Do you pack more than you need just in case or is your farrier rig lightly packed?
How do you maintain the inventory for your farrier practice?
My biggest account is probably Baylor Equestrian Team. They maintain over fifty head of hunter jumpers, reiners, and showmanship disciplined horses. All but four are shod. Because they keep up with their own scheduling, I never really know what mix of horses I will be shoeing on Monday, the day of week I'm there. Because of the variety, I need shoes ranging from #4 to #00, steel and aluminum, and different sections to accommodate what the horse does for a living. This makes me need a rather larger than normal inventory. I keep up with inventory by observation and looking at the boxes of shoes and nails I have stacked neatly in my office. When I need something or inventory is getting low I take out my smartphone and open notepad and start making myself an order. When I'm ready to order, I typically get on the Internet and search for prices to see who has the best prices for the majority of items on my list. That's who typically gets the sale.
—Cody Gilreath
I buy local here in Lexington and try to pack light when I can. There is nothing worse than sitting on a bunch of equilox or equithane and letting it go bad. I keep boxes of my most used shoes and nails at home to keep my truck light with only a couple pairs of each size on my truck all the time. On busy days ill pack heavier and on Mondays I try to take most of the morning to clean out any clutter and run to the local shop and restock on any special items I might use that week. I know this isn't perfect but it seems to work well for me when i see new horses I try to get a detailed history of the horses past issues and plan ahead. The lighter I can keep my rig it seems to keep my gas mileage down.
—Tristan Mathes
I try to carry light. No more than a few pairs of each size of shoe. I have to carry a few styles of therapeutic shoes along with some aluminum shoes, but mostly steel keg shoes. I customize everything from the basic keg as the starting point. This keeps me from having to carry rim shoes, flats, regular web, wide web... I forge every shoe, pull all my own clips, and make hand made specialty shoes. This really helps keep my truck inventory down. I find the better your ability in the fire, the less you need on your truck.
—Paul
I carry almost everything. I have gone so far as to use different size nails in a shoe to deal with issues. I never want to be not prepared. The chemical products... I keep some, mostly buy as needed for that.
—Kevin Scheerer
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