Online or in store? Why equestrian retailers need both

There’s no better way to get a read on where the equestrian trade is headed than to spend two days in a venue filled with retailers, suppliers and equine experts. BETA International 2026 was a successful event for all involved, and a great opportunity to ask real retailers where they stand on some of the biggest challenges the industry is facing right now. 

The retailers I spoke to were wrestling with familiar pressures: suppliers wanting bigger commitments earlier, competitors discounting hard, and dealing with more data than anyone has time to work through. One debate kept coming up: exactly how important is taking business online? 

It’s a question I love to take on, so I jumped at the chance to join the panel discussion “Talking Retail: Online vs In-Person & Strategies for Winning in Both”. If you couldn’t make the event, or the talk, here’s the summary of what you missed and the advice we shared.

Your website is your biggest shop window 

Even when a purchase happens in-store, more often than not, the equestrian shopping journey now starts online. That makes accurate, 24/7 stock visibility non-negotiable. 

Physical tack shops are still highly valued by customers who want specialist advice, like to try things on, and seek reassurance on bigger purchases. This is especially true for items related to horse or rider safety. Research is an important step in the purchase process, one that requires a customer to be able to see what you have in stock, what it costs, and how easy it is to get hold of.

That’s why Click & Collect matters so much in the equestrian sector. It gives the customer certainty that their item is available and ready to be picked up in store at a time that’s convenient to them. It turns online browsing into store visits, and it’s the first signifier to a new customer of what they can expect from your shop’s brand and experience.

Your shop and website should run as one business 

One of the most common mistakes I see retailers make is treating their online store and physical shop as two separate businesses with two different types of customers. That’s not how shoppers see it, so you shouldn’t either. 

Some tack shops separate out products they sell in-store from products available online. While it’s true that some products don’t need to be enabled for national delivery, bulky, tight-margin lines like feed and bedding can still be offered for Click & Collect or local delivery only. By offering them online you’re saving customers from having to call you up or drive to the store just to check availability. 

Smaller tack and feed shops often tell me they’re not trying to compete with the bigger online businesses; they’re there to serve their local customer base. That’s exactly why the website matters. Running the two sides of the business separately feeds one of the biggest fears I hear about selling online: losing control of the relationship with your customers. When your website isn’t connected to your stock, you end up selling products you don’t have, then refunding customers, cancelling orders and risking bad reviews.

Keeping your prices, offers and loyalty schemes consistent across everything means customers get the same experience with you, wherever they choose to shop.

The right foundations lead to the right prices

Get your stock right and you’re improving your shop and your website at the same time. If you’re regularly missing key sizes, or don’t have a good, better, best option on a product, that will hurt your sales far more than not having flashy banners or an AI button on your website. You don’t need to get caught up on fancy features when accuracy wins.

The reality is every price is now a quick search away; which made discounting a big discussion topic during the panel. It’s hard not to feel pressure to match the cheapest option when a customer is checking prices on their phone in your shop (while you spend half an hour fitting their boots).

Being the cheapest doesn’t necessarily mean you sell more, anyway. If a competitor down the road discounts heavily, let them, and give customers what they can’t get there: your service, your advice and the stock they came in for. That’s where getting your stock right pays off. A business known for its service holds on to customers far better than one known for its prices, especially when costs and the economy shift.

Use your data to tackle discounting 

The retailers I see growing the most have something in common: a really good grip on their data. They look at a combination of data points across the whole season, instead of relying on a single figure. 

Equestrian is seasonal retail. Depending on your business, you might work to two seasons or four, and new-season products will only sell at full margin for a certain amount of time. When you take what you know about what sold well to your brands and suppliers, you can make informed purchasing decisions, get better deals, buy in higher volumes and forward order with far less risk. 

Before stock arrives, decide how you’ll sell through. That means looking at your digital marketing, SEO and web design, anything you’re doing on social media, and where those products will sit in your shop. Remember that core products make up a large part of an equestrian store’s business, so don’t let seasonal lines take up all your attention. 

Then keep a close eye on your weeks cover: based on your current rate of sale, and the margin you’re making, how many weeks will it take to sell through a line? If you’re going to run out before the end of the season, that’s a brand or line to invest in more heavily. If something’s moving slowly, you want to spot that early in the season if you hope to avoid discounting. Take what you learn back to your suppliers next season, and your next round of buying decisions is better informed again.

Knowing where to start

One fair point raised on the day was that there’s so much data available, it’s hard to know what to look at or how to act on it. I hear that plenty of retailers feel the same. 

People open tack shops and take on family businesses because they love horses, the sport and the products, and very few start out as experts in ecommerce or digital marketing. That’s why the right partner matters. A good system and solid foundations give you the numbers, and ongoing guidance helps you work through them and decide what to act on. 

That’s the kind of relationship we have with retailers like Hatton Park Saddlery, winner of Online Retailer of the Year at BETA International, and runner-up Redpost Equestrian.