Press Release 02/20/12

The Southern Belle Invitation is proud to announce our affiliation with The Big A and The Stars and Stripes 2012 show.  The manner in which exhibitors and owners demand value from equine events has changed and in an effort to stay current and offer our breeders, owners and exhibitors more opportunities and exposure, we have decided to combined our Southern Belle Invitation July 2012 show with The Stars and Stripes and The Big A 2012 show managed by Mark Harrell Horse Shows.  We have been asked for a number of years, by both our exhibitors and vendors to add AQHA events to the July show.  Due to the AQHA mileage constraints for existing shows, we have never been able to successfully offer this level of AQHA event at the July show.  We felt for our July show to be sustainable we needed the AQHA affiliation and David Pardue and Mark Harrell have managed an outstanding show in  Georgia with a large number of exhibitors. We are of course sad to see the July show go but we feel that when the demands of the exhibitors changes, we have to change as well. The combination of our affiliations with high profile shows, now allows us to guarantee more added money than previously in the history of The Southern Belle Invitation.

Our July Breeder’s Classes will be dispersed throughout the Georgia show schedule and the large money slot class for the three year olds, will be moved to the All American Quarter Horse Congress where the money will be divided between the 3 year old Open Western Pleasure Futurity and the 3 year old Limited Western Pleasure Futurity Classes.  We are also adding additional added money to the Limited Rider Division of the existing SBB classes offered at the Congress.  The payment for the Breeder’s portion of the 3 year old Open and the 3 year old Limited will be made by installments.  Look for the upcoming Congress Futurity Nominations brochures for more details!

The Southern Belle is proud to host Southern Belle Breeders classes at The All American Quarter Horse Congress, The AQHA World Show, The APHA World Show, The Arizona Sun Circuit, The Prairie Classic, The Virginia Quarter Horse Classic, The Stars and Stripes & Big A Circuit and The Reichert Celebration.  In the past three years we have paid out $1.3 million dollars in winnings, with just over $1 million being paid in the Breeders division.  We are proud of our contributions to the industry and look forward to our future.  We hope you will embrace these changes and continue to participate in the Southern Belle Breeders as we focus to stay current and offer more opportunities for breeders, owners and exhibitors. 

Connie Hill

Mike Coggin

Chris Cecil Darnell, Show Secretary

Neal Kring, Show Manager