Offering people SOMETHING more than horse racing is a great antidote during a penny-pinching, cheap-entertainment-seeking economic environment.

What’s more, some racetracks are not worrying about how much people will bet–worrying about handle would miss the point.

Invite people to experience your track and your brand. If they have fun, they will come back. And if they come back, eventually they will turn into bettors, even more so when the economy turns.

Whether you invite people using ostriches, fireworks, pig races, or concerts as Del Mar does, first get people to the track. The sun and scenery of Del Mar is not universal, nor is the ambiance of Keeneland or upstate character of Saratoga. And the ability to handicap a 5 Furlong $4,000 Claimer for Three Year Old Fillies and Mares Which Have Not Won a Race Since April 1 will never be universal.

But you know what is universal?

Something you can market, and people can relate to: Fun.

Congrats to Jose for not falling off.

Des Moines Register

DAN JOHNSON • REGISTER STAFF WRITER • JULY 22, 2008 Ostrich fever

Iowans love their ostrich and camel racing. That was proven again Friday when one of the year’s biggest crowds packed Prairie Meadows to see the yearly exhibition. Attendance is measured only in 24-hour intervals at Prairie Meadows, and Friday’s 12,954 turnout was the third-largest this year.

July has produced three of the top four attendance days this year at Prairie Meadows. Attendance totaled 13,404 for the concert to benefit flood relief July 16. And fireworks night resulted in a 12,194 attendance for July 3.

The year’s biggest attendance day was 14,049 on Kentucky Derby day, May 3.

Hump D. Dumpty won the camel race while Breakin’ in the Night, the only one not to unseat its rider, won the ostrich dash. Both animals were ridden by Jose Ranilla.

The camels and ostriches also ran at Canterbury Park near Minneapolis on Sunday, where attendance was 14,828.

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