Duncan Taylor: With Him, You’ve Been Family

He always says that had he been born in Detroit, he would have gone into the automobile trade. In other words, whatever kind of horseman he might allow us to credit him, first and foremost he came into the world a businessman. Now that Duncan Taylor is stepping down from the helm of one of its most remarkable family concerns, then, the Bluegrass can count itself fortunate that fate instead applied his flair to a more literal type of horsepower.

True, the old school can't have been enamored by his every flourish. There was the famous occasion at the Keeneland November Sale, for instance, when a mare had been prematurely scratched by the veterinarians. Taylor, thinking fast as always, got onto the airfield across the street to see if anyone could trail a banner announcing that she had been reinstated in the sale. But he had tried a similar stunt a few years previously, at the Woodbine Breeders' Cup, when he was repatriating A. P Jet from Japan.

“That horse didn't run well on the grass but he ran, like, 1:08 for six furlongs on dirt,” Taylor recalls. “So I hired this plane to fly a banner saying 'A. P Jet 1:08-and-change' over the crowd. Well, the guy flew so high you could hardly see it. I paid him his money, but I'd learned my lesson. So this time I sat down with this pilot and said: 'Now I don't want you flying up there where nobody can read it, you need people to be able to see what the hell all this is about.' Well, I don't know what kind of plane he had, but it sounded like a 1955 tractor. It was popping and spewing and sputtering, and he was swooping over the barns, back and forth, and everybody's horses were going crazy. And Mike Cline from Lane's End ran over and said: 'Duncan take that damned plane down! I'll buy your damned horse from you before you kill all mine!'”

Nor was that the only time Taylor reached for the stars in his publicity. With an important dispersal going through his barn, another November, he rented a plane to get the big spenders back from the Breeders' Cup at Gulfstream, dressing up in a pilot's uniform to record a video wishing everyone a comfortable flight.

Mark, Ben, Frank and Duncan Taylor | Jon Siegel photo

It's not as though such literal flights of fancy directly account for the giddy evolution of Taylor Made, from its unobtrusive foundation in 1976 when Taylor was still only 19, into so dominant a force that its consignment has ranked No 1 in a staggering 26 years of the past 28, while processing $2.7 billion of bloodstock. But his receptivity to innovation and experiment–undiminished even as he hands over to his brother Mark, as CEO, and embraces a new role as Senior Thoroughbred Consultant–has pioneered many of the services nowadays taken for granted on the sales ground.

“You know, one of the things I've found in business–and in life–is that if you don't start on the course of trying to do something better, then you never get the benefit of other opportunities that emerge along the way,” he reflects. “Opportunities that are often better than the things you originally set out trying to do. And that's about the force of human passion. When people start driving towards something, good things start to happen.”

As is often true of Taylor's perspectives, this one dovetails with his Catholic faith. “Because it's about hope,” he says. “When I was young I understood faith, and I understood charity. But hope? Where did that fit in? It was only as I got older that I understood how hope is really the greatest of the three. Because it's a real blessing if you can get up every morning and think, I need to get this done, that done, because you're always chasing that brighter future.”

Taylor Made has met two extremely delicate challenges during its perennial expansion. One was to maintain due intimacy with customers, even as the scale became ever more industrial, so that their slogan can still credibly remain: “With us, you're family.” The other was to maintain a vital equilibrium between fraternal affection, among Taylor and his brothers Mark, Frank, Ben, and their partner Pat Payne, and the hard-headed administration of what has become such a huge business.

Taylor and Pat Payne | Keeneland photo

Taylor stresses that he has “the best hard-working brothers and a tremendous business partner in Pat Payne.” But to have somehow always made it all work tells you much about their upbringing. Their mother Mary was a woman of iron faith; and “Daddy” Joe commanded respect across the Bluegrass not just for the horsemanship that sustained 40 years as farm manager at Gainesway—on which vocation he literally wrote the book—but also for the probity he demanded of his children. “Don't ever do anything you wouldn't want to read about in the Herald-Leader,” he reproved them.

“He would always try and help the underdog,” Taylor says. “In his early life he experienced the Depression. A lot of those people in that generation, they had really tasted poverty, and they were geared to make work central to their lives. Mom let my dad work as long hours as he needed, and always had a hot meal for him when he came home. And from the time we were just young boys, he was taking us with him and teaching us.

“Like any young kid, we weren't a lot of help at first. But by the time we were 10 years old most of us could drive a tractor; and by the time I was 14 or 15, I was about half a veterinarian for the cattle, I knew how to plow, if the tractor got dirt in the lines I knew how to bleed the lines. I thought, 'Man, I have to work all the time while my buddies are playing ball.' But that was just the way that my father operated.”

Taylor was already the fourth of what became eight children in what he humorously likes to describe as “the Catholic business plan.” But he would lose two of his brothers, in 1968 and 1981.

“And I think that also had something to do with how you can stick together, as a family, even when you have all the pressures of being in business together,” Taylor muses. “Yes, you can still fall out over little piddling stuff, that might not seem piddling at the time when everybody's emotions get high. But if you did get mad, you'd be over it the next day, didn't harbor any grudge.

Joe Taylor at Gainesway | courtesy Taylor Made

“I was 12 years old when my older brother got killed in a car crash. My mother's faith kept her strong, but my dad was just all torn to pieces. I remember going out there with him, where the wreck had been, seeing him walk around saying: 'Oh man, why? Why did it have to happen?' And finally, he realised that he couldn't get it off his mind, so he went out to some old country roads in Jessamine County and bought 170 acres at $600 an acre. From then onwards, my sisters Emily or Mary Joe would haul us out there to work. They helped us greatly, by being the younger boys' transportation. If they didn't take us, then whatever time Daddy Joe clocked off at Gainesway, he came through and picked us up.”

