Interview with Cot Campbell

How exactly did the Dogwood "idea" germinate? You were already a successful advertising executive, so what made you take the leap into the racing world?

In the late 60's I was chairman of an advertising agency in Atlanta, and it had begun to flourish somewhat. So I bought a horse with a couple of pals. Because my background was in racing, I managed the partnership (her name was Social Asset: she wasn't!). I then originated the idea - since I was doing all the work - that I should form a limited partnership, serve as general partner and sell shares. Then I got lucky. We had a wonderful old $8,000 claiming horse named Memphis Lou who brought much fun and excitement to the partnership, and then I bought a little filly with a lovely pedigree and a crooked ankle and she was "faster than the word of God!" Her name was Mrs. Cornwallis, and she was one of the best of her generation. She focused attention on what I was doing and soon I had 18 horses and 45 investors, and I thought why don't I just go in the horse business. And God Bless Mrs. Cornwallis - she put me in the game!

What attracted you to racing— even before you started Dogwood?

My grandfather, Dick Cothran, was an original member of the New Orleans Jockey Club. Both my mother and father loved racing, so I was bred to race horses. I was a pretty good show rider as a kid. My father sold the show horses in 1940 and went into the thoroughbred business. With World War II right around the corner, his timing was not good. He went broke, but I got hooked on racehorses and never got over it. I followed it throughout my early days and wrote about racing frequently when I was a sportswriter on some rather insignificant papers in Florida.

You took a dream, an idea, and made it into a reality and a very successful one. What traits do you have that led to your success in a business where so many others fail?

I've combined a knowledge of horses, an understanding of how to present a service or a product with the notion that the negatives of racing should be overemphasized, if anything. So, we've had some people who may have been disappointed, but they could never get mad at me because I hadn't promised anything. Thank God we have had some wonderful success stories, with a few that truly boggle the mind. Personally, I'm well-suited for what I do because I am optimistic, resilient, practical, and I do not dwell on the past. I'm in this business for one reason and one reason only: I am absolutely nuts about a Thoroughbred racehorse!

Are you having as much fun now as when you started Dogwood?

I adore what I am doing, and I want to keep doing it until I drop. I realize I am the luckiest person in the world. I'm spoiled and I could never do anything else.

Dogwood Stable is now located in Aiken, South Carolina. You started with a farm in Georgia -- why the move?

We started in Georgia because that's where I lived and the whole thing evolved there, and I suddenly found myself in the horse business. The farm was created in 1973, and by the late '80's I was tired of driving 60 miles to it two or three days a week, the Dogwood office being located in Atlanta. The decision was made to move the horses to a leased barn in Aiken, South Carolina, where my good friends Mack Miller and Mike Freeman were running the Aiken Training Track. It seemed desirable to streamline the Dogwood operation, and it appealed to me to get rid of the headaches of running a 422-acre farm with 35 employees. We moved in 1986 and kept the office in Atlanta. By 1987, my wife, Anne, and I had fallen in love with Aiken, and we moved the whole shebang over to this charming horse town. Ron Stevens, Dogwood’s trainer, came over, and so did Jack Sadler and some other key people.

Do you have a favorite horse?

I have several favorites, each one demonstrating qualities that made him or her a favorite. Lord knows Summer Squall would have to be. He won the Preakness, $1,844,000, and has been a wonderful sire (a Derby winner, Charismatic, and a Breeders' Cup winner, Storm Song). Summer Squall was a world-class horse and has had a dramatic influence on our operation. We have bought many of his sons and daughters; one of them was a Champion and most of them ran well for us. Another favorite was Dominion. I bought him in England after he was third in the 2,000 Guineas. He came to America and danced every dance! We shipped him from Chicago to Miami and from Saratoga to New Orleans. He was a "five o'clock Saturday afternoon horse" and I adored him. If he had been a human being, he would have been Spencer Tracy! This horse came along at a time that was crucial in our development and he helped establish us as one of America's leading racing stables. Summer Squall could have beaten him but Dominion was just as admirable.

Do you have a favorite race?

One of the most memorable races for me or anyone else was the 1989 Hopeful, in which Summer Squall moved into a hole with two horses on his left and two on his right and when he got in there he got squeezed horribly and what ensued looked like a "pier six brawl." Summer Squall would have gone down if he had had any place to fall. He just "kept trucking" and popped out of that pack like a seed out of a grape and won the Hopeful to the acclaim of every human being who saw the race that day. Some legendary horsemen still talk about that effort. His Preakness was wonderful, so was Mrs. Cornwallis winning the Alcibiades in 1971, our first important win. Dominion won the Bernard Baruch in a race I will never forget. It was in 1978 at Saratoga and it helped establish us as a factor in the horse business. He beat a great field, and I can see him now - with his ears flat on his neck and his belly on the ground, out-fighting everybody to the wire. He was a bitch!

Back to the business— explain your strategy for buying horses. How did you decide to have just four shares per horse?

First and foremost, we buy moderately priced horses with the best possible bloodlines and conformation. We sure can't go up against the Arabs, the Japanese and the truly heavy hitters in this country. We wouldn't if we could. I don't agree with spending enormous money for untried babies. I strongly feel that the success ratio between a $100,000 colt and a $500,000 colt may be tilted slightly in favor of the latter, but he costs five times as much and the increase in expectation of success is relatively small. Simply stated: we want to put ourselves in a position to get lucky, but avoid exposure to financial disaster.

