“Greyhound racing is nothing without betting”
I was sitting in Nick and Natalie Savva’s lounge and was about to take the biggest risk of my life, buying Greyhound Star (the newspaper). There was just Nick, Bob Morton and myself in the room.
I didn’t want Bob’s money but was after the most valuable piece of free advice that the multi-millionaire could offer me.
(His foremost advice was actually ‘Invest in your own ability’ – a supremely astute observation that I have plagiarised many times since)
The “Greyhound racing is nothing without betting” line came from an ensuing conversation about the state of the greyhound industry.
My first reaction was to be slightly miffed.
Greyhound racing was about the dogs, the owners, the trainers and the kennel staff, its history, the romance! Surely?
No! In the cold-blooded, soulless way that accountants see the world (don’t worry my new boss won’t be reading this), Bob was absolutely spot on.
Greyhound racing would never have been conceived but for betting.
Gambling has, does. . . . and always will . . . . keep the whole ship afloat.
The key to greyhound racing’s ridiculous growth in the early years wasn’t its excitement or novelty. It was because there were so few other places where Mr & Mrs Average could have a bet.
Street betting was active but illegal. There were no betting shops. Although the working classes could bet on horse racing, it was a daytime activity with most racecourses being a day trip on the train or coach.
(It cannot be a coincidence that the ‘football pools’ – for many years, the closest we had to a life-changing national lottery win – and greyhound racing, were born within four years of each other?)
Dog tracks were generally built on the edges of towns, accessible by trolley bus and foot. For the first time, tens of millions of working-class folk could now have a flutter – and they did.
The bigger tracks like White City might have 200 bookies in attendance plus a flourishing tote.
I’m not going to go into tons of figures about the sheer magnitude of it all, but 21 years after the first meeting was staged, track totes alone (not including on-course betting) turned £99m in a single year. That is the equivalent of £4.9bn today.
As all greyhound historians will be aware, second only to post-war taxation, it was the opening of betting shops in 1961 which led to greyhound racing’s massive decline.
The tracks screamed, but realistically, the customer simply voted with his feet.
As I have stated previously, in my view, the tracks should have stayed at the forefront of the gambling industry. They were potentially much bigger players than the young Joe Coral, William Hill, or Victor Chandler.
But they didn’t.
The industry not only lost its bodies, but it also lost its all-important gambling revenue which was its greatest edge.
While countless sporting activities also relied on admission prices, and maybe selling a few refreshments, greyhound promoters could also rely on a massive additional income – betting.
Ironically, even after the opening of the shops, betting on greyhounds didn’t decline significantly. But unlike horse racing or dog racing in Australia, Ireland and the USA, none of the gambling profits were ploughed back into the sport.
The bookies raked in hundreds of millions on greyhound racing, NONE of which was returned.
The tracks attempted a game of cat and mouse by attempting to restrict the publication of form and results, but they damaged themselves as much as the bookies.
When, in desperation in the mid-1960s, the track owners came up with an offer for what would eventually become the BAGS service, the bookies were very coy about engaging.
Why pay for something you are getting for free anyway?
But technology was moving on and it would only be a matter of time before live racing was shown in the shops. Until then it was audio only.
The track promoters might gain the edge by demanding a high price for the cameras to be installed at their tracks.
So the three biggest players: Ladbrokes, Corals and William Hill each decided to buy a couple of tracks. (They also became founders of a tech company required to broadcast the coverage – SIS)
Ladbrokes actually bought seven in one block lot. They held onto Crayford and Monmore, sold off Brough Park to GRA, and closed Leeds, Gosforth, (the original) Perry Barr, and Willenhall for development. They later planned to sell Crayford too but were refused planning permission unless they built a smaller track on the same site.
As the track numbers continued to plummet, the betting industry was finally forced into pumping in some of their profits via BAGS contracts and the BGRF which was set up in 1992.
How ironic that the mainstream bookies were then so quick to point the finger and the new ‘parasites’ getting the product for free – the betting exchanges.
And the point is?
Well maybe I am a lone voice in this, but I wonder whether we continue to look at greyhound racing’s pressing issues through the wrong lens.
We continue to concentrate on attendance, track numbers, owners, trainers and available greyhounds and all are vital in their own ways.
But what about betting?
I would suggest that betting is the heart and lungs of greyhound racing. If betting was to cease, the greyhound industry wouldn’t last a month.
