by Jeremy Hipes | Jul 28, 2026 | Barn Business
The trailers are hosed off, the last camp t-shirt has been handed out, and your calendar has gone from a wall of color-coded camp sessions to something that looks… a little empty. If you run a lesson barn, late July and August bring a familiar kind of whiplash:...
by Jeremy Hipes | Jul 21, 2026 | Barn Business
Every barn manager knows the rhythm of camp season. The waitlist forms in February. The spots fill by March. By June, you’re turning families away and adding a fourth week you swore you wouldn’t run again. This year, for a lot of barns, that rhythm broke....
by Jeremy Hipes | Jul 20, 2026 | Blog
Search for barn or stable software and you will find plenty of options advertising themselves as free. For a small operation counting every dollar, free is tempting. But free software is almost never free in the way you expect, and understanding how these tools...
by Jeremy Hipes | Jul 20, 2026 | Blog
Pricing board is one of the hardest decisions a barn owner makes. Set it too low and you subsidize your boarders out of your own pocket; set it too high and stalls sit empty. Ultimately, the goal is a rate that covers your true costs, earns a real margin, and still...
by Jeremy Hipes | Jul 20, 2026 | Blog
Running a horse boarding facility is equal parts animal husbandry, customer service, and small-business operations. The horses are usually the easy part; it is the scheduling, billing, communication, and staff coordination that quietly consume your days. In short,...
by Jeremy Hipes | Jul 20, 2026 | Blog
Ask ten barn owners whether horse boarding is profitable and you will get ten different answers, ranging from “it pays for my own horses” to “never again.” The truth is that boarding can be a solid business, but the margins are thin and easy to...
by Jeremy Hipes | Jul 20, 2026 | Blog
One of the first questions barn owners ask when shopping for stable management software is simple: what will this actually cost me every month? The honest answer is that pricing in this category is all over the map, and the sticker price is rarely the whole story. In...
by Jeremy Hipes | Jul 19, 2026 | Blog
Before Stables Systems had a website, it had a whiteboard problem — the same one most lesson barns have. Last spring, our founder Jeremy Hipes sat down with Beth Lauren Parrish on the Inspired Riding® Podcast for a full hour on why running a barn from whiteboards,...
by Jeremy Hipes | Jul 17, 2026 | Blog
Ask ten barn owners how they set their board rate and nine will tell you some version of the same thing: “it’s about what the barn down the road charges.” That works right up until hay doubles, insurance renews, or you finally sit down in January and...
by Jeremy Hipes | Jul 15, 2026 | Blog
Running a horse lesson barn is often a labor of love, born from a deep passion for horses and equestrian sports. However, passion alone doesn’t pay the bills. Many barn owners and managers find themselves on a financial rollercoaster. They grapple with unpredictable...
