Friday, September 21, 2012

Add A Quarter Million to a Purse, Get Four Horses

Gary West takes a look at the $1M Cotillion Stakes this weekend at Philadelphia Park.
  • When nobody, or nearly nobody, wants to race for a million mazumas, horsemen lack much more than good fillies. But there it is, Saturday's $1 million Cotillion at Parx Racing with a quartet of a field. 
A million bucks, 4 horses.

This year this race's purse was bumped by $250,000.

I guess if it was for $750,000 maybe they would've only got three entries. Who knows.

We've said it before, but bumping an already high stakes purse another incremental $100,000, or $200,000 (and make no mistake, these bumps are from slots money) does about as much for the gambling-sport from an ROI perspective as a Jeff Mullins poster giveaway.  Even worse, it shows no management imagination whatsoever.

Question: What can we do with an extra $250,000? Racings answer: "Let's make a purse for a stakes race bigger and get four horses"

With some imagination, how about $250,000 for seeded pools of some sort? As everyone knows, especially since Pete Denk highlighted it this past week, Pennsylvania tracks - who are awash with slots cash - charge 30% takeouts.  Out of the 68 tracks ranked by blended takeout score, Parx ranks 64th.

If that $250,000 brought in $1,000,000 of new betting, it could almost pay for itself at 25% takeout. Not to mention, it may actually give a reason for people like me and Denk to play that track once a year. It'd be $250k well (better) spent.

How about $250,000 in marketing to get people to the track to fill some seats and build a better and bigger brand? That might bring back some ROI wouldn't it? More people would be there eating hot dogs, drinking beer, betting a little, or hitting the slot machines after the races. Maybe that $250k brings in some revenue, and brings in some new fans.

Sheesh, why not $250,000 in free betting vouchers if we're going to go all out. It'd be a wicked promotion with people, local TV and radio providing a ton of free buzz. If the people who get the free vouchers churn it five times, it bumps handle by $1.25 million, to boot. Heck, maybe a few of them actually come back next week.

Or, let's just take the easy way out and add another $250k to the purse. Horsemen won't mind, and it's a hell of a lot less work. If it brings in four horses, oh well, we tried.

Welcome to racing. The easy road is the safe road with slots money.

Related: NYRA Boosts Stake Race Purses From Slots
Georgian Ups Purse For Upper Canada Cup By $100,000

Notes: Allan has a full recap for the Little Brown Jug yesterday.

Dumb bettor chats the Jug in today's Harness Racing Update (pdf).

No comments:

Most Trafficked, Last 12 Months

Similar

Carryovers Provide Big Reach and an Immediate Return

Sinking marketing money directly into the horseplayer by seeding pools is effective, in both theory and practice In Ontario and elsewher...