On the one hand it may be hard to believe that Arqana is already 20 years old, but when one considers that horse sales have been taking place in Deauville since 1887, then France's leading Thoroughbred auction house is still a mere stripling. Five years after that initial offering of 20 horses passed through the ring 139 years ago, the Deauville sales moved to the plot of land which has come to be known as the Elie de Brignac complex, where Arqana has been based throughout.It was the merger of Agence Francaise de Vente de Pur Sang and Goffs France which led to Arqana's existence and its first August Sale in 2006 was topped by the Monsun filly Sortita, who was bought by Shadwell from Haras du Mezeray for €750,000. Mezeray has subsequently dropped from the list of consignors, having been bought by Nurlan Bizakov in 2021, but the leading vendor of that year, Haras d' Etreham, is still very much a force on the breeding and sales scene.Over the course of the last two decades, an encouraging number of operations have emerged as the French bloodstock community has gained a new vibrancy. The sales calendar has expanded to include the newer sales companies Osarus and Aktem, but turnover at Arqana has trebled. The man perhaps best placed to give an overview of the last 20 years is Olivier Delloye, who joined Arqana on day one, then spent eight years at the helm of France Galop before returning as CEO on the retirement of Eric Hoyeau in April 2024.“I have been lucky to be part of the journey since day one, because the fun fact is that I officially joined on 1st of July 2006, which corresponds exactly to the day when the new shareholders took control of the Agence Francaise and then renamed it Arqana,” says Delloye, who was initially hired by Agence Francaise chairman Philippe Augier. “The key man in the new operation was Eric Hoyeau. He didn't choose me, and I didn't choose him either, but luckily we got on very well from day one and we worked together for a good 10 years.” Olivier Delloye | Scoop Dyga He continues, “In the last 10 years, Arqana has increased its sales turnover by €100 million, which is not something I could have imagined when I left Arqana for France Galop. Back in 2006, I think the yearly sales turnover was about €70 million, and last year it was three times more than that, above €210 million.“Obviously, that is in a market that has grown itself, it's not only Arqana. However, it corresponds to a gain of market share in the last 20 years, and if you look more specifically, I think the August Sale has probably doubled over that period. The breeze-up sale is now probably the leading sale, coming from a pretty modest sale in Saint-Cloud at the beginning, and the breeding stock sale usually fetched something like €7 million, now it's around €15 million every year.”Delloye largely credits the breeders for this success. He says, “I think there has been a dynamic which can not only be the dynamic of a sales company, it's a dynamic of the whole industry – with new breeders, new operations, younger people and also some dynamism as well from some more established breeders and consignors who are still in the top three or top four every year.”There is also a distinct advantage enjoyed by Arqana: location, location, location. This is particularly so for its flagship yearling sale. After all, not many people would complain about spending a week or so in beautiful Normandy in mid-August, with top-class racing on the doorstep, not to mention the beach and some pretty swanky restaurants. There's a reason Arqana launched a range of merchandise with the tagline 'The sales paradise'.“It's very true to say that Deauville has played a huge part in the French sales history and recent success,” Delloye agrees. “So that's a key asset to us that we are trying to leverage as much as we can.“I see more and more people investing in this industry. They are looking for a great experience to source really good horses, which they can find at the August Sale and other sales. I think it's more and more about the experience that we can offer to our clients – something that is both pleasant, memorable, and which gives them good reasons to keep investing in an industry, which is sometimes quite difficult for owners because you have ups and downs. So at least what we must do is, whatever the success or bad luck they might have with horses they buy, at least when they come here they are having a really good time and we are doing the best we can to please them. We see our role like that.”Evolving hand in hand With the August Sale now only days away, certain graduates of that auction have been putting on quite a show on the track this year. Constitution River (Wootton Bassett) and Diamond Necklace (St Mark's Basilica) each returned to France to win three Classics between them for Aidan O'Brien and the Coolmore team. They have both fared well against their elders, too, with Constitution River landing the Eclipse Stakes and Diamond Necklace maintaining her unbeaten record when taking the Nassau Stakes at Glorious Goodwood. Other stars from the previous year's August Sale are the dual Group 1 winner Blue Bolt (Blue Point), one of the revelations of this season for Juddmonte, and Opera Ballo (Ghaiyyath), winner of the G1 Jebel Hatta and G2 Bet365 Mile so far this year. Flying the flag for the latest bunch to have emerged from Arqana in August is G3 Albany Stakes winner Libertango (No Nay Never), who heads next to the G2 Lowther Stakes at York. Henri Bozo and MV Magnier | Zuzanna Lupa Diamond Necklace topped the 2024 sale at €1.7m and is a member of a family which routinely makes star turns in the Arqana sale ring. Her Night Of Thunder half-sister topped last year's auction at €3m, and their half-brother by Siyouni will be offered on the Sunday of this year's sale as lot 128. The vendor is Ecurie des Monceaux, who bred their dam Prudenzia (Dansili) and her offspring in partnership with the late Lady Chryss O'Reilly of Skymarc Farm.Monceaux has been the dominant force of the August Sale for more than a decade, and that dominance came quickly after its inception.