse Park’s tourist experience has also gained more attention as a result of the World Equestrian Games.
“The fact is the Horse Park has so many dynamic events going on out there, that if you go this year and go next year, you are likely to see something different, at one of the museums or even in the daily presentations that they have,” Heichelbech said.
The Horse Park will be looking to work more closely with the state’s Tourism, Arts and Heritage Cabinet in the next year to promote itself as a venue for bus tours and other tourism audiences, Kerr said. The Horse Park also has a plan to re-examine the visitor information center and the amenities offered for general tourists and is working with an outside firm to develop a mobile app for Horse Park visitors as well.
Bland said that from her perspective as both an event producer and a Horse Park visitor, the Horse Park’s amenities and service set a high standard within the industry.
“I think that the Horse Park, in all honesty, is just really like a good bottle of wine,” Bland said. “The longer it’s there, the better it’s going to be.”