Since 2008, this company has been on a journey to provide the very best equestrian experience possible, and the road to getting there has been filled with many obstacles. Most professional equestrians are independently wealthy, reliant on great horses and great trainers to fuel their rise to the top. But for those of us who live this life at Windfall Equestrian Center, none of us are millionaires, and all of us grew up on the backs of scrappy ponies. We firmly believe that if you work hard, you can achieve great things - and that's just what we're trying to do here. The horse industry is painfully difficult, and we try to make this amazing life more accessible to young would-be professionals who want to pass the torch along. All of us here at Team Windfall knew that we wanted to make horses into a career, to help train them and their owners to be better partners. Together, we do just that.
Purely by luck, a potential new location was found in Stillwater, Minnesota, that was having it's doors closed. When we stumbled on it, the barn was dilapidated and needed a lot of love, but we could see the potential. We saw potential for a new place for this business to grow - a place for people to learn, horses to play, and for partnerships to be born. Friends, family, and neighbors chipped in to fix it up and prepare it for horses. Stalls were rebuilt, walls constructed, windows cleaned, saddles polished, and before we knew it, Windfall Equestrian Center finally came to be. What makes Windfall Equestrian Center such a wonderful place is simply this -the people. We have the best people you could ever ask for, and it's what makes every good company great. It truly is OUR barn, and we look forward to sharing everything it has to offer with you.
The Windfall culture is a unique one, especially in a pay-to-play industry that often is built to cater to the super rich while being notoriously inaccessable to those without the means. We work hard to make this life accessable to everyone, where your success should never come down to what you can afford. We are a resourceful group of passionate horse people who truly believe that team work makes the dream work. Our team is positive and encouraging and have created an environment built on trust and respect. Every staff member, client, parent, rider and horse is a valued member of our barn family with a level of belonging and inclusion that is an undeniable feature of life at Windfall.
Our purpose, cause and passion is to create meaningful positive impact on the equestrian industry as a whole through creating an inviting environment for new riders and supporting the growth of aspiring professionals. Although many riders start purely as a hobby, our learning environment encourages riders to move beyond a path of pure self-development towards a path of real partnership with horses. Through the advancement of their horsemanship, riders are shown a path to a more artful manner of communication and partnership with the horse.
We love horses and treat then and their riders with compassion. We do everything for the well-being of the horse, the human, and for the betterment of the equine industry as a whole. We truly love what we do, and endeavor to be the very best at helping each other succeed, even when no one is watching or may ever even know what we did.
We demonstrate responsibility and a can-do attitude. We do what we say we will do, pay attention to the little details, take pride in our work, and hold ourselves accountable.
We understand that we can help others when we help ourselves. Our personal goals and aspirations to become better riders, instructors and trainers have to keep moving forward every day. We encourage everyone to keep pushing, keep climbing and keep achieving those goals that make your passion for horses come to life.
We aren't afraid to branch out and discover new areas of the horse world. The more we learn and grow, the more we understand horsemanship as a whole. We encourage everyone to become as diverse as possible, comparing and contrasting ideas and methods from multiple disciplies and schools of thought.
We welcome and encourage everyone to think independently, ask questions, and come up with new or different ideas. We don't do things just because 'thats the way it's done'. Think outside the box, be original, question the norm. All good things start with a good idea. Share yours!
