Three months ago, almost no one knew the name. On 30 June, at its very first auction, 160Foals sold 19 of its 26 foals to new owners around the world, with more than 200 buyers now registered across the globe. For a first edition, a very encouraging start. For its first sale, 160Foals did almost everything differently. No ring, no rostrum, no fashionable sire carrying the page. Instead, a live auction streamed online from Belgium to the world, where every lot traced back to a mare proven at 1.60m, and where buyers could study the data behind each pedigree before they raised a hand. A new format for a new idea. On the night, it worked.
Nineteen of the 26 foals found a new home, close to three quarters of the collection, at a first-ever auction for a name that did not exist in the public eye a season ago. First editions rarely place that many. This one did. The foals that sold changed hands for an average of around €20,000, and the top of the sale, Umara Optima Lulu, reached €46,000.
Two hundred buyers, built from zero
The most telling number sits around the sale, not only in it. Three months ago, 160Foals was unknown. Today more than 200 buyers are fully registered on the platform, from across the globe, a base built from nothing on a single idea: that the dam decides.
New owners on more than one continent
Interest spanned the globe. The more than 200 registered buyers came from 26 countries across four continents, among them France, Belgium, the Netherlands, Italy, Germany, Switzerland, Spain, Poland, Austria and Great Britain in Europe; the United States, Mexico and Guatemala in North America; Brazil in South America; and the United Arab Emirates. The foals that sold went to new owners on three continents. For a first sale, that reach is the clearest sign the idea travels.
The method, backed by champions
Before the sale, ambassadors Nina Mallevaey and François Mathy Sr each chose a favourite from the collection, judged the way they judge any horse: by the mare behind it. François’s pick, Dalinka Lulu, is out of the World Cup winner Kalinka vd Nachtegaele, and was among the top of the sale at €27,000.
Three months in, foals from our first collection are already going to owners around the world. This is only the beginning.Benoît Dulac · Founder
Change the odds, and only starting
A first auction that placed foals with owners across three continents, backed by more than 200 registered buyers, says the market is listening. The dam decides, and the story is only beginning.
