The world-renowned Red Mills horse feeds are coming to South Africa and business development director Michael Connolly was at Durbanville at the weekend to outline the company’s plans.
The world-renowned Red Mills horse feeds are coming to South Africa and business development director Michael Connolly was at Durbanville at the weekend to outline the company’s plans.
He said: “We are the number one horse feed supplier in Europe and Asia, supplying 76 countries worldwide, and we have been looking at the South African market for the past ten years. You have world class horses and world class horsemen.”
Apparently one of the key reasons for taking so long was cost because Connolly is determined that his firm’s products are competitive with the local ones and “we have to ensure that they are affordable.”
The Irish-based company- William Connolly & Sons (Michael Connolly is a grandson of the founder) – boasted 97 Group 1 winners in 12 countries last year and supplies many of the top trainers around the world including William Haggas and Nicky Henderson in England, the Aga Khan’s trainer Alain de Royer-Dupre in France and in Ireland Melbourne Cup winner Joseph O’Brien, Cheltenham king Willie Mullins, Dermot Weld and John Oxx.
Connolly continued: “Under phase one of the South African operation we will supply the top trainers and studs direct and in phase two we will operate through a distributor.
“We are proven over time and the advantages of our products, as we see it, are that we use whole grains not extracts, steam for cooking which improves digestibility, a shelf life of ten months minimum that copies mother nature and does not use any nasty chemicals, consistency and state of the art quality control.”
Connolly was accompanied on his trip by global account manager Nicholas Gaumerais and he has recruited Peter Gibson (083-406 4881) as the company’s product adviser in South Africa.
Doubtless the likes of Equi-Feeds will hit back with offers and promotions of their own in a bid to hold on to the market and the competition can only benefit racing stables and studs in this country.
By Michael Clower
