The first interesting piece of news at the end of July is that General Manager Chuck Keeling announced his resignation effective October 1, 2010. For those who are not familiar with the history of Fraser Downs, Keeling's grandfather Jim Keeling Sr was the one who founded the racetrack at Cloverdale in 1976 - back in the days when it was known as Cloverdale Raceway. In the early 90's his son and Chuck's father, Jim Keeling Jr, took over the management duties. In 1996 he died rather tragically in a boating accident and his son Chuck took over running the racetrack. Huge shoes to fit for a young man in his mid-20's. Chuck has not announced what his new venture is other than to say it is nothing related to horse racing or gaming.
On Friday, August 13 2010, a newsletter was issued on the BC Harness Racing website. You can read it here.
Bottom line is the number of racing days at Fraser Downs has been cut from 37 days to 23 days. Racing was supposed to resume on October 1 but has now been postponed to October 15. All race days for 2011 have been cancelled, but there might still be racing next year, dates to be determined.
This is not good news for the horse owners and trainers and other persons who work in the backstretch of Fraser Downs. That is practically no income at all.
Awhile ago I posted about Fraser Downs moving into the 2000's. I was at the city hall meeting where the racetrack staff and backstretch people were all for a casino opening in Fraser Downs with slot machines. I went to the meeting out of curiosity. Bottom line is it didn't matter to me one way or the other. I've been to Reno and Las Vegas several times over the years. I did not oppose a casino opening at the racetrack.
The incredible thing was the horsepeople's attitude to this. Slot machines were good. It would save their racing industry. They'd be able to share in the slots revenue and the purses. Some sort of racetrack propaganda they were all blindly believing as several horsemen and women took the microphone to address the council.
I shook my head. I sympathized with them and for their jobs and way of life but they weren't seeing the bigger picture. These are not businessmen used to the corporate world. Well there might be a couple of semi-retired corporate types who got into horse racing as hobbyists, but we're not talking the majority of the backstretch folk, many of whom have not worked any other jobs. Corporate business people are used to meetings, contracts, budgets, crunching numbers, speaking with advisors, etc. Not so on the racetrack where gossip runs rampant and the scuttlebut clearly was that the slots would be a good thing.
I doubted it. I figured the casino would bring in a new clientele who lived closer to Fraser Downs than other casinos and would come to Cloverdale instead of driving into Newton, Coquitlam, Richmond, etc. The corporate busines people running Fraser Downs would be checking their spreadsheets and seeing that slots revenue was good and the wagering on the horse races not so good because they are two different business run under Fraser Downs. I knew the slots revenue would carry the horse racing along for awhile but eventually someone crunching numbers would see that the horse racing venture just wasn't that profitable.
I think this is just the first step.
Prepare for a mass exodus of horsemen to Ontario.
Showing posts with label slot machines. Show all posts
Showing posts with label slot machines. Show all posts
Sunday, August 15, 2010
Saturday, April 17, 2010
Fraser Downs moves into the 2000's.
On New Year's Eve 1999 there was a bring in the millenium event at the Cloverdale Fairgrounds. It was marketed as an event for the whole family. Various tents and exhibits were set up around the fairgrounds and there was horse racing on the track that was advertised as the last horse races anywhere in the world for the century. Admission was $5 or maybe $10, I don't really recall. We bought tickets and it was good for in and out privleges. We only lived a couple of blocks from the fairgrounds so we went home to have something to eat and came back again. Attendance was projected to be 50,000 but only 5,000 tickets were sold.
Kind of the same thing that was happening at the Fraser Downs racetrack. Attendance was down which meant less patrons purchasing wager tickets which ultimately meant less purse money available to the horse owners and trainers. Many of them headed to other tracks in Canada. The problem with that is the tracks in Ontario have a lot of competition. Good horses, good trainers, and good drivers are already established there and its hard for a newcomer to compete, no matter how successful they were in Cloverdale. Many stables headed into Alberta during the summer months where there was a chance to make money but most of them returned to Cloverdale. The winning purse money might be low but a stable with decent horses could earn pretty good money here.
The grumblings continued about wanting to put slot machines into the grandstand and turn it into a casino. Of course everyone connected to the racetrack wanted the slot machines, but there was continued resistance from some City of Surrey elected officials and some locals.
In late 2003 the City of Surrey mayor and council held a meeting at city hall to vote on putting in slot machines at the racetrack in Cloverdale. We went down to city hall to observe and the place was a circus, standing room only. There was a sign up sheet in the lobby for anyone who wanted to address council and members of the audience in the public and a lot of people had signed up to speak.
A former politician had given a copy of his speech to my father so I'd had a peek at it beforehand, but he didn't read it, doing the old politician trick of having someone else read it and have them look like an idiot. A neighbor of ours in Dogwood Gardens read it and it was hilarious. He really made a fool out of himself. Another man in the crowd stood up to say his objection was the casino would bring in more patrons and they would all be litterbugs and throw garbage all over and the children walking to school would trip over it. That brought a lot of laughs. Didn't their parents ever teach them they should watch where they're walking? To make a long story short and what we all know today, council approved the slot machines and casino and the racetrack managed to get some temporary slots installed almost immediately.
