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Reading the comments of the on course layers in today’s RP , it seems the consensus among them is that betting exchanges have killed on course bookmaking – and to borrow their phrase "the game has gone"…
Is there any way back for on-course layers?
I can’t see anything other than a slow and painful death for their business….
Why limit it to on-course bookies?
Is there a single bookmaker in the land who’ll lay you and pay you on horses if you’re not a pathological gambler? Is there any price but the Betfair price these days? What purpose do a second layer of middlemen serve?
I’m limiting to on-course bookmakers as they are suggesting that their businesses aren’t viable any more – that isn’t currently the case with off course bookmakers.
If you would like to start another thread about why you get knocked back with off course bookmakers then please do so…
Dark
Betfair’s coffin through the
streets of London
was a slick marketing tool
thought up by Black
a thoroughly non-conformist thinker.I did think at the time
it might well be prophetic.
The exchanges offer convenience,
in fact you can even bet in the small room
and you’ll find many shy monkey men
in their, planning their blue holidays.It is quite stressful asking for
a big wedge to be taken out of the satchel,
and Barry’s smile can hide a hundred hernias
as he counts you out.
When I have taken large slices
out of other’s accounts
my eye sometimes mists over at night
in feeling for the poor souls,
but there is no ave maria
and I am soon asleep
Yes, imo, the Exchange(s) have killed the Ring, and a great pity it is too.
Racing itself will probably go the same way, and will just be a sideshow thing of the past, that kids ask their mums about, as they cruise round the inner- city fundays.Virtual reality? You betcha E and alkipops it is!
Progress is progress, innit?Off course bookmakers will have to change, a fact of which they are no doubt well aware. However they have the resources and investment to allow them to do that.
I feel no sympathy for the on-course bookmakers (or any boomaker in fact) who moans about Betting Exchanges ruining things for them. Another business has come up with a better product; they can either adapt or go to the wall.
Insomniac – that is fair enough. Do you think there is a way in which on course bookmakers can adapt and still remain profitable?
Have to agree with Insomniac -times change and evolution takes place.
Marble also sums it up perfectly – there are few if any, bookmakers who are prepared to make a stand – they are like sheep. Fearless Freddy was probably the last of the "old school" bookmakers, prepared to put his oney where his mouth was, now he has gone those who remain are much of a muchness.
The bookmakers have had it too much their own way over the years and now they are paying the price – is it too late to do anything about it – possibly yes – unless they are prepared to take an individual stand and lay the horses they want to take on then the ring will die even more.
They’ll plod on for a few years, eeking out an existence out of bolters they can shorten up to the next rule four bracket and getting mothercare vouchered with office money to make certain horses artificially short, but what real purpose do they serve these days?
Some could in theory adapt and bet to opinions, but if that’s your game surely you’d go where the real punters are, which isn’t at the racecourse.
Per TDK:-
Do you think there is a way in which on course bookmakers can adapt and still remain profitable?
That’s the $64,000 question.
I think it’s fair to say that, even before the rise of Betfair, the betting ring for many (perhaps most) race meetings was a diminishing market. Can’t recall hoardes of bookies competing for thousands of racegoers custom at the average drab mid-week fixtures that I used to frequent in the 80’s and early 90’s.The death of the on-course market for such fixtures was being heard back then. They were chasing a diminishing customer base and the exchanges haven’t helped.
However, the exchanges aren’t solely to blame for the drop in the on-course market. Where there is a decent crowd there will be a demand for on-course cash bookies. There are too many fixtures to pull in sufficient racegoers for them all. And with the comparitively recent introduction of ATR and RUK, plus the costs of travel and entry and exhrobitant catering costs, why bother making the effort to go racing?
Cut the fixture list; cut the cost of going racing; market the sport better; – that’s what racing can do to get bodies back – which the on-course market needs.
What can the on-course bookies do (if anything). Try giving value and stand a decent bet for a start. But if they are to go the way of the stagecoach and the beta-max video recorder, then so be it.
After all, many (perhaps most) racing countries survive without bookies; they’re not essential and are more of an anachronism peculiar to GB & Irish racing. They have no god-given right to survive or to extra assistance.
