Saddled but enjoying ride

By LIAM DANN

When Allison Lozell left a nine-to-five job to start her own business the move was all about finding more time to indulge her passion - riding horses.

It seems a cruel twist of fate that the success of her business has meant she has had to give up eventing and cut back her riding time.

But for Lozell the outcome of her decision to start working from home is anything but cruel. The enjoyment she now gets from working with horses easily compensates.

Lozell and her partner, John, run a home-based business called Seahorse Seafreight.

Based 15 minutes from Tuakau in the Waikato, they specialise in shipping horses overseas, or bringing them into the country, for owners who want their animals treated with a personal touch.

The horses are mostly bound for Australia but work is gradually spreading to places such as New Caledonia, Tahiti and Korea.

The couple custom-build the containers that house the horses. They deal with all the customs, shipping and Maf paperwork and are at the port to ensure the horses are settled for departure and in good condition on arrival.

Remarkably, Lozell has found she can do nearly all of the work without leaving home. She reckons she can now go two or three days at a time without leaving her property, which suits her just fine.

"I got really sick of the Monday-to-Friday grind." Lozell got the idea for the business from a family friend who had sold a similar operation five years ago.

After making the decision to leave her job as production planner at a local confectionery factory, Lozell found herself wishing she had bought her friends' business.

"I said to John I could run that so easily from home, I could set it all up on the computer and do everything over the internet."

So they set up on their own and did just that. It is the internet that has made a huge difference.

She initially tried to write up all the export paperwork manually, then had to drive up to the Customs office at Auckland Airport to get it processed.

But she found that Customs had generally processed it and faxed it back by the time she got home.

By registering on the website she is now able to do all the Customs administration from her computer.

It a case of working smarter not harder, she says. Lozell also does all her banking online.

"It fits in really well with our lifestyle, although it's a lot busier than I expected.

"I love the client contact. We've made a lot of good friends.

"A lot of horses we import for people are sport horses and by the time they get here I know which horse is which without even looking at the name tags because I've heard so much about them."

Lozell says getting started was the hardest thing.

The thought of no more monthly salary was scary, she admits. But the couple massively underestimated demand.

They budgeted to survive on just one shipping a month but now do between three and five a month and are limited only by the number of containers they own.

John is hard at work building more.