Sunday, March 21, 1999
Turfway tries to get untracked
BY JANE PRENDERGAST
The Cincinnati Enquirer
FLORENCE — Turfway Park starts this week in search of a future.
The thoroughbred track is one of dozens around the country struggling against reduced revenues and casino competition. Loyal fans are aging. Younger people aren't drawn to the Sport of Kings.
Admissions at Turfway have declined every year for the past four, more since riverboat casinos opened in southeastern Indiana in 1996. People still bet; they just don't come to the track to do it.
To the rescue comes a unique trio of partners. They bought the track last week, in a merger of the flush casino in dustry, the world of electronic gaming and Kentucky's venerable racing history. They promise a turnaround, one that could make Turfway an example of how to shore up the entire industry.
“This is a little bit of a laboratory for us,” said Pete
Weien, vice president of corporate development for Harrah's Entertainment Inc., one of the buyers. “We're going to try some things. I suspect some are going to work and some won't.
“A track in Kentucky, obviously, is the ultimate proving ground.”
The threesome has its sights set on an industry laden, maybe burdened, with tradition. Horses have run for the roses in Kentucky for 124 straight years. Turfway's own history spans more than a century. Its predecessor, “Old Latonia,” opened in Covington in 1883. It moved to Florence in the early 1960s and became Turfway in 1986.
But tradition is no longer enough. Tracks around the country have closed. Only 10 percent of the key “cash cow” fans are under 35. Americans spent $700 billion on gambling in 1997, but less of that at horse tracks than ever.
Tackling that dim picture: Harrah's, which bills itself as the world's largest gaming resort group; Dreamport Inc., the gaming and entertainment subsidiary of lottery giant GTECH Corp.; and Keeneland, the genteel Lexington track where horse sales are big and white parasols dot the grandstands on sunny days.
The union has renewed worries about whether casino-style gambling will crop up at Kentucky tracks in the future. The trio admits it'll likely pursue a casino if such gambling is legalized.
But representatives also insist they have nothing else in mind other than bolstering this track. And maybe helping save the rest, too.
“This may well be the most forward-thinking thing we've ever done,” said Judy Taylor, spokeswoman for Keeneland. “If the marriage is successful, it will be repeated everywhere.”
Fan base dwindles
What's dying is the tracks' fan base. And the next generation isn't filling the void.
Men over 45 go to the track a lot, much of the time on the spur of the moment, and bet the most of any demographic group. They know the most about the sport.
The younger track-goers may have about as much money to spend, but they don't know much about horse racing and they're less avid sports fans in general, according to research by the National Thoroughbred Racing Association (NTRA). They also have plenty of options — more fast-paced, whistles-and-bells options than ever — for their entertainment dollar. Including casinos.
“The reality is that wherever people are given a choice between casinos and traditional parimutuel wagering, the casinos win,” said Randy Baker, a former professor of gaming management at the University of Nevada who now runs a public relations firm. “And the reason is obvious: There's constant stimulation.”
A decade ago, two states allowed casinos. Now, 24 do. Among them is Indiana, where riverboat casinos lure Greater Cincinnatians daily to pull slot levers and play blackjack while they ride on the Ohio. Argosy Casino in Lawrenceburg is the most popular riverboat casino in the United States. Patrons gambled $259.3 million there in January alone.
The parimutuel industry has been in decline for 30 years, Mr. Baker said. The new piece is the casino boom — “it's created a mortal blow.”
Adding to Turfway's problems is River Downs, the track in Anderson Township. With simulcasting, Cincinnati fans can stay closer to home and still see plenty of races.
In with the new
What the thoroughbred industry must do is cultivate new fans, younger people who have probably never before stepped to a betting window or read a racing form. The question is how.
The easiest way, casino statistics suggest, is to open a casino at the track. But pending that political brouhaha, the new owners are focusing on what they can do now. They've spent $37 million to buy the track and committed another $1.25 million each for improvements. They're promising the most extensive marketing program any horse track has ever seen.
