I received a lengthy media release from Yallambee Stud today outlining recent successes achieved by resident sire TESTA ROSSA. The email states (inter alia):

SWING TIME

There’s no form like current form and Testa Rossa has been in the news during the past week:

- Irontrak ran 2nd at Kilmore last Thursday
- Ella La Rossa won at Canberra last Friday
- San Pietro ran 2nd on debut at Warrnambool last Friday
- Master Archie won the TJ Smith Slipper-LR at Doomben on Saturday, becoming Testa Rossa’s fifth stakeswinner and ninth black type earner
- Tereschenko ran 2nd to a potential superstar in California Dane – in track record time – at Moonee Valley on Saturday and now boasts 3 wins and 3 seconds from 6 starts
- M’Lady Tess ran 3rd at Flemington on Monday

A number of studs have been noticeably silent this season in terms of promoting their stallions (both in terms of website updates, press releases and newsletters) despite the fact that the progeny of the same are doing an excellent job enhancing the value of the yearlings about to enter sales rings in Australia and across the Tasman. But what use are race results if the stud standing the stallion/s aren't assisting their clients (investors and/or future vendors) by informing/reminding the general public of the importance of such results?

It strikes me as an astonishing oversight given the millions of dollars that are invested in stallions, broodmares and general (read as: untargeted) advertising. If I was an owner of a yearling being offered on account of any of these establishments [and there are a few of them] over the next few months and I was paying top dollar for the privilege I can't say I would be entirely happy when I next received that familiar window faced envelope.

In many ways the current marketing practices of many establishments remind me of non-thoroughbred organizations who willingly spend (waste ?) a million dollars trying to get "the next big client" ... and completely overlook the 80/20 rule (you get 80% of your business from 20% of your existing clientbase) and the fact that it costs, on average, 8 times as much to get a new client as it does to satisfy an existing one.

Well, at least Yallambee's marketing team are on top of things.