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British racing targets new audience with £3.6 million campaign 'to raise the sport's profile
British racing targets new audience with £3.6 million campaign 'to raise the sport's profile
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Why waste money on the campaign? Give the £3.6m to the racegoers. They will be able to tell the GBR why they go or not go horseracing in the UK. I think £3.6m will go a long way to reduce the costs of attending a race meeting and possibly increasing prize money and improving stable staff and female jockeys facilities at the tracks.
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Certainly won’t include the fodder tbh….
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The best investment Racing could make would be to get The Prince of Wales interested and involved in it.
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Michaelides on rtv, exactly as I suspected
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Will be following Jaguar's successful remodelling of its marketing strategy
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I'm not a potential sponsor of horseracing in the UK, and even if I was I'd not want to be associated with the peddlers of crack-cocaine of gambling. I firmly believe until Horseracing UK is cleansed from the bookies' stranglehold very few non-bookie sponsorship will prevail.
Exorbitant fees charged by racecourses = fewer racegoers; bets refusal by bookies = lesser Levy = decline in horseracing UK |
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Not set foot on a racecourse now for nearly 3 years after I sold my last racehorse, not had a bet in that time either all due to the nanny state. I have had betting accounts restricted and I refused to give personal information for affordability checks. Racing has lost until this madness stops, so I guess racing has lost me now as I spend my time and money on other things.
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Left ownership 14 years ago and like dpm, attend race meetings far less and with my age and health issues,
I may not go back on course. I do still watch racing most days and bet regularly but to minimum stakes to give me a challenge without significant cost. No issue with affordability checks  The traditional racing folk are either dead or infirm and if their families are still keen on the sport they are in a minority. I was born on a farm, attended ptps all through my childhood and graduated to rules racing once I started working. We went as a family back in the 1950/60s and it was the only real trip away from the farm back then. Every other farming family was there as well, at least at the local ptp at Didmarton and many went racing every Saturday in the season. |
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Simon Michaelides
Simon is an accomplished C-Suite executive, a Fellow of both The Marketing Society and The Marketing Academy and has twice been named by Marketing Week as one of the UK’s Top 100 Most Effective Marketers (2020 & 2022). With over 26 years of commercial business experience, Simon is originally P&G and PepsiCo trained, accumulating 15 years of experience in FMCG – including 2 years as a management consultant, before making the leap into the Media & Travel sectors, where he spent 12 years in a variety of C-Suite roles, including Chief Commercial Officer at UKTV (a BBC Studios company), Chief Marketing & Innovation Officer at BBC Studios UK, and Chief Customer & Strategy Officer at Riviera Travel. Passionate about driving positive change and unlocking potential for others, Simon is an active coach & mentor, and a trustee of Brooklands Museum – the original home of British motorsport and aviation. He has led consulting projects for clients including Bacardi Martini, Coca-Cola, Starbucks and Mondelez, and he is currently consulting for British Horse Racing as the interim Chief Customer Officer at Great British Racing – the central marketing and promotion arm for the Sport. Simple Simon will have no connection to the people he's hoping to attract , suspect half the 3.6 million will be his salary and the rest will be wasted . |
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Same wavelength as the fodder ? Doubtful tbh….
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Which plonker enlisted him? What was the fee of the headhunter?
Imagine a fully able and fit individual (a non-disabled) chairing a meeting to assess, approve and apportion funds for the needs of various disability groups without the knowledge and understanding of each individual disability. How can one understand the challenges of a blind person using public transport if one is not blind and does not use public transport? |
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He will mention everything but betting…..probably doesn’t realise without punting fodder the industry would drown.
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This shows how wasteful and inadequate the BHA are regarding the usage of Levy funds and appointment of an individual with the necessary acumen and expertise for a specific task.
