RACING and breeding enthusiasts from home and abroad now have the opportunity to book one of 11 unique ‘behind the scenes’ experiences in Ireland’s ‘Thoroughbred Country’.

It’s happening through a new website backed by Fáilte Ireland, Horse Racing Ireland and the county councils of Tipperary and Kildare, which aims to develop the tourism potential of Ireland’s thoroughbred sector.

Following almost two years of planning and experience development, the project kicked off in March 2023 when Thoroughbred Country was formally incorporated with Laura Magee as its chief executive. Laura spent eight years working at Punchestown Racecourse, primarily in sales and hospitality.

Charged with putting together a menu of ‘thoroughbred’ tourist experiences to offer to the public, Laura - in consultation with the funding partners - began with obvious hotspots such as the Irish National Stud, Coolmore Stud, Kildangan Stud and the Curragh Racecourse, but has also worked with trainers Johnny Murtagh, Jessica Harrington and Mark Molloy on creating very special and memorable bespoke visits.

“The first thing to say is that this is about seeing the bigger picture for our industry,” Laura says. “Nobody is going to get rich from this, however, we must make our world more accessible. We need new eyes on our sport and it is up to us to create the fans. As an example, in 2019 we had 1.7 million US visitors to Ireland. They are checking out Dublin and then usually heading down the motorway to Galway, Cork or Kerry. We have an opportunity to interrupt this journey and have them stay in Kildare or Tipperary. Even better if they can get up close and personal with our horses and horsepeople.”

Laura continued: “We are currently working with some brands that have experience in welcoming groups to their premises, but we do want to see smaller enterprises get involved. It’s about opening your door and telling them your story. That is what visitors want – an emotional experience, a deeper and more meaningful interaction with the place (or in our case, the horse!).” September 2025 will see an opportunity for new experiences to be onboarded and I am happy to talk to any interested parties about what is involved.”

The Thoroughbred Country concept has only just begun but there’s no reason why it couldn’t grow into something like the Wild Atlantic Way, the tourism trail that stretches from Donegal to Cork and is already a roaring success having been launched just 10 years ago.

“They have stunning coastline and we have amazing, rolling pastures and beautiful horses,” says Laura. “Fáilte Ireland have put together a five-year Destination Experience Development Plan and you could say that Kildare and Tipperary are the pilot counties. We are currently still working on phase one of the plan which centres around developing world-class visitor experiences but I am also looking forward to the next phase where we will be working with other hospitality businesses to grow the destination.”

The Thoroughbred Country team has been busy promoting their market-ready experiences internationally through trade visits with Tourism Ireland.

“I visited Lexington, New York, Washington DC, Atlanta and Florida to meet face-to-face with some of the top US travel planners in the hopes that Thoroughbred Country can be added to their itineraries.

“In Lexington they have the ‘Visit Horse Country’ initiative which includes all the big stud farms in Kentucky. They were extremely helpful and we are looking at ways in which we can work together to promote both our centres of thoroughbred racing and breeding.”

Web: thoroughbredcountry.ie

VISITORS to the Thoroughbred Country website may notice how clean and easy it is to use. You can now just click and book some of the experiences and others you can ‘request now’.

It may seem simple but CEO Laura Magee says a huge amount of work has gone into developing the booking and ticketing platform, and this is now one of the company’s biggest assets.

“By digitising some of our products we are able to cut down on the administrative side of things, track and trace actual visitor numbers, communicate with those clients, and promote our products globally. This is the first booking system of it’s kind in Europe and we have the Digital That Delivers programme through Failte Ireland to thank for their support in making it come to life for us,” says Laura.

Plenty of work too has been done by Fáilte Ireland in bringing in some leading tourism consultants to assist Thoroughbred Country partners in creating their very own visitor experiences.

“It was a very important meeting of two industries, but neither knew too much about the other and these workshops were an essential piece to getting this right,” Laura said. “Ireland’s thoroughbred industry is worth €2.4 billion per annum and the tourism industry is worth over €6 billion. We wanted to make sure we got this concept right and that it stands the test of time.”

Almost two years of development work have gone into understanding how the two industries can work harmoniously. This involved numerous site visits by tourism experts and, finally at the end of 2023, familiarisation trips by Ireland’s leading travel designers and tour operators who are responsible for bringing international guests to Ireland.

Laura reported: “The feedback we had from them was amazing and filled us with confidence that we have a sustainable and gold standard portfolio of offerings for visitors to Ireland and specifically Kildare and Tipperary.

“What really resonated with me is that from a group of 12 of the top travel buyers in Ireland, over half of them said that being given the opportunity to touch and bond with a young thoroughbred and racehorse was so thrilling for them. It really hit that emotional response we were hoping for.

“Another observation was about the passion these hosts have when welcoming guests to their homes, yards and kitchens. The day in the life stories, the bond they have with their animals, the camaraderie amongst the people working in the yards and some Irish humour thrown in!”

So what exactly is involved for trainers, breeders or any other thoroughbred business owner who thinks they might have a visitor experience on their hands?

“They go through a series of Failte Ireland-led workshops and they will get mentoring to help them have an understanding of the tourism industry,” Laura says. “There are also three site visits before the product is market-ready.”

THOROUGHBRED Country began as an idea and a discussion group amongst some of the already available visitor offerings in our industry (eg: Irish National Stud and racecourses).

They were wondering how the industry could take the lead on opening the doors to our sector so people can come behind the scenes and see for themselves the wonderful horses, how they are cared for, the people behind the horses and the wonderful family dynasties and stories associated with this most amazing sport.

The discussion led to the creation of a steering group and in March 2023 Thoroughbred Country was incorporated into a company limited by guarantee.

It was vitally important that the initiative had the backing of the tourism and thoroughbred industry authorities and so Fáilte Ireland and Horse Racing Ireland came on board and are now two of the funding partners.

Fáilte Ireland recognised that the counties of Kildare and Tipperary were quite often overlooked when it came to attracting the tourist to visit and stay. They also happen to be home to a huge thoroughbred population in Ireland and so the support of Kildare County Council and Tipperary County Council has also been instrumental.