curious Posted 4 hours ago Author Posted 4 hours ago (edited) 5 minutes ago, Chief Stipe said: Yes but I showed some restraint in saying what I thought of it. I'm disappointed that you think this graph has any meaning. You would get the same line if you put Marketing Expenditure vs Turnover on the axis. Or Turnover vs Expenditure. Well if you have better data or analysis on the correlation between turnover and stakes supporting your view that they are unrelated, please post it. At this point your restraint appears to be due to you having no evidence to the contrary. Edited 4 hours ago by curious Quote
Chief Stipe Posted 4 hours ago Posted 4 hours ago 5 minutes ago, hesi said: Racing has to make sure it uses the money it does get wisely and putting it into races that generate a higher turnover is one avenue. Yes, there are many others. Focusing on Stakes vs Turnover is doomed to fail. The focus should be on the fundamentals - providing safe tracks and facilities for horses to train and race on. Quote
hesi Posted 3 hours ago Posted 3 hours ago Not so much a focus just on stakes/turnover But stakes are the biggest cost to the industry and turnover is the biggest effective income to the industry, so it has to be the main focus. Less money allocated to stakes would mean more money for infrastructure, just as higher turnover would Quote
Chief Stipe Posted 2 hours ago Posted 2 hours ago 26 minutes ago, hesi said: Not so much a focus just on stakes/turnover But stakes are the biggest cost to the industry and turnover is the biggest effective income to the industry, so it has to be the main focus. Less money allocated to stakes would mean more money for infrastructure, just as higher turnover would Stakes have been the main focus for decades. Increasing them has resulted in a loss in participation NOT an increase. Perhaps @curious can post that two variable graph. A bit like Clubs focussing on the Party rather than raising money to maintain their infrastructure. They now expect the Industry to fund that instructure but the pot isn't big enough! Quote
Murray Fish Posted 2 hours ago Posted 2 hours ago 2 minutes ago, Chief Stipe said: They now expect the Industry to fund that instructure but the pot isn't big enough! They being? The big 7 clubs? Quote
Chief Stipe Posted 2 hours ago Posted 2 hours ago 5 minutes ago, Murray Fish said: They being? The big 7 clubs? All Clubs. None of them are making enough to fund their maintenance. Lets face it a 2000m turf track be it at a "BIG Club" or a "SMALL Club" has the same basic maintenance and renovation costs. The only difference is if you race once or twice a year you can defer the renovation part. Quote
curious Posted 1 hour ago Author Posted 1 hour ago 2 hours ago, Chief Stipe said: Focusing on Stakes vs Turnover is doomed to fail. The focus should be on the fundamentals - providing safe tracks and facilities for horses to train and race on. So, isn't wagering the primary source of revenue which funds safe tracks and facilities as well as stakes? Quote
curious Posted 1 hour ago Author Posted 1 hour ago 58 minutes ago, Chief Stipe said: Stakes have been the main focus for decades. Increasing them has resulted in a loss in participation NOT an increase. Perhaps @curious can post that two variable graph. A bit like Clubs focussing on the Party rather than raising money to maintain their infrastructure. They now expect the Industry to fund that instructure but the pot isn't big enough! What measure of participation are you using when you say that? Quote
Chief Stipe Posted 1 hour ago Posted 1 hour ago 40 minutes ago, curious said: So, isn't wagering the primary source of revenue which funds safe tracks and facilities as well as stakes? That's the flaw in the whole business model. There isn't enough revenue from wagering and there is unlikely to be at least in the next 10 years to fund the Stakes and Capital wants of the Industry. In fact there never has been enough revenue from wagering to fund ALL the racecourse maintenance AND stakes. Clubs cannot rely on wagering to fund themselves. They need supplementary and complementary sources of revenue - particularly the latter. Quote
curious Posted 1 hour ago Author Posted 1 hour ago 1 minute ago, Chief Stipe said: That's the flaw in the whole business model. There isn't enough revenue from wagering and there is unlikely to be at least in the next 10 years to fund the Stakes and Capital wants of the Industry. In fact there never has been enough revenue from wagering to fund ALL the racecourse maintenance AND stakes. Clubs cannot rely on wagering to fund themselves. They need supplementary and complementary sources of revenue - particularly the latter. Why? Can't you just reduce stakes to a level that provides sufficient additional revenue for infrastructure. That's how it worked until 20 years ago. Quote
Chief Stipe Posted 49 minutes ago Posted 49 minutes ago 11 minutes ago, curious said: Why? Can't you just reduce stakes to a level that provides sufficient additional revenue for infrastructure. That's how it worked until 20 years ago. You model fails on several levels. As for it "working" twenty years ago - that is a myth. I don't understand why you keep perpetuating it. The fact is there wasn't enough money twenty years ago to fully fund track maintenance and rennovation. It was deferred and deferred until the track systems have failed. Quote
curious Posted 33 minutes ago Author Posted 33 minutes ago (edited) 15 minutes ago, Chief Stipe said: You model fails on several levels. As for it "working" twenty years ago - that is a myth. I don't understand why you keep perpetuating it. The fact is there wasn't enough money twenty years ago to fully fund track maintenance and rennovation. It was deferred and deferred until the track systems have failed. A lot of expenses may have been deferred but the industry lived within its means. Since then, we have increasingly paid out more to codes than we have earned, bankrupting the TAB and requiring a taxpayer bail out and the sale of that. As you noted above, more tracks with less racing required less frequent significant maintenance. I don't think the principle of living within our means and not having to beg steal and borrow to exist fails as a model. If you have a better one, what is it? Edited 32 minutes ago by curious Quote
Chief Stipe Posted 23 minutes ago Posted 23 minutes ago 6 minutes ago, curious said: A lot of expenses may have been deferred but the industry lived within its means. Since then, we have increasingly paid out more to codes than we have earned, bankrupting the TAB and requiring a taxpayer bail out and the sale of that. As you noted above, more tracks with less racing required less frequent significant maintenance. I don't think the principle of living within our means and not having to beg steal and borrow to exist fails as a model. If you have a better one, what is it? If you are deferring maintenance of your core racing assets you are NOT living within your means. Costs increased at a faster rate than revenue and maintenance kept being deferred. Looking back I doubt the industry was ever living within its means. The belief systems 50 years ago believed that our tracks would last forever just like we thought our crop, pasture and market garden systems would. In the 80's and 90's they started to collapse. Quote
curious Posted 8 minutes ago Author Posted 8 minutes ago Hindsight is always 20/20. So, what is you better model for the next decade or two? Put it up so we can consider and debate it. I think you'd agree that the current and proposed ones don't and won't work. Quote
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