treasurer’s
report
by Frank Lupton
D
uring August of 2015, the AMHA
needed to collect demographic information to support the efforts of a
member working towards securing corporate
sponsors for the association. It was decided
that the easiest way to collect the needed
data was to do a quick, single purpose survey of the members. The survey was completed and the information furnished to the
member seeking sponsors. Apparently some
members had trouble with the electronic
format of the survey and complained on a
facebook page. In an effort to help, another
member ran a survey using the online tool
called Survey Monkey. There are similarities and differences between the two surveys.
One important distinction is that the AMHA
survey went only to members. The Survey
Monkey survey was open to anyone, whether they owned horses or not, were AMHA
members or not, but each respondent could
only complete the survey once. At the time
of this writing, both surveys had an almost
identical number of respondents, the AMHA
survey having one more response than the
SM survey. As the data is presented, I will
identify it as the AMHA survey, or the Survey Monkey survey. I am not presenting every question from either survey, due to space
limitations, but am including the information I feel is most likely to be of interest to
the broadest segment of members. I encourage you to obtain the complete results of the
surveys if you have a further interest.
It is probable that each of us, as we read the
survey results, would take away different
meanings or ideas. What follows is my list of
garnered facts from looking at the results as
AMHA treasurer.
1. As a group, we are reasonable well educated and make good incomes. We have expendable income and use it to support our
lifestyles.
2. We are land owners and we invest significantly in the structures and tools necessary to
care for our land.
3. We are not young. With the average age
for acquiring our first Miniature horse is 41.6
years of age, it is people who are entering
their peak earning years who get into miniature horses. Since 38% (AMHA) and 55%
(SM) of the respondents also own full size
horses, it seems logical that many first time
Miniature owners come to us from the large
breeds at an age where falling off or getting
stepped on aren’t as much fun as it used to
be. This has important implications for the
AMHA. We always say that youth is our future and this may not be completely true. I
am not in any way suggesting that the association should back off from supporting our
youth programs, but perhaps we should be
looking at some of the full sized horse breeds
as a source of new members.
4. Once a person acquires a Miniature horse,
they tend to stay involved with Miniatures
for a good long time. According to the
AMHA survey, the average length of time
respondents had owned Miniatures was 16
years. Also, as we all know, no one owns just
one Miniature horse. The average number
owned by the survey respondents is 20.
5. Those who own Miniatures tend to use
them as more than pets. With over 70% of
the respondents active in breeding and showing (AMHA Survey), it shows we like doing
things with our horses. It also shows that
those who took the surveys are among the
more active people in our association. If
70% of all the AMHA members showed, our
shows would be far larger than they are.
6. When it comes to what we think a Miniature should look like we are very divided.
In the AMHA survey, 38.9% thought the
perfect Miniature should look like an Arabian and 43.8% picked one of the four stock
breeds (Paint, Quarter, Appaloosa or Thoroughbred). The loud and clear message to
the AMHA is that it should value and find a
place for more than one type of Miniature
horse. We, as an association, need to work
hard at being inclusive rather than exclusive
as to what type makes a good Miniature
horse.
10 Miniature Horse World
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