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April Fools Day comes around rather quickly in horse racing imv...
seems to me there are about half a dozen of them per year tbh. |
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Racing needs to get down to the grass roots but what does the BHA do, hire another 'consultant', no
doubt at huge expense, to advise them on how to meet the goals of their 'raise the profile of the sport' programme. There are dozens of people on here that could advise them for free! They need a 'C Suite' to advise them when the problems with racing and the solutions are blindingly obvious! |
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to be fair, responses on the Betfair forum are heavily weighted to the "racing is all about punting" demographic. Not many non-punters on here.
But the BHA is asking the wrong question if it thinks raising racing's profile is the answer. The problem is not that non-racegoers do not realise that racing exists. |
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So, give people the opportunity to find out about what a day out at the races is all about. Part of this budget should be spent on funding one free day at the races at every racecourse. The courses should also be given financial help and marketing expertise to run a campaign aimed at getting people to come to the races.
The dates of these free days should be when most people can attend. Tickets should be sold in advance so that the racecourses know how many spectators to expect. Also,it should make it easy to report back with the numbers so as to assess whether the campaign was a success or not. Tbh, we all know it’s a waste of time with us coming up with suggestions, they’ll just waste the whole budget on some hare-brained schemes and then tell us afterwards it was a roaring success. Anyone asked Ben or Brian their thoughts? |
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Here's what I'd do with that budget and I'd bet anything you like that it would have greater impact than the drivel GBR will produce:
Go to the yearling sales or breeze ups and buy ten horses for c.£200,000 each. Then give them away. And offer to pay all of the training and veterinary fees for two years. Yes, that's correct - give them away to ten utterly worthless, self-opinionated, narcissistic, mostly-young social media 'influencers' or 'celebrities', all of whom have millions of brain-dead, infatuated followers hanging on their every word and will bombard their followers with anything to do with said horse on an almost hourly basis. Imagine the reach and impact over two years of social media bombardment on an hourly, weekly, monthly basis. |
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I have noticed over the years that a specific demographic attend sporting events that require paynent to gain entry,whether it be racing,cricket,golf, tennis or association football etc.
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Look at Beverley today, loads there enjoying the day and the delightful weather. But the bha suits would be wincing.
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easier and cheaper;
have a dragoon of attractive young people, male and femake walking around with fizz and handing out free glasses to those that want em and those that dont might like the view wouldnt cosy much |
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Free candy floss….
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In the event that this initiative does attract any individual to the sport, I can say with a high level of confidence that that person will not experience the electric, edgy, illicit thrill of a 16 year old, having a few bob on a winner in the smokey den of a 1970s betting shop, listening to the monotone exel commentary calling the name, and emerging blinking into the sunlight with a fistful of pound notes, then wanting more of the same the next day. Obviously, that is not, and should not, be the aspiration. Only later did I discover the richer experience of being up close to the sounds and smell of racehorses, but for many, I'm sure that was the hook that got the ball rolling.
If they could bottle it, they would never have to do this again. |
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They could look into something called the ‘national lottery’ which is quite popular and based on gambling and look to create a betting model which would mean that people might actually have an interest in following horse racing results/watching racing. The biggest blockers to it have been the bookies but as they aren’t interested in allowing customers to bet on horse racing any more that shouldn’t be an issue.
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Only later did I discover the richer experience of being up close to the sounds and smell of racehorses, but for many, I'm sure that was the hook that got the ball rolling.
If they could bottle it, they would never have to do this again. No chance. The last thing racecourses want is the mug punters getting up close and personal with the actual racehorses. |
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How many clued up punters started out as mugs in a betting shop in the 70s then? Its if and how fast they get clued up that counts, and them that doesn't are less likely to ever appreciate the aesthetics. We all started somewhere.
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No chance. The last thing racecourses want is the mug punters getting up close and personal with the actual racehorses.
As opposed to the coked up sockless overtight blue suits and the VPLs of fat drunken women fighting in the car park. |
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Back in the 70s there were no TVs in betting shops showing the racing.
