Racinos not advertising racing product

[joeydb]

As I've posted here several times, I live near Parx, which advertises only the casino there. "So Vegas..." and all that nonsense - the advertisement showing well-dressed, good looking people strolling through a casino with a purposeful attitude, presumably eager to feed slot machines.

The track is never mentioned. Not on billboards, not on TV. The only place that I recently saw an ad is on the "Let's Go Racing" TV program that I religiously watch every week, as Keith Jones (track announcer) and Dick Jerardi do a great job. But that's an ad airing to people already watching a show about horse racing centered at Parx. It's like Parx is embarassed that they have a racetrack.

I got to wondering - is this going on all over the country? Does Gulfstream advertise in their market? Is the racing at Aqueduct advertised at least when the track is live?

Don't get me wrong - the sheep filing into these places to make guaranteed negative expectation wagers keeps our sport afloat - until the casino operators eventually are able to escape the mandatory payments. And I understand that in business you would prioritize the operation of the part of your business making the most money. But you would also want to improve the profits of all parts of the business, so even the other parts would get advertised. This does not seem to be happening here in Philly.

I believe that Parx upper management secretly can't wait until they can shut the track part down, expand their casino and sell the remainder of the land for development. I was just wondering if others are seeing this sort of thing where they live or if the other tracks that have casinos are still trying to improve the track side.

[rpncaine]

It was the same at Indy Downs until the parent company (Cenataur) acquired them from bankruptcy. Now you can get into the clubhouse by showing your players card and don't have to pay $5. Which is something I bitched about all the time. They also have several cross promotions going on too. It's like they suddenly love each other. They even have the track feed going in the racino bars when there is live racing now. The track also is advertising about the slots during the races, even have ads in the program offering $5 free slot play. I've seen a lot more racing people head to the slots after the races are over since the acquisition.

[MaTH716]

I have heard commercials on the radio for Belmont.

[Dunbar]

Hollywood/Penn National has at least one full-size highway billboard on I-81 that only mentions its live racing. There may be more than that, but I remember being pleasantly surprised when I first saw it.

--Dunbar