For decades the tracks were totally financially dependent on punters through the gate but lost them to the betting shops and a plethora of other entertainment options.
The tracks are still massively reliant on the shops. The Gambling Commission figures for 2022/3 show that the greyhound profit on retail (that’s ‘shops’ to you and me) was £142.6m at a 17.8% margin compared to a mere £79.2m at an 11.8% margin on ‘digital’ (that’s ‘online’ to most of us).
If we compare that to horse racing, the comparative figures are £446m at 13.4% margin of profit in shops and £733m at 8% margin online.
In other words, horseracing generates three times more profit than greyhounds in the shops, but nine times more profit online.
But to throw one more set of figures at you. Gaming machines yielded £201m, online casinos brought in £815m and online ‘slots’ £3.2bn.
So where is all this going?
On the current trajectory, things are only going to get worse for dog racing. Betting shop numbers have fallen by a third in the last 15 years and the amount bet on greyhounds is less than half of what it was 15 years ago.
But while generally online betting and gambling have gone from strength to strength and have almost certainly overtaken retail in terms of overall volume, greyhound racing will potentially be going in the other direction following the loss of the dedicated TV channel.
Which leads into the world of pure speculation. . . . here goes.
I see a direction of travel where greyhound racing absolutely needs promotion across a bigger audience underpinned by broadcasting on mainstream TV. Any TV production will need to showcase the entertainment factor of the sport, the betting proposition and the welfare of the greyhounds.
Without the increase in digital betting turnover, the sport will only contract further and it is vital that the media rights companies (PGR and SIS) embrace any opportunity to drive betting growth in all areas.
I see PGR and SIS having to heavily invest in promotion and broadcasting as part of their service to bookmakers to drive an upturn in digital betting turnover and, as a by-product, attendance at stadia.
But to make it work PGR and SIS will need to invest heavily, not only in things like promotion and a new TV presentation, but also, as the industry’s commercial powerhouses, to enhance the responsibility for welfare that the GBGB has focussed a lot of their attention on.
My view is that this will happen sooner rather than later as the bookmakers (and inherently their suppliers, PGR and SIS) still see greyhound racing as a viable betting product. But how long will that last? A continued decrease in betting turnover driven by a lack of promotion and a lack of greyhounds for full fields won’t be sustainable.
The significant increase in ‘trainer retained’ retired dogs in GBGB’s last set of annual returns only highlights a growing crisis. However, the crisis could be significantly addressed with better organisation of the process for rehoming and focused advertising on the greyhound as a pet (and we all know how good they are in this respect). This will obviously take a good chunk of upfront investment and would have to run alongside the other promotional activities I have already mentioned for consideration by PGR and SIS.
Looking much further down the line, much will depend on the future of one of the PGR partners, Entain (Ladbrokes and Coral).
A report in last week’s Financial Times hinted that the company could again be subject to a new takeover bid. https://www.ft.com/content/fe9f5405-6fec-4234-b346-197d4fa4d6fc
If it were to happen, how far down the road would they go in following William Hill? They sold off their dog tracks and following the takeover, all their betting shops too. Albeit, Hills were a much smaller company.
Greyhound racing needs to position itself for all eventualities but, above all else, realise that increasing betting turnover is central to its success.
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I take great pride that the Star remains the link between the current greyhound industry and many of the key players of recent years.
If we are talking former racing managers, there is no one more highly revered than the former GRA Senior Racing Manager Bob Rowe who so kindly put the following few words together:
“Hope you are keeping well. Had a good smile at this article, which set me thinking. Not so much about humorous names but the actual length of some.
The two longest that I recall were “Proportional Representation”, trained by Paddy Coughlan which I saw run at Newport in the late 1950s and then “Borris-in-Ossary Prince”, trained by Stan Gudgin at Park Royal when I worked for London Stadiums Limited in 1962/63.
It was the latter name which caused NGRC to introduce a name limit of sixteen letters, including spaces.
The shortest name ?………..that was “It”, which transferred to West Ham from Romford
In 1968 during my years there and was trained by Paddy Power.”
“Editors Chair is an opinion article written by Floyd Amphlett who has been with the Greyhound Star since 1987. Floyd has experienced all of the major developments in greyhound racing for the past 40 years and maintains an enthusiastic interest in the progress and future development of the industry.”
