Ah, I get you now, Gamla, and I understand your point about paying for the quality of the racing, but, unless you're talking about the Derby, the vast sweeps of fun or non-serious punters wouldn't know a Listed from a Class 6 - it's just lots of brown horses running rather fast with riders in pretty colours. Now, that's not meant to sound condescending (although it does), but pretty much how it is down on the shop floor. And then there are the Annual Members, who sign up to a variety of courses for decades, and go regardless of the quality of the races, because it gets them off their bums and out for the day. That's the backbone of raceday attendances - the thousands of people who want something to do that doesn't involve watching re-runs of Diagnosis Murder or babysitting the grandchildren 7 days a week. They're more than happy with 7 or 8 races, happier with bigger fields (even if no-one's got past a rating of 59), and happiest if their Tote returns give them a profit of a tenner on the day.
What I think we've got to look at is racing being split, roughly, into these camps:
The (minority) pro or semi-pro punter who may not even bother attending a racecourse, preferring to send out spotters, gallops and paddock-watchers to report back. They're of little value to racecourses' income, but they're of immense value to bookies and exchanges.
The (majority) of non-pro racegoers, who break down into:
...Annual Members (particularly the very loyal, who usually spend little on course but do contribute to a major lump sum income to the course each year)
...Corporate hospitality - boxes, marquees, high-end spending
...Sponsors -outlay pretty similar to corporate hospitality, plus paying to sponsor races and buy advertising space around the course/in the card. An absolute necessity for courses.
...The day's gate take. Fluctuates due to weather conditions, special offers/events on the day, the day of the week or weekend, whether any nationally-recognised race is being held, etc.
There's no point pitching to the minority, so you must pitch to the majority, for whom racing is an escapist pastime, however often or little indulged. The more you can lard it with goodies - competitions to win luxury holidays, cars, cash, the more you can present it as a day out where customers can pick and choose from a wide variety of eating and drinking venues to suit their budgets - the more people will be inclined to think they've got value for money even if the racing itself is not up to much. If you charge people £15 a meeting and they see they're very well catered for, that they can enjoy a variety of non-racing events onsite as well (which must include coverage of other concurrent major sporting events such as the Ashes, World Cup footie, etc.), then I think courses will have cracked it.
Unrelated to how racing needs to market itself (which is what we're on about), Shadow's points about a badly-distributed fixtures list is very apt, as my own 3 y.o. can't find anything to run in at her low level in the south. There is an absolute dearth of sprints this season down here for the lowly-rated. And she was lowly-rated because of a crap 2 y.o. campaign inflicted on her by her previous connections - whether she ever really gets going as a 3 y.o. remains to be seen, but it's idiotically expensive to hold on to her until she gets to 4 or 5 (when her dam actually did her best), in the mere hope she can get a chance of a run. She's had one run at 3, and the course didn't suit at all, so we'll be bloody lucky to get two more races out of her this season, which is patently absurd. But that's the fault of race planners, nothing to do with the way in which we need to market racing to paying customers.
What I think we've got to look at is racing being split, roughly, into these camps:
The (minority) pro or semi-pro punter who may not even bother attending a racecourse, preferring to send out spotters, gallops and paddock-watchers to report back. They're of little value to racecourses' income, but they're of immense value to bookies and exchanges.
The (majority) of non-pro racegoers, who break down into:
...Annual Members (particularly the very loyal, who usually spend little on course but do contribute to a major lump sum income to the course each year)
...Corporate hospitality - boxes, marquees, high-end spending
...Sponsors -outlay pretty similar to corporate hospitality, plus paying to sponsor races and buy advertising space around the course/in the card. An absolute necessity for courses.
...The day's gate take. Fluctuates due to weather conditions, special offers/events on the day, the day of the week or weekend, whether any nationally-recognised race is being held, etc.
There's no point pitching to the minority, so you must pitch to the majority, for whom racing is an escapist pastime, however often or little indulged. The more you can lard it with goodies - competitions to win luxury holidays, cars, cash, the more you can present it as a day out where customers can pick and choose from a wide variety of eating and drinking venues to suit their budgets - the more people will be inclined to think they've got value for money even if the racing itself is not up to much. If you charge people £15 a meeting and they see they're very well catered for, that they can enjoy a variety of non-racing events onsite as well (which must include coverage of other concurrent major sporting events such as the Ashes, World Cup footie, etc.), then I think courses will have cracked it.
Unrelated to how racing needs to market itself (which is what we're on about), Shadow's points about a badly-distributed fixtures list is very apt, as my own 3 y.o. can't find anything to run in at her low level in the south. There is an absolute dearth of sprints this season down here for the lowly-rated. And she was lowly-rated because of a crap 2 y.o. campaign inflicted on her by her previous connections - whether she ever really gets going as a 3 y.o. remains to be seen, but it's idiotically expensive to hold on to her until she gets to 4 or 5 (when her dam actually did her best), in the mere hope she can get a chance of a run. She's had one run at 3, and the course didn't suit at all, so we'll be bloody lucky to get two more races out of her this season, which is patently absurd. But that's the fault of race planners, nothing to do with the way in which we need to market racing to paying customers.
! While Im on it, id also make sure that viewing facilities for the racing itself are adequate. If there isnt at least one giant screen (in working order), its just not good enough..