Like Marble, I used to enjoy the hustle and bustle of the ring; trying to get the optimum price etc. But there are probably now thousands of younger punters who enjoy just as much the hustle of the internet to get a price .The current situation of the three markets (off-course, on-course and exchange) being entangled and more-or-less dependent on one another has become untenable in my view, particularly the archaic and increasingly unfair/unrealistic SP mechanism
The three should ideally go their separate ways and trade as quite independent betting outlets.
Off-course – to service their ‘estates’ with their own industry prices, both morning line and SP
On-course – to service the needs of the racegoing public only
Exchange – to service the needs of punters who have the but the vaguest inkling what ‘value’ meansFreed from the shackles of ‘office money’ an independent on-course market would be free to react to the market forces on the racecourse alone, and who knows, a new breed of bookmaker may reappear who will be prepared to ‘take a view’ on a horse from what he or his paddock-man has actually seen of the beast, or what his trusted form-man’s tissue says. As in days of yore.
Result: a more competitive market that just might tempt the clued-up heavier hitter to foresake an afternoon in myopic big-blue land for a venture into the presbyopic great outdoors.
Though it is doubtful on-course turnover will ever return to anything like it was was pre-exchange.
Over-simplistic? almost certainly
The on course business has been dying since about 2002 when Betfair really took off and a huge number of serious punters stopped going racing. The punters who would regularly bet from £100 to £2,000 drifted away to Betfair and left a huge hole in the on course market.
I reentered the on course industry in 2001 after a gap of 20 years running other businesses and soon discovered the game was up. I sold up my pitches at a loss and simply moved my working capital to Betfair.
Most on course bookmakers are actually Betfair traders with a small edge in odds over those based at home. The day is coming when there will be Betfair terminals on the course right alongside the Tote windows and also easy access to WiFi network connection supplied by the courses for a small fee or free from Betfair.
I guess the start of it all was the removal of the off course betting tax, which in an instant suddenly made sitting at home and playing with bookies (and later exchanges) a very attractive option for the bigger players
I can’t see how even an opinionated and talented bookmaker would be better off on course these days. To operate on course he will have to pay entrance to the course, expenses and tax on winnings – and then ,bar a few arb players, who is going to come out and play with him on his "opinions"? The bottom line is, if he is needing to put up arbs to get significant business, he is better off sitting in front of his PC at home and playing on Betfair, tax free…
Maybe the oncourse ring is like the stagecoach and beta-max and is just an anachronism now, but like others, its demise saddens me. One of the things that made me catch the horseracing "bug" was ducking and diving in the betting ring, searching out the best value. Now it all seems so desperately dull….
Interesting stuff. From personal experience, I’m not surprised it’s in trouble. When I go racing these days, the one item crucial to me is my mobile phone. So few on-course bookmakers take a view these days that all they offer me is the show I can get with various bookmakers, most now offering SP if better or betfair either on the phone or through wap technology. EIther of the last 2 options are preferable as I think I’m likely to get a better deal. Surely I cannot be alone in this.
I felt alone David
when I was standing
in for gamble
as I have done
on a few occasions
at a racecourse venue.
A great sadness came over me
at my realization I was just a clone
in her fiendish plan to one day
wield the sort of power
that Black had in the early days.I was talking to Kevin Dale
the then marketing director
of Betfair and we were discussing
the sea of his blue umbrellas
staked out in silver
all enjoying a light rain
before the third race,
and dotted amongst them
the great whites,
all suffering from blue blindness
even in them early days
and one turned to a collector and said
all right if I see you right at Leicester on TuesdayIt was at the time when there were
problems at teamgamble.
It was a grey day
and on the drive home
I kept to the B routes
and Madonna came on the radio.
I dont remember the track
but it jogged my mind into to
thinking what I was at the time
wanting to say to Kevin Dale,
and that wasWhy don’t you try to turn the rain blue
…but I never said it
I was just a clone
with no bottle.As for the bookmakers
possibly Mad donna,
who herself defies gravity
might hold the solution.
They all need to sex upI went racing for about 25 years,the game has changed so much that I only go now when on holiday.The £50 or £100 punter is so much better catered for on Betfair.The cream of the on course books will survive because speed of thought ,mental arithmatic skills, and anticipation,are still valuable assets to have on course.Some of the others will be hoping for more Girls Aloud nights for some mug money.
If you go to back a certainty always buy a return ticket.
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