OFF THE RECORD #133
Ravi Naidoo Takes Cousin Casey Outside The Box
If there is such a thing as a proverbial box, flamboyant entrepreneur and racehorse owner Ravi Naidoo is certainly not sitting in it. He doesn’t need to think ‘out of the box’ because that is where he operates naturally – in a world of unusual ideas, creativity, energy and a constant urge to do things differently.
At a time when most advertising is delivered through social media, websites and digital campaigns, Ravi took his unique approach to promoting his Vercingetorix stallion, Cousin Casey. After covering 90 mares in his first season at Mauritzfontein Stud, the second-season sire is now at the awkward stage where unproven stallions invariably find themselves – in need of a second round of support.
Ravi produced a broadsheet newspaper and mailed it to people in the racing and breeding industry. Called The Kimberley Recorder, after the location of the stud farm, it is an exceptionally well-designed, high-quality publication, filled with superb and insightful industry articles built around its central character, Cousin Casey.
A broadsheet is the traditional large-format newspaper, the sort of publication once associated with serious journalism and substantial stories. Turning one into a piece of stallion advertising is about as far removed from the usual racing advert as you could get – and in an age when almost everything has moved online, it is wonderfully old-school and completely original.
It is also a pretty good introduction to Ravi Naidoo.
We tracked him down earlier this week, 38,000ft above the Atlantic on a Boeing bound for New York City. We correctly assumed that he had turned left upon boarding and was sipping vintage red wine while plotting his next big idea.
Ravi wasn’t travelling just for business, though. On Wednesday, 12 August he celebrated his 62nd birthday with his New York-based sons, Rahul and Rohan, a pair of Harvard-educated lads who have clearly inherited their dad’s grey matter and entrepreneurial acumen.
Ravi’s own journey began with an MBA and BSc (Hons) from the University of Cape Town, followed by a stint at advertising agency Young & Rubicam.
He describes his “biggest kicker” as pitching the idea for Vodaworld Magazine to telecoms giant Vodacom and landing the contract for his company, Interactive Africa. The free quarterly publication ran from 1994 to 2010, eventually reaching a circulation of more than a million copies across South Africa and parts of Africa.
During this period, he founded Design Indaba, a multidisciplinary design institution. Known globally for its influential creative conference, held between 1995 and 2020,
Design Indaba grew into a major annual Cape Town event that brought together leading international and African thinkers and practitioners across design, architecture, advertising, fashion, art, technology, music and other creative fields. It championed creativity as a force for innovation and social change, with the slogan: “A better world through creativity.”
Ravi’s broad creative background provides a useful clue to the thinking behind The Kimberley Recorder, of which he said: “On one hand it’s a love letter to Cousin Casey. Simple as that. He’s given me so much, and I wanted to really do well by him. A brochure was never going to do it.
“Then on the other hand, it’s a bit of a homage to the industry. As we said in the covering letter – a thank-you to all the stakeholders who galvanised around the crisis and did so well to resurrect the South African industry, in many ways. Everyone held on through the lean years, and now you can feel the upside coming, and it should be everyone’s upside. It’s also a tribute to Mauritzfontein, who gave Cousin Casey the most beautiful home.”
Ravi said that The Kimberley Recorder was also about, ‘just having fun’, – a follow-up to ‘Cousinology 101’ – a promotional video clip featuring comedian Barry Hilton, used when Cousin Casey was retired to stud in 2025.
Cousin Casey was syndicated to a broad base of individuals, including the smaller, so-called ‘Indie’ breeders, and Ravi said: “I like the spread of investors, comprising more than just the industry’s ‘alphas’. Racing needs the long tail to thrive.”
Naturally, Ravi hopes that Cousin Casey will become the ‘Heir Apparent’, following his champion grandsire, Silvano, and his own phenomenal sire, Vercingetorix, although he knows that nothing is predictable when it comes to thoroughbreds.
The Kimberley Recorder noted: “For the line to run into a third generation, the horse has to be fertile, must be given mares of substance, must be very lucky and, in the case of Nijinsky-Lomitas-Silvano, has to continue along a bloodline that has thinned and become unfashionable, everywhere except in South Africa.”
A third-generation champion is one possibility among several, but Ravi is keeping his hopes high. Cousin Casey has already ticked the fertility box and, having covered 90 mares from 56 different broodmare sires in his first season, satisfies two of the four requirements.
Ravi said: “Cousin Casey was an Equus Champion at two, and a Graded winner again at three. At four, he was beaten a neck in the Durban July. He was a juvenile champion that trained on – the rarest and most bankable virtue in the breed.
“The first season lays the foundation, and this one has been laid right. Cousin Casey is sound, willing and correct and, in my view, he is the most handsome son of Vercingetorix at stud.”
Vercingetorix’s dominance was on full display at the recent National Yearling Sale, when he was responsible for a whopping 22% of the entire turnover. He has just won a third successive National Sires’ Title, with Group 1 winners of both sexes on his roll of honour.
As the most in-demand stallion in South Africa, it is almost impossible to secure a service to the mighty Maine Chance Farms resident, who stands at R420,000 a pop and is fully booked years in advance.
Ravi concluded: “Cousin Casey’s first foals will reach the ground in the next few days and we are most excited. Everything that could reasonably be done for him has been done, and as the only Equus champion by Vercingetorix at stud, his covering fee of R10,000 is incredible value whichever way you look at it.
“Watching a great bloodline attempt its next link is one of the sport’s honest pleasures!”
There are a limited number of copies of The Kimberley Recorder available to interested readers. Please contact Dominique Millard at Mauritzfontein on (+27) 53 833 7095.