The only way to see what generated the mystic of the Extel commentary was to go and witness it yourself. No such incentive now. Plus, a visit to the races these days is not much different from visiting the betting shop, the difference being that the racecourses have liquor licenses. |
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if i was given two free tickets with lunch and drinks thrown in...
i'd turn them down. |
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i hve followed and enjoyed horse racing all my adult life and when the children were young we often went to horse racing fixtures and generally had a very good time.
kids had a few soft drinks chose a few horses to have 1,50 ew on and all in all it was great. that was 30 years ago. my children today dont go the horse race meetings and neither do i as much a i used too. too expensive , poor experience, full of nob heads who want to get pissed and the atmosphere of by gone days has been lost. there have been some great suggesstions on here for improvement but unfortunatley the industry has been taken over by, greed, drink and louitish behaviour. a very sad story and spending 3.5 million on a marketing campaign is pathetic |
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my children today dont go the horse race meetings and neither do i as much a i used too. too expensive , poor experience, full of nob heads who want to get pissed and the atmosphere of by gone days has been lost.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- spot on The Dragon... the folk they are trying to attract 'full of n0b heads' spoil it for racing fans... so they pander to 'the n0b heads' meanwhile racing fans in the true sense of the word are alienated. |
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Racing fans are typically (I'm in my 50s) older people who got into gambling when horseracing was pretty much the only thing to bet on, so you had to invest in learning something about the sport to play the game.
Leaving aside the slots etc stuff - sports betting now encompasses the sports people get into playing and following in their youth - cricket, tennis, rugby, football. There's no longer that driver to discover racing. It's a shame, but I don't think that is reversible. |
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It's a shame, but I don't think that is reversible.
------------------------------------------------------ totally agree longbridge... so why THEY keep chucking huge amounts of cash at it is mind boggling imv... it's just window shopping imv. |
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one thing horse racing has NEVER been able to deal with (and NEVER will imv) is...
it's 2,3,4,5 minutes of 'action' then 30 minutes of folk standing around doing nowt... look at football / tennis / cricket and it is pretty much constant action... that is what the yoof of today want's isn't it ? you just do not get that with horse racing... why they don't just admit that and stop pouring bad money after good money at a war they will NEVER win ? i suppose it's coz the BHA folk (who are pretty clueless tbh) have employed folk to 'get the yoof on board' and if they do nowt then they won't be able to justify their jobs... it's absolute madness fighting a war you simply CANNOT and WILL NOT win imv... but what do i know ? |
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oh and btw...
doesn't help when folk might back an odds on chance that then drifts to huge degrees... jumps like it has never seen a fence in it's life... ends up being pulled up and very little seems to be done to look at who was laying the horse to make it drift so much in the first place... but the BHA clowns want more mugs to get involved in the rancid game ? laughable imv. |
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There is a utter lack of understanding of their product and society as a whole. Racing isn't a "great day out" there isnt much "excitement" and the "4 million memories made" arent really great ones.
But Simon's still getting a wage and the gravy train will slowly trundle closer to extinction. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- totally agree scoobytoo. |
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Introduce a segregated mini casino eg roulette, blackjack and bingo tables with at least 20 fobt in the surrounding buildings. These will accommodate every denomination of the race-going public esp the youths and tech savvy culture. The Exchequer will be happy; the Levy Board and those BHA clowns too.
The above is a sure-fire success; horseracing needs to be taken to a different level very different from the present spiral declining and bookie-driven sport. |
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There are plenty of quiet midweek meetings to go to, where you can enjoy the racing without the piss heads.
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On a serious note there's clearly too much horseracing in the UK where a sizeable chunk is surplus to requirement, and for the benefits of bookies only. This bookie "cancer" needs to be cut-out before an improvement could surface; a radical streamlining introduced is also an absolute must to provide a better future for the sport.
We've a key trial for the Epsom Oaks today yet no thread or post on the race. Similarly, The Dante tomorrow. |
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the dealer 14 May 25 08:49
There are plenty of quiet midweek meetings to go to, where you can enjoy the racing without the piss heads. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- nobody is saying anything to the contrary i don't think the dealer... BUT... sounds to me like the BHA will be doing their best to turn quiet midweek fixtures in to drunk and disorderly pi$$head fixtures in the near future. |