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Would like to welcome Jess Paveley from Hufeisen Shoeing Company.
Thanks for having me.
Well, You’re welcome. Is that the correct name of your business Hufeisen Shoeing Company?
Yes Hufeisen Shoeing Company. Hufeisen means horse shoe in German.
So how come you went with a German name?
I spent some time shoeing in Germany and I thought it was appropriate.
Do you have a website you would like to share with us?
Yes I do. It is hufeisenshoeingcompany.ca . If you don’t want to type out that mouthful you can go to OttawaFarrier.ca and it will redirect you.
Ottawa Farrier. Ca
Yes.
Okay, Perfect. So could you tell us a bit about what you do and how you got involved with horses?
I am a farrier and also a blacksmith. So I trim and shoe horses as well as making metal sculptures and art.
Do you have any of your blacksmithing art on display anywhere?
This weekend I had a table on display at the Home and Garden Show.
Was if for sale? Did anyone buy it?
It wasn’t for sale. It was a display peice for Butcher Block Counter Tops.
Did anyone comment on it?or say “hey! I’d like to buy that.”
You know I just popped by to see it, in all its glory and took a couple of pictures. The fellow who had the booth said he was going to have these steel frames available on his website so we will see how that goes.
So can you send us a picture so we can put it up with the interview.
Yes I will.
Do you have any more upcoming events or new projects?
No new shows this summer. Right now I am building a fire pit which I am really excited about. And maybe I will send pictures of that to you as well.
How are you making a firepit?
Well it is made out of a car [tire] rim. A steel rim, that is where the fire will be and a decorative lid. It is going to be “in town” so it does have to have a lid.
By-law compliant.
Alright Jess, tell us how you got started with your riding.
My mom put me in riding lessons at the National Capitol Equestrian Park when I was seven years old. So that was over twenty years ago and I have been riding ever since.
You do English, hunter/jumper type stuff.
Yes.
With your business what is the driving force to keep you going with your projects?
With my blacksmithing projects, probably just joy. I enjoy making stuff from other stuff. I do a lot with scrap metal.
How about with your farrier stuff, your horse shoeing stuff?
Well I also enjoy that. I enjoy seeing horse walk away happy and sound. And I like paying my bills. Why does anyone work?
You like doing your job and you like paying your bills. That is why we are here. It’s a “horse” job.
There must be a lot of farriers out there. How do you make yourself different?
There are a surprising number of farriers in Ottawa. What makes me different? You’ll have to ask my clients.
What is the number one thing holding people back from doing what they want to do? You are doing what you want to do, You have gone through some “life changes”, why do you think people are NOT doing what they want to do?
I am doing what I want to do because I had a few people shove me. I knew what I wanted to do but was to afraid to start it. I got a big kick to get it done. I think the reason why most people don’t or aren’t doing what they want to do is because they are afraid of new things or getting out of their comfort zone or afraid of failing at the things they are going to try.
So do you think a mentor is important to have for someone starting out or to give some guidance? It sounds like your mentor pushed you in the right direction. Is that right?
Yes, that is right. A mentor can be anyone. It doesn’t have to be someone in your industry it can be someone with more experience. More life experience.
This may be a difficult question. What do you think your biggest “flop” was? Or maybe something that wasn’t so successful.
I don’t know if you would call it a ‘flop’, but I spent a lot of time moving around. And just having to build your business back up from nothing more than once is extremely hard.
Your a farrier, so moving around is not good for your business. So each time you moved you have to put yourself out there and get new clients and develop your base again. So you are going to be staying put in the Ottawa area for a little bit anyway.
Yes definitely. I am happy here. No plans to move anytime in the future.
What do you think your biggest success it?
I think that ties back into my biggest “flop” and being successful in each new place I lived. Because I had to move around and start over so often I had to constently putting myself out there, networking and talking with everyone I could, which was really, really hard for me. If you know me at all, you know it was really hard. As a result of pushing through, and not giving up, which would have been really easy, my business thrived. how hard it was. go out
What is the biggest setback people face when they try to do what you do?
I think people underestimate how hard it is. They think it is a brute strength when really it is a lot of anatomy and finesse.
So why do you think the number one reason people succeed when others don’t in the farrier scheme of things?
I think the main issue is business skills. I think you can be a really good farrier with poor business skills and you will fail. I think you can be a mediocre farrier with reasonably good business skills and you will most likely succeed.
That is a really good piece of advice. Good for when you set out in any business.
With respect to your farrier what was one of the major road block you experienced when you set out on your journey?
I think one of the major roadblocks for me was gender, starting out. I had more than one male farrier who I asked to ride with, say “no”, purely because I was a woman. And “what would people think?” It was really hard for me to find someone that would let me ride along.
Do you mean they were wondering what would people think about them riding with a woman? Or that you are a female farrier?
Of them riding with a woman. I don’t think the issues was my being a female farrier at all.
That being said, when I was starting out and would show up on farms people were always surprised and they would say, “oh! A female farrier, I haven’t seen one of those”. I found it reasonably difficult to be taken seriously.
Has that changed at all, for you these days?
Yes it has. I don’t have to fight as hard to be taken seriously as a farrier. Some people will walk out to the barn to and go, “oh wow, female”, but people don’t stand over me looking at my work.
Making sure you are doing it right?
Exactly! Making sure I do it like a man would do it.
What was an Ah-ha moment when you knew you had overcome one of those roadblocks?
I’m not sure it was one moment necessarily but more of a progression of my business. When people started calling me and say, “my horse has this problem, can you help him”.
I knew people were more aware of my ability and less of my gender. Another thing that ties into that is that when I moved back to Ottawa people thought I was fresh out of school. Secretly I think that had to do with my being a young woman. I think I have been able to push past it and be successful the short time I’ve been here.
Excellent. Good to hear you were able to overcome that. That is a key thing when people start calling you in your business. You’ve gone past what you need to get past for the type of work you do.
Okay Jess that is the business end of things completed. Now we are going on to the equitation questions. I know you are looking forward to this.
Why is equitation and riding well so important?
I think riding well is so important because if you don’t you will never get to where you want to go. On the one hand if you want to ride a Grand Prix course you will never get around it if you are riding down hill but on the other hand if you want to hack your horse out and you don’t have good basics, where are you going to end up? On the ground.
So riding well is important for everybody, for safety as well.
What’s the biggest challenge you see people are struggling with their equitation?
I see a lot of people that don’t have a good base of support. Their legs are flopping around, their stirrups are too short, they are riding with a chair seat. It affects everything from the legs up. It affects your seat, your shoulders, your posture, your hands.
So the basic riding skills. Lunge lessons that type of thing.
Yes. I hate to say it yes, but basic riding skills.
What are some tips you could give right now to help prevent, stop or correct the problem that you are seeing?
People are going to hate me for this one. I am going to say, no stirrups.
That is a favorite with everybody, riding without stirrups. Any specific exercises without stirrups?
I don’t know there are so many.
Just pick one and go with it right?
Okay Jess. I would like to thank you so much for coming into the studio today. Is there any other thing you’d like to say about your business or anything we didn’t cover that you would like to say?
No, I think that is everything.
Thanks for having me Laura.
Thank you. That was Jess Paveley. HufeisenShoeingCompany.ca and OttawaFarrier.ca.