From humble beginnings on the Tuscan showground circuit, Thomas Saddlery has grown into one of central Italy’s most respected names in equestrian retail — serving professionals and enthusiasts alike across nearly four decades.
There is a particular kind of business that earns its reputation not through advertising, but through presence — by showing up, season after season, at the places that matter. Thomas Saddlery is precisely that kind of enterprise. Founded in the late 1980s in the Tuscan countryside, the company was born not from a commercial calculation but from a genuine passion for horses. Its first transactions took place not behind a shop counter but on the showground itself, at equestrian competitions across Tuscany, and gradually across Umbria and Lazio as the business found its footing and its following.
That circuit-based origin shaped everything about how Thomas Saddlery would grow. Rather than waiting for customers to come to it, the business went to where the equestrian world gathered — and in time, that world came to include some of the most prestigious events on the calendar. Thomas Saddlery has attended Piazza di Siena and La Bagnaia, and following the opening of the Arezzo Equestrian Centre, extended its presence to the Global Champions Tour and the Toscana Tour, among a wider range of high-level competitions. At these events, the company established itself as a trusted point of reference, recognised for its professionalism, the quality of its offering, and a product range broad enough to serve both professional riders and dedicated leisure enthusiasts, men and women alike.
Growth, inevitably, demanded space. The original shop in Bettole, in the province of Siena, eventually proved too small to accommodate an expanding clientele and an ever-deepening inventory. The business relocated to its current home in Foiano della Chiana, in the province of Arezzo — a carefully chosen position alongside the Valdichiana Outlet Village. The new premises spans approximately 900 square metres, a scale that allows the shop to offer a genuinely comprehensive retail experience rather than a curated selection of it. The move marked a shift from a business defined by its mobility to one with a flagship destination worthy of the name.
The digital chapter opened in 2017 with the launch of an online shop, which has grown steadily in popularity and now allows customers well beyond the reach of Tuscany to access the full range. It is a development that reflects broader changes in how equestrian enthusiasts — who are often part of a geographically scattered community bound by competition schedules and stable commitments — choose to shop. For Thomas Saddlery, the online platform has extended a relationship that might otherwise have been limited to the showground encounter or the in-store visit.
The most recent addition to the business arrived in 2021: a new stand at the Arezzo Equestrian Centre, a handsome 150-square-metre wooden structure designed to offer a welcoming environment within one of the region’s most important equestrian venues. It is, in many ways, a return to the company’s origins — the itinerant spirit of those early competition-day sales now given a permanent and elegant form. Together, the flagship store in Foiano della Chiana, the online shop, and the Arezzo presence form a coherent portrait of a specialist retailer that has expanded thoughtfully, without ever losing sight of the passion that first set it in motion.