Harrah's starts the task with a giant database — more than 10 million names of people who have visited one of the company's 15 casinos. Even outsiders describe Total Gold as one of the most sophisticated such systems in the business.
Patrons get reward points — the more they spend, the more rewards they reap. But every time they slide that card in, they're helping Harrah's keep track of everything from what games they like to play to what kind of restaurants they choose.
Total Gold won't necessarily come to Turfway. But what will come is that level of marketing savvy, Harrah's Mr. Weien said.
“We should know this customer base a lot better,” said Bob Vincent, Dreamport's vice president of business development. “There are simple ways to understand your fans. Racing hasn't done that.”
Research shows a racing fan comes into contact with something like 27 people during every visit, he said. Savvy industries would capitalize on that by training every one of those track workers in impeccable customer service. Some tracks have started to catch on with ideas like ambassadors to help newcomers learn how to bet, Mr. Vincent said, but the racing industry in general hasn't.
One curmudgeonly mutuel clerk, for example, can leave a potential new fan feeling intimidated and turned off.
The new owners also are planning to tap into their strong relationships with big-name companies like Coca-Cola, Anheuser-Busch and American Express. Marketing deals with them, Mr. Vincent said, will result in more money to spend to promote racing locally and statewide.
Also forecast: a big push in group sales, in using Turfway for events. Maybe concerts, like a few other tracks do. People who wouldn't think of coming to the track on their own might come if the annual company picnic is held there.
It's too soon for concrete goals. The partners aren't ready to say how Turfway's next meet in the fall will look different. But a customer survey is already under way. Horsemen and employees will be quizzed next on everything from the track's strengths to its challenges and what threatens it.
Fresh perspective
Harrah's and Dreamport are massive worldwide companies. But they're not horse industry insiders. They see that as a plus. Maybe the industry has accepted for too long, Mr. Weien said, that the status quo is just the way horse racing has to be. “We don't think so.”
NASCAR successfully reinvented itself. Once only a regional attraction, it's now the fastest-growing sport in the United States.
Las Vegas figured it needed reinventing, too. The gaming industry used to rely on casinos and $4.99 prime rib buffets to draw people. But the gambling capital of America figured out, Mr. Weien said, that family entertainment and good restaurants would bring even bigger crowds.
Every industry has to evolve, Mr. Weien said. The good ones anticipate when and how.
“The rest of sports has figured this out a long time ago,” Mr. Vincent said.
Racetracks have begun catching on. Keeneland invites children for Saturday breakfasts where they can see horses and get their pictures taken in a jockey's clothes.
At Gulfstream Park in Florida, Family Days are huge. Kids play in a park right next to the paddock.
“Maybe Mom and the kids go play while Dad watches racing, but those kids are still there, they're seeing it,” Mr. Vincent said. “That's a start.”
The new partners take over just as Turfway puts on its biggest race of the year, Saturday's Gallery Furniture.com Stakes. Twenty thousand people are expected on what has become the track's most popular day.
The race's new sponsor, Gallery Furniture owner Jim McIngvale, may be the face of things to come. He shows up on his Houston television commercials dressed as a mattress.
“It's great that he's like that,” Mr. Vincent said. “Maybe that's what horse racing needs more of — some excitement.”
And the Oscar goes to ...
Best supporting trivia
Kazan should be honored for his work, not actions
Sunday show seems to be inspired idea
Will we choose cages or classrooms?
One of the faces of AIDS
Parents investigate police shooting
Ditka coaches 10,000 Catholics
Race St. tower to be razed
Turfway tries to get untracked
Tuxes can't hide bawdy behavior
Tigerlilies play Austin at last
Luken undercuts GOP's optimism
UK fans score basketball tickets
Politician helping Bush in Ky.
Boone Co. developments move forward
Cincinnati Country Day School to rebuild bigger
Governor's Award honors arts innovator LoveLarkin
Historic church gets ready for 150th year
Lebanon hires Laidlaw buses
Loss can't dim fervor for Mason fans
Maybe a poem is just a poem
Newport native son unknown
Sharonville reviving tie to railroad
TRISTATE DIGEST