The grandstand underwent another renovation as Fraser Downs underwent the task of turning the old building into a casino that would attract a new clientele. For the most part they succeeded. The new grandstand is much more appealing than the one that existed in the 80's. The only thing I fault it with is that there is really no place for patrons who want to sit down and watch the horse races. Now one can argue that there are all kinds of places where people can watch the racing such as the Clubhouse or Homestretch restaurants, both of which you have to shell out some money if you want to sit in these sections and watch the racing. The only place to watch the horse racing for free are outside at track level either in front of the grandstand or alongside the parking lot fences, and this might not be desirable depending on the weather. Or there is a pub style restaurant on the ground floor near the racetrack's finish line. There are a couple of betting windows here. We tried to come one night and have a meal here but most of the tables were full of people. It was unknown whether patrons sit down at a table and wait for one of the few servers to come over and take an order or to go up to the counter and place an order and no one would stop and answer us, so we ended up leaving and going out for sushi.
The Fraser Downs casino does seem to be successful, judging by the full parking lots on weekends and lots of cars in the lot the rest of the week. But has the extra income from the casino really helped the horse race purses and winnings the owners can expect? Shortly after the casino opened it appeared the purses did increase but since then it appears that while some class of races have increased, most have stayed the same. The scuttlebuck from casino employees is that the slots revenue is carrying the racing and that wagering has not significantly increased with the inception of the casino. Although the casino is doing the well, the clientele do not appear to be overly interested in horse racing.
Interesting times as Fraser Downs enters a new decade.
Kind of the same thing that was happening at the Fraser Downs racetrack. Attendance was down which meant less patrons purchasing wager tickets which ultimately meant less purse money available to the horse owners and trainers. Many of them headed to other tracks in Canada. The problem with that is the tracks in Ontario have a lot of competition. Good horses, good trainers, and good drivers are already established there and its hard for a newcomer to compete, no matter how successful they were in Cloverdale. Many stables headed into Alberta during the summer months where there was a chance to make money but most of them returned to Cloverdale. The winning purse money might be low but a stable with decent horses could earn pretty good money here.
The grumblings continued about wanting to put slot machines into the grandstand and turn it into a casino. Of course everyone connected to the racetrack wanted the slot machines, but there was continued resistance from some City of Surrey elected officials and some locals.
In late 2003 the City of Surrey mayor and council held a meeting at city hall to vote on putting in slot machines at the racetrack in Cloverdale. We went down to city hall to observe and the place was a circus, standing room only. There was a sign up sheet in the lobby for anyone who wanted to address council and members of the audience in the public and a lot of people had signed up to speak.
A former politician had given a copy of his speech to my father so I'd had a peek at it beforehand, but he didn't read it, doing the old politician trick of having someone else read it and have them look like an idiot. A neighbor of ours in Dogwood Gardens read it and it was hilarious. He really made a fool out of himself. Another man in the crowd stood up to say his objection was the casino would bring in more patrons and they would all be litterbugs and throw garbage all over and the children walking to school would trip over it. That brought a lot of laughs. Didn't their parents ever teach them they should watch where they're walking? To make a long story short and what we all know today, council approved the slot machines and casino and the racetrack managed to get some temporary slots installed almost immediately.
The grandstand underwent another renovation as Fraser Downs underwent the task of turning the old building into a casino that would attract a new clientele. For the most part they succeeded. The new grandstand is much more appealing than the one that existed in the 80's. The only thing I fault it with is that there is really no place for patrons who want to sit down and watch the horse races. Now one can argue that there are all kinds of places where people can watch the racing such as the Clubhouse or Homestretch restaurants, both of which you have to shell out some money if you want to sit in these sections and watch the racing. The only place to watch the horse racing for free are outside at track level either in front of the grandstand or alongside the parking lot fences, and this might not be desirable depending on the weather. Or there is a pub style restaurant on the ground floor near the racetrack's finish line. There are a couple of betting windows here. We tried to come one night and have a meal here but most of the tables were full of people. It was unknown whether patrons sit down at a table and wait for one of the few servers to come over and take an order or to go up to the counter and place an order and no one would stop and answer us, so we ended up leaving and going out for sushi.
The Fraser Downs casino does seem to be successful, judging by the full parking lots on weekends and lots of cars in the lot the rest of the week. But has the extra income from the casino really helped the horse race purses and winnings the owners can expect? Shortly after the casino opened it appeared the purses did increase but since then it appears that while some class of races have increased, most have stayed the same. The scuttlebuck from casino employees is that the slots revenue is carrying the racing and that wagering has not significantly increased with the inception of the casino. Although the casino is doing the well, the clientele do not appear to be overly interested in horse racing.
Interesting times as Fraser Downs enters a new decade.
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