I like it. My wife runs a riding academy and we use a Honda Fit the way some people would use a pickup truck: we can fit 10 bales of wood shavings in the back. [1] We’re dreading when it fails because they don’t make the fit anymore and compact hatchbacks seem to be on the way out. Recent experiences have made me a bit of a Buick enthusiast and I can see driving a 2005-ish sedan except that I won’t get those sawdust bales into the trunk. We are also thinking of fitting in EV into the fleet, so far the used Nissan Leaf has been the main contender but this is a pickup truck I could get into.
[1] We were profitable from day one because we didn’t buy a $80,000 pickup on day one the way everybody else does.
how do you haul hoss though? i would imagine you then outsource to professional hauling services? what do you do for vet visits, when it's not a farm call?
Just pay somebody. In a rural area there are a lot of farmers with a big truck and a trailer and it costs less than the monthly payment on a big truck.
i'll be honest, if the rest of your profile wasn't at least somewhat corraborative, i'd say you're larping, but what you're saying is at least irresponsible. most farmers in rural area have livestock trailers, not horse trailers, hauling for hire (including if you're hauling for students at your barn or whatever) requires CDL and a bunch of other documentation, which you're not typically going to have as a farmer, and more documentation if you're hauling interstate (my vet is across a border), but would i even trust random joe dirt to haul for me? i've hired professionals to transport horses, and i have a handful of people who could haul in a bind and unlicensed but i wouldn't rely on them to be available in an emergency. last year i had to haul an old mare, she was colic, she laid down in the field, covered in sweet, and had to be put down at the vet, but overall it was less than an hour from load to vet. if i had to rely on "farmers", that would prolong her agony. now i just train, so i don't usually have freak accidents, but at riding barns, with students, on trail, something happens from time to time. riding barns i work with tell me horror stories all the time. i'll give you a benefit of the doubt, maybe your wife knows the details, and ithaca being horse country, maybe she's got a friendly neighbor on speed dial, but then you're at best outsourcing your responsibilities to someone else. what other things you can save on to make your operation profitable, at the expense of safety and well being of hoss?