“The funny thing with Arqana and Monceaux is that we are more or less the same age,” says Henri Bozo, who has been at the head of Monceaux from the outset. “The only thing is that we really started selling in 2010 but we started redoing Monceaux when I arrived here. It was a farm with no horses, with no team, so it had to be redone, organised, and we had to start a broodmare band. Then we started selling 15 years ago, but we really started together.”He continues, “And I really remember those long discussions with Eric Hoyeau, with Olivier, with Georges Rimaud, with Marc de Chambure, when they were working hard and starting Arqana. It's been really interesting and it was a fun thing to do, to take the same road as them, because we started Monceaux then and we decided to trust them. We are in Normandy, we are French, and I think it made every sense to bet on them rather than spreading our small production within the different sales companies in Europe.”It was a pretty good bet for both sides. Monceaux has sold exclusively at Arqana since the outset, with 17 Group 1-winning graduates having emerged from the draft in that time, including Prix de l'Arc de Triomphe and Prix du Jockey Club winner Sottsass and four-time Group 1 winner Paddington.“You go to the sales and you try to do well there, but our real passion is enjoying those days at the races,” says Bozo, who made his first visit to Goodwood to watch Diamond Necklace win her fourth Group 1. “I don't think you are assessing the success of an operation on the sales ring, but rather the racecourse, and having a filly like her, it's an amazing dream that we share with Patricia Boutin and with all the team. And especially when it's a filly that represents so much of our short history, because Prudenzia has been the flagbearer for Monceaux, and thanks to her, we have managed to grow up and to be put on the map. We shouldn't forget that. And we will surely not forget Chryss, who was part of the adventure.”The international view Along with a large core of domestic consignors, Arqana's August Sale naturally attracts some select international vendors, and Ballylinch Stud is among those to have been supporting it from the start.“I've been going to the sales there even before Arqana ran the sale there because I used to work close to Deauville in a place called Crevecoeur-en-Auge,” says Ballylinch Stud's managing director John O'Connor. “Top Ville was standing at Bonneval at the time and Kenmare was in his first season just outside Deauville at Haras de Meautry.“Arqana took over and I think it's fair to say that Eric and Bernard Salvat and the team really drove it forward. They were very hands-on managers, very customer focused and they built a good business. And I think that ethos has been passed on well to Olivier and Freddie [Powell] and the current team.”He adds, “They're able to combine the good location with some excellent racing and a fairly compact and selective sale which attracts high-end people who can see a lot of nice horses in a short time.”On behalf of friends and fellow breeders Brendan and Anne-Marie Hayes, O'Connor was responsible for selling Blue Bolt through Ballylinch at the 2023 August Sale.“It's a family that Brendan has been nurturing and developing for generations, really, and this one is the prime example of what a good horse from that family can do. She's got a lot of Kilfrush influences, including Whipper as a broodmare sire, who we stood here at Ballylinch.” Ballylinch Stud's John O'Connor and Eoin Fives | Zuzanna Lupa When is comes to selecting the right horse for the first European yearling sales of the season, O'Connor says that it must have “that level of precocity so that it can be ready to be produced at its peak, if possible, in mid-August”.He continues, “And as we're coming from Ireland, we need ones that can appeal to an international audience. We try to choose a small, compact draft because we just want to have a boutique presence there to show off the progeny from the sires. We're trying to just have an impact without trying to compete with the local people so much.”Buyers at this year's sale won't have to wait long for a horse from Ballylinch with global appeal. Lot 1 is a filly by the internationally renowned Lope De Vega whose relatives include the Breeders' Cup Turf winner Red Rocks and last year's Commonwealth Cup winner Time For Sandals. “We've been so lucky that Lope de Vega has really established himself in pretty well every continent across the world,” says O'Connor. “For the last two years, he's been the leading sire of black-type horses worldwide.”As if to illustrate that point, two other daughters of Lope De Vega have already rung the bell at the highest level after being sold at Arqana: Place Du Carrousel won the G1 Prix de l'Opera and Expensive Queen took Keeneland's G1 Jenny Wiley Stakes, enhancing an impressive Ballylinch record of 11 black-type horses sold at Arqana between 2020 and 2024 from just 32 lots offered.Just the ticketBloodstock operatives don't get much more international than Michel Zerolo, who has plenty of experience as both consignor and agent, through Haras des Capucines and Oceanic Bloodstock respectively, in his native France and in America. Zerolo is fulsome in his praise of the evolution of Arqana. “Eric Hoyeau has been a tremendous managing director of Arqana,” he says. “He's very forward-thinking and he went from a position of being a challenger to being, not an equal to Tattersalls, but certainly very, very good.“They also had great help from Elodie Garamond and the team at FRBC [French Racing and Breeding Committee], who were fantastic at bringing in the Aussies.“Where I think Arqana has also been extremely successful is to attract all the breeze-up pinhookers and consignors from Ireland. I think they've made the Arqana Breeze-up Sale probably the best in Europe.” Michel Zerolo, right, at Arqana | Zuzanna Lupa An example of that forward-thinking approach came in an announcement last week of the issuing of ten 'golden tickets' during the first session of the August Sale. “We will draw 10 lots among the 80 that are catalogued on day one and every single buyer in the ring of one of these 10 lots will be granted a voucher of €30,000 to be spent on a second lot during the August Sale,” says Delloye. “I think that might add a bit of excitement.”Some would say that excitement levels already run pretty high in Deauville in August. At the heart of that fun, however, there is some pretty serious horse business conducted in an arena where Arqana has, in a relatively short space of time, found its successful niche. Here's to 20 golden years, and many happy returns. The post Arqana Turns 20: Reflecting on the Evolution of France’s ‘Sales Paradise’ appeared first on TDN | Thoroughbred Daily News | Horse Racing News, Results and Video | Thoroughbred Breeding and Auctions.