GBR publishes results of its campaign to woo summer crowds to racecourses

Rod Street, The chief executive of Great British Racing (GBR), said it is "absolutely vital" the sport continues to fight for relevance after its Everyone's Turf campaign failed to reverse the trend of falling attendances last summer.

The national campaign, which cost £1.6 million with £1.35m provided by the Levy Board, was launched in June and set out to combat declining racecourse attendances following the coronavirus pandemic. It was headlined by former England footballer and TV presenter Jermaine Jenas, which drew some criticism on social media, and targeted young people through July, August and September, when a total of 1.95m visited racecourses in 2019. 

GBR set out the key objective of hitting that number last year but fell short, with just 1.62m people going racing in Britain during that period, which Street believes is primarily due to the cost of living crisis.  Using consumer research, the other key aim was to reach 12m people who would consider a day at the races, compared to 10m in 2019. A national poll in October indicated that the equivalent of 12.9m people were open to the idea. 

"It's absolutely vital that British racing continues to fight hard for relevance with consumers because the challenges have not gone away. There's no suggestion from the figures that there's any diminishing interest in going racing, so we think we're being affected by what's happening in the wider economy but we can't ever take that interest for granted, which is why after the coronavirus pandemic this campaign was so important," said Street, following the publication of the campaign results on Wednesday. "We're acutely aware at this moment in time, £1.6m is a lot of money to spend on marketing and advertising but compared to other sports, it's a low sum for national promotion.

"We certainly think the levels of engagement were positive. The industry, particularly racecourses, felt it was important we did something to engage with consumers. We do acknowledge we missed one of the key objectives in driving admissions but we did sail into the strongest headwinds in relation to the economic crisis, after 2022 had started quite brightly leading up to the spring. That said, we wanted to have a benchmark to work towards."

Street confirmed GBR was pausing on new activity for 2023 while work continues on a broader industry strategy, and he added: "There are some bigger questions being asked around consumer involvement and fan engagement. It makes sense to let that inform our future activity. The sentiment around the industry strategy is that the sport is underfunded in terms of marketing and that GBR and racing needs a bigger budget to be able to campaign properly."

The campaign, as well as GBR's National Racehorse Week, benefited from Levy Board funding and its chief executive Alan Delmonte said: "On the national consumer campaign, there was a mixed picture. Racecourse attendances fell significantly but, on the other hand, consumer awareness and consideration of going racing increased, as did views of campaign videos, which were the subject of good consumer feedback. The board supported GBR’s recommendation that expenditure on national campaigns is deferred until the outcome of the industry strategy and was of the view that as far as possible, future HBLB involvement should be aimed at specific initiatives in their early stages which should then be taken on by the industry. 

"On National Racehorse Week, which the board funded as part of a commitment to equine welfare, this was very positive. Overall the board was encouraged by the reach of this campaign, including to those without previous experience of racing. The death of Her Majesty the Queen was considered to have had a noticeable impact on the number of people attending events.”

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