About RC Bean Saddlery

As told by RC Bean: I made my first saddle with big help from Gary Penny. He sort of built half and I did the other half, and at that point I was hooked!  I knew then, at the age of 15, that I was going to be a saddle maker for the rest of my life. My business turns 40 years old this year, and it’s been a good ride.

Getting into the retail business when you’re a saddle maker is quite natural, and has happened to most saddle makers in some form or another. If you start early and keep adding inventory items along the way, by the time your company is 40, your company has a lot of inventory!  With the help of my wife, Kristie (the prettiest and most talented of the two of us), we’ve delved into our retail business pretty heavy, and have a great little saddlery/western store. It’s located out on a country road in Star, Idaho.  Well, it used to be a country road; now it’s a major road, unfortunately!  Anyhow, we are two artists that didn’t know diddly about running a business, but I think we’re doing all right.  Our motto is simply to treat people like we, ourselves, want to be treated. We always try to be fair with everyone, and we do our best to get orders out in a reasonable time frame.

I have a complete saddle shop in the store and make repairs there during business hours, but my real shop is in the middle of our house. It’s where I will spend all my time some day in the future, building the kind of saddles that sit in people’s homes, show rooms, and art galleries, but for now, I try to balance my time between the two shops.

We meet really cool and interesting people every single day.  We’re blessed with a lot of great friends, and like adding more to that list all the time.

So, if you’re looking for a nice piece of tack or a unique piece of jewelry for yourself, your horse, or as a nice gift for someone, or if you need a properly fitted saddle, we have it or we’ll get it.  Our return policy is maybe the best in the industry. If it doesn’t fit or work like you wanted, bring it back. We don’t want to sell anyone anything that they’re ultimately not happy with. We'll work with you until you are happy.

Thanks for reading this, and I hope we can do business together. I promise we’ll treat you right.

Best Wishes to you,
RC

To check out our little store, you might enjoy this walk-thru by trainer Carson James.  If the link doesn't respond, please copy and paste to your browser:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hmuhfVs3Btk