New horizon for Stridyl as Racing Queensland collaboration gets off the ground

Cover image courtesy of Gold Coast Turf Club

With five days of selling at the Magic Millions Gold Coast Yearling Sale under the belt, there are over 800 horses well on their way to finding a new home.

Some will take up residence with glamorous trainers, having commanded seven-figure sums from colt funds aiming to find their next stallion prospect, while others have been loaded into trucks with trainers grinning about grabbing a yearling at what they consider to be a bargain price.

Regardless of who bought the horse, and how much it cost, all 802 lots sold so far have one thing in common, someone needs to own them.

Australia’s incredible prizemoney, the envy of many parts of the global racing fabric, affords the everyday ‘battler’ a chance to dream about what their five per cent share could return them, if they can scale the mountain to perform at the highest level.

One platform targeting that market is Stridyl, an online marketplace that seeks to connect trainers and syndicators with prospective owners. With eyeballs fixed on the Gold Coast, their announcement of a collaboration with Racing Queensland, that allows trainers and syndicators operating in the state to list a horse for free, has an optimal sense of timing to it.

It’s not just Queensland that Stridyl is making headway in, with a number of top trainers registering to offer horses on the platform. Some names need little introduction, including Chris Waller, Mick Price and Michael Kent Jnr, along with Matthew Dunn, who enjoyed a stellar Magic Millions Raceday on Saturday, preparing Boom Torque (Spirit Of Boom) and Derry Grove (Star Turn).

Simplified approach for prospective owners

Managing Director of Stridyl, David Rorison, likened his platform to others outside of the racing bubble, with an adoption of the ‘economy of convenience model’ into the industry.

“The Stridyl ownership marketplace facilitates trainers and licensed syndicators to advertise their available ownership opportunities, similar to how realestate.com, Carsales, Uber Eats work,” he explained.

“With that in mind, we developed it just to simplify the process, for people who want to become racehorse owners.

“It's (currently) not an easy process, they (prospective owners) have to have some sort of understanding of what they're searching for, (they have to go to) different websites, trainers, (and wonder) how do you contact them?

“So the whole thing is just to simplify it, and the other aspect is content. So we create unique content where it assists people to come to the website, build up their education, their knowledge through the education aspect, and be a little bit entertained as well, such as features, podcasts, et cetera.

“We also have partnerships with other podcasters where we host their content again, to assist the person, get a little bit more knowledge of why they'd be in racing and, and the opportunities out there.”

Touching on the collaboration with Racing Queensland, one that gives Stridyl a significant strategic presence in the state, Rorison highlighted his delight in the faith shown by a principal racing authority to collaborate with his emerging business.

“They (Racing Queensland) were first to market to look at an innovative way of getting people to either reinvest in racehorse owners(hip) in Queensland, or become owners in Queensland.

“This then supports those hosts domiciled with syndications, and also trained with their licensed trainers. They've been fully behind it with positioning at Magic Millions, plus putting it out through their database (to tell people) who we are and what we're doing, and for us, that gives us credibility.

“Mainly, to be endorsed by a governing body is incredible, their trust to be the first to market shows their commitment to innovation and being forward thinking, which is incredible.”

With such a novel concept within the racing industry, early support is vital to get the idea off the ground, and according to Stridyl’s Creative Director, Hayley Blythe Devlin-Rorison, there has been good levels of support along the eastern seaboard.

“One of our biggest supporters was actually Darby Racing Syndications, they were the very first client on Stridyl, and they've had some really great traction.

“Some great people that, even if they weren’t interested in horses they were advertising, they might have actually put them into some other horses that they had available as well.

“It's a great way for trainers and syndicators to build up the database. It's really hard, when the market's so saturated, they've got so many buyers buying horses and they've got to sell that to the wider public.

“So it's really hard for trainers and syndicators to constantly have to go through their own database of selling it to the same people. So the way Stridyl was built was to be able to get a wider audience to come in, for trainers and syndicators to be able to connect with people that weren't necessarily within their database or actually knew about them.

“That's why Stridyl wants to create that unique content to showcase different people in the industries, their personalities, what to expect, and then from there they can connect and, hopefully become an owner.”

Racing Queensland embrace the model

Ownership Manager at Racing Queensland, Sophie Swain, spoke to The Thoroughbred Report about the need for creativity in the industry, and told of her delight to have secured a collaboration with Stridyl.

“You can sit on there and the trainers put up available horses or the syndicators do and it's just an opportunity for them (prospective owners) to sit and have a look through and think about what they want and see what's in the market.

“You look at a catalogue, but this is actually available horses for owners and they can see by sire or by filly or by location.

“It's just a really great tool for me because I can put them straight on there, I can let them have a scroll through, they can come back and say, ‘Yeah, I really like Tony Gollan, I really like this stallion’, and then I can say, ‘Oh, well I can then introduce you.’

“Historically, people have had to jump on different websites, and it’s hard to keep those websites updated, so this is an opportunity for them (trainers and syndicators) to throw it straight on. The Stridyl team do a great job at the back end, making sure it is current. They update it every day.

“I can just see the future of it. I can see it's going to be similar to the auctions. How they went online and how successful the online auctions have been. I can see that this is going to be the same for the ownership space.”

Swain, who has been at the forefront of innovation with initiatives such as the ‘Own The Morning’ coffee catch-up at Queensland sales, which allows prospective owners to hear from industry figureheads about their yearling selection process, is a big believer in pushing things forward in the racing industry.

As she tells it, the collaboration gives Racing Queensland a significant boost, one that won’t be felt solely at the top level of trainers.

“I'm an owner and so I could see how it (the collaboration) would be so beneficial to us, but we need to get the trainers on board, we need the horses to be on there.

“So we went to Stridyl and said, ‘Is there any way that we could offer Queensland trainers that buy in this sale and in the March sale, a free horse to list?’

“That means that everyone who buys (will have equal exposure), Helen Page will buy one and she can go on there and she has the same amount of space, and people can look her up.

“They also have a trainer profile on there so they can do their research between all these different trainers and what they offer and I just think we just saw the value in it but it but it needs to have that backing and that amount of scrollability, like a good catalogue you need to have comparisons to really get your teeth into it.

“I didn't want it just to be the top trainers and I didn't want to personally just say, ‘Oh, well I know someone I can introduce you.’ I wanted to say, ‘Look, this is what's on the market, have a go yourself.’

“Then I can take the next step by personally introducing them to you or giving you the contacts.”