Boarding Package Management: Structuring and Managing Your Board Offerings
Your boarding packages are the product you're selling. How they're defined, priced, and communicated affects both your revenue and your client experience. Vague package definitions lead to billing disputes. Too many packages create operational complexity. Poor pricing leads to a financially unsustainable operation. Getting your boarding package structure right, and managing it consistently in your systems, is fundamental to running a sound boarding business.
Designing Your Boarding Package Structure
Most boarding barns offer two to five distinct board packages. More than five becomes difficult to manage consistently. Common structures:
Full board: All daily care included. Typically stall, daily turnout, hay and grain per barn schedule, water, stall cleaning. This is your highest-priced package and your highest-care offering.
Pasture board: Horse lives in pasture rather than a stall. Typically includes hay and water; individual grain or supplements may be extra. Lowest-priced package.
Stall with turnout: Stall at night, turnout during the day. A middle option.
Training board: Includes all of full board plus a set number of trainer rides or lessons per month. Your highest-revenue package.
Self care or partial board: Owner does some or most of the daily care themselves. Reduced staff involvement, reduced price. Works for highly hands-on owners who are at the barn daily.
For each package, document precisely what is included and what is not. This precision is what your boarding agreements rely on and what prevents the "I thought that was included" conversation.
Pricing Your Packages
Package pricing should cover:
- Direct costs (feed, bedding, medication supplies allocated per horse)
- Labor costs (staff hours attributed to horse care at that board level)
- Facility costs (a share of mortgage/lease, utilities, insurance)
- A reasonable margin for the operation's sustainability
If you've never done a formal cost analysis, it's worth doing at least once. Many barn managers discover they're underpricing because they've never calculated the actual cost of providing a service.
Managing Packages in Your Software
In BarnBeacon, each package is a template with the defined monthly price and included services. Each horse is assigned to a package, not a custom price, so if you update a package price, you update it once and it reflects across all horses on that package.
When a horse's board type changes (moves from pasture to full board, adds a training package), update the horse's record immediately. Don't wait until the billing cycle. Mid-cycle changes need to be captured in real time to bill correctly.
Communicating Package Changes
When you update package pricing (typically annually), communicate the change to all affected boarders with appropriate notice (30 days minimum, 60 preferred) and a brief explanation. A rate increase framed as "our costs have increased and this reflects the investment we're making in maintaining our care standards" lands better than no explanation.
Have boarders acknowledge the new pricing in writing, either by signing an updated boarding contract or an addendum. See boarding rate management for how to handle rate change communications.