They were set to work on the tangled wire fences, the fallen trees, the dilapidated barn. And that site eventually became the cornerstone of the little operation started by Taylor with his buddy Mike Shannon, a Texas schoolteacher working at Gainesway who had resolved to start a boarding farm.

“At that time of my life, I was just a kid with long hair. I was a hard worker, but if you saw me you'd think me a hippie,” Taylor recalls. “I was in U.K. and majoring in trying to get out. I had nine hours left and I quit. I'd saved up some money. When you worked for other farmers, you got paid! Cutting tobacco and baling hay, stuff like that. Mike and I both had a pick-up truck, and we put in our $10,000 apiece, and we started the farm.”

With Gainesway servicing its world-class stallion roster, Daddy Joe was sending mares to maybe a dozen different farms. The new venture received a couple mares and, between the oversight of the old man and the good work of the kids, gradually more followed. Mike also had a group of southwestern contacts sending us horses that helped us greatly in our early years.

Taylor Made at sunset | Taylor Gilkey photo

“Mike taught me a lot,” stresses Taylor. “I was a shy kid, I'd never talked on the phone to an owner, but he just got me in there to finally get used to that. And he was a risk-taker, too: we bought some mares from John Nerud, spent about $125,000 when we didn't have any money. Breaking up that group and selling them gave us a bit more of a nest egg. And meanwhile we basically built up the farm one customer at a time. You know, I don't want to knock any other farm. But being broke and hungry, when I boarded a horse, that customer meant a lot more to me than if Leslie Combs boarded a horse. I didn't have Caro!”

Having initially rented a number of different tracts, they expanded a core for what has become a 1,600-acre footprint around the new land in Jessamine: if Taylor Made had to lease stalls, then they might as well pay their own family. The game-changer, however, was a game-changer for the whole industry.

Tomorrow: Part II: Ideas, and more ideas

The post Duncan Taylor: With Him, You’ve Been Family appeared first on TDN | Thoroughbred Daily News | Horse Racing News, Results and Video | Thoroughbred Breeding and Auctions.

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Joe Migliore Departs West Point To Launch Bloodstock Agency

After six years of experience as a sales associate for Terry Finley's West Point Thoroughbreds, Joe Migliore said he is going out on his own as a bloodstock agent and plans on being active at the upcoming OBS March Sale in Ocala, Fla.

Migliore said he has taken to heart many of the valuable lessons learned during his time with West Point.

“It's a great team that they have, a very family type of setting,” Migliore said. “Working for West Point gave me tremendous exposure to how partnerships in the United States work. The team at West Point really go above and beyond what the standard is. I learned quite a bit about dealing with so many different types of owners. There would be some owners that own five percent of one horse and some who own larger shares of multiple horses. That really accelerated the process of how to communicate with certain owners.”

Migliore, 30, is the son of retired jockey and current America's Day at the Races analyst Richard Migliore. A former intern for NYRA in the press box at Saratoga, Migliore has hit the ground running and is currently in Florida doing his homework on the upcoming OBS March Sale of 2-Year-Olds in Training.

“I've been going everywhere from Palm Meadows to talk to trainers to Ocala and visiting a lot of farms and checking out horses that are heading off to the sale,” said Migliore.

Migliore plans on buying for owner Robert Masiello, who currently serves on the board of the New York Thoroughbred Horsemen's Association and first got involved in ownership in 2005 when partnering with West Point Thoroughbreds on multiple horses, including graded stakes winners Twilight Eclipse, Freedom Child and Justwhistledixie.

“I wouldn't be able to be in this position without his support,” Migliore said. “We've built a strong friendship that goes beyond the racetrack. He's a young and ambitious owner and a spectacular guy. We need more people like Robert Masiello in this industry.”

Masiello owns the popular turf sprint sensation Fiya [7-5-1-1, $184,396], a $400,000 auction purchase recommended by Migliore. Masiello said his friendship with Migliore has grown stronger since their early days with West Point.

“I got to know Joe at West Point and in the last couple of years as I've transitioned into my own stable, and he's been very helpful,” said Masiello. “Joe has given me ideas of horses to claim and he has just been so helpful over the years. He and Terry still have a great relationship, so they'll work together at some point in the future I'm sure. He's very studious, always is asking questions and he's tried to learn a lot.”

Migliore said he has utilized that studious nature to hone in on his client's business needs.

“Some owners want fillies to build a potential broodmare band, others want colts and have big dreams of the Triple Crown,” said Migliore. “Price comes into play too, so it's important to understand people's budgets.”

Migliore said he plans on being “extremely active” at the Fasig-Tipton New York-bred Yearling Sale in August.

“That is one sale I have a big circle around,” Migliore said. “You can find tremendous value there, although the prices are getting a little higher now that people are recognizing that value. For me, I hope to do a lot at that sale and I definitely will make a big push. It's one of my favorite sales to work. I'm always looking for New York-breds because of the strength of the program, so New York-breds are a priority for me.”

Migliore credited bloodstock agents David Ingordo and Mike Shannon, who scout out young talent for West Point, for helping him learn what to look for in a horse.

“I learned a lot from the two of them,” said Migliore. “You always should learn something new each day in this game. If you aren't, then you aren't working hard enough.

“A strong hind leg is something I look at,” Migliore added. “In dirt racing especially, you need a good hind leg. I focus in on a horse with correct conformation and there are other things that come in to play and some things that you're willing to forgive. We all have different interpretations.”

Migliore also credited not only his father but also his mother, Carmela, who worked as a longtime assistant trainer to Steve DiMauro.

“We talk about horses pretty often as a family and it's something that we share a bond over,” Migliore said. “I've learned so much from them both.”

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