At one point, we used to put together packages of six horses and sell forty shares. It was just too many people, and if you did come up with a good horse, the unsuccessful ones in the package tended to drag him down. We think there should be a close personal relationship between the partner and the horse and the present system of us keeping five percent and selling four other shares of 23.75% each is ideal. If a person wants a hedge, he can buy into several horses. We do not recommend taking more that one share in one horse because I think this defeats the purpose of spreading the risks; the more horses you can participate in, the better.

How do you go about finding clients? How do clients find you? How do you keep clients interested and (hopefully) happy throughout the life of the partnership?

We find each other by word of mouth, primarily. We have been at it a long time, I have written two books, and - because of our longevity (and accomplishments, hopefully!) - we are well known in the industry, and generally credited with being the originator of the group ownership concept of owning racehorses. Certainly a good portion of the horses racing today are owned by partnerships, most of which went to school on us.

We keep clients interested by communicating with them, before they find a need to communicate with us. One of the things we are selling is the pleasure and excitement of owning a racehorse, and knowledge about that horse's activities is a matter of paramount importance. We have certainly had many people who were not happy with the outcome of their partnerships (simply because most horses in the world are not cut out for stardom), but we have had none who ended up being resentful of us. We report the good and the bad with equal objectivity. 

I think the one key to our success has been that we have thoroughly cautioned people - those who need it - prior to investment, that Thoroughbred racehorses are a speculative proposition indeed. We say here is something that might make money - but don't count on it. It's going to give you some good tax benefits whatever it does. And third, it will be one of the most exciting, colorful adventures of your life - if you are of the right temperament. 

What type of role does your family play in Dogwood?

When I went into the horse business, the one human being in the world who thought it was a good idea was my wife Anne. This took some guts. She's played an enormous role in the success of Dogwood. Anyone who is around her has fun, and that includes me - in spades!

You have horses with several trainers. On what basis do you choose a trainer?

We have a major division with Todd Pletcher, one of Wayne Lukas’ distinguished alumni (and no trainer in history has ever turned out more wonderful horsemen). We also have horses with Frank Alexander, George Weaver, David Carroll, Christophe Clement, Mark Hennig, and Leigh Delacour. We’re interested first in a fine horseman, a good detail man and certainly the chemistry between the trainer and me must be good. I talk to trainers every day. We don’t talk long, but we cover every horse. I think Dogwood probably makes for an ideal client in that I understand the problems of the trainer and my input is direct and practical.

Dogwood Stable is one of the elite group of owners that have won both a Breeders’ Cup race and a U.S. Classic race. This is quite an accomplishment. Why do you think Dogwood has achieved this when others have thrown much more money away in the pursuit of such a goal?

I’m proud of some of our big horses. We’ve had ten entries in the Triple Crown races, and placed in four of them! We have won a Preakness, have had two North American Champions, have won a Breeders’ Cup and have been invited to represent America in two Japan Cups, several Washington DC Internationals and Canadian Internationals. We’ve had 73 stakes winners. And, we've had some other horses who couldn't run as fast as me! Again, I go back to our philosophy of buying the best pedigree we can get combined with the best physical type. We have had luck in buying some horses and forgiving minor insignificant physical flaws that other trainers or managers, when dealing with neophyte owners, could not have taken advantage of.

What goals have you set for Dogwood Stable that have not yet been achieved? (I read somewhere that the Derby is a big goal).

To win the Kentucky Derby!

How does Dogwood make money?

By our markup. Let's say we buy the horse for $75,000. By the time the syndication begins, we probably have $85,000 in him. Maybe we mark him up to $115,000. This markup then compensates us for putting the partnership together and it is our only compensation for serving as racing manager during the entire lifetime of the partnership. We charge no management fee, nor do we derive any profit from the various maintenance charges, and we carry our share of the maintenance load.

We invest a great deal of time at the sales in an effort to buy horses, and when we do purchase one, we feel that he is bought below the market, so that when we present him to our partners - based on sire averages, the market, etc. - he is not overinflated. We deal in the most perishable commodity in the world. Every year we end up absorbing the costs for horses which are injured or found to be defective after the purchase and cannot be offered in a partnership.

Our only other compensation is that if and when the partners have gotten all of their money back, from that point on, Dogwood is entitled to 10% of the net cash flow.

Your book Lightning in a Jar, published by Eclipse Press, was released in the fall of 2000. Not only is this book a guide to Thoroughbred ownership, but it intertwines your life history with that of Dogwood’s. How did you come to write Lightning and would you say it has been a worthwhile experience?

The Blood-Horse people felt I had qualifications for writing such a book and offered me a contract, which I accepted. I wrote three hours a day for six months and enjoyed doing it very much. I’m proud of the book because I do think it walks the line of informing and entertaining at the same time. The response has been marvelous and I’m very grateful for that.

Rascals and Racehorses: A Sporting Man's Life was published by Eclipse Press in the fall of 2002. This book is different than Lightning in a Jar because it is more anecdotal. What was the basis for writing this book? Do you have a favorite story of a race track “character” of the many that are included in the book? And, finally, has being a twice-published author changed your life in any way?

I’ve been around the race track a long time now, and I’ve heard and been part of a lot of stories. When I wrote the first book, it became clear to me, and the publisher, that I did know a lot of them. It was therefore suggested that I write another book dealing strictly with anecdotes– both poignant and humorous, with a definite drift toward the latter. Warner Jones was one of my favorite characters. He spawned a wealth of anecdotes from me and everyone else. I miss him. Writing two books has not changed my life. However, I found it stimulating to write each of them. I devoted about two and a half to three hours a day in seclusion, and kept up with the rest of my duties (hopefully). I sort of missed it when Rascals was put to bed.

What about your new book, Memoirs of a Longshot?