FYI - Industry Participants of Harness Racing

[SCD]

I know a number of people on here are either owners / trainers / drivers or in some way are interested in Globe Derby at the moment - especially given the poor stake money.

As you are probably aware a majority of the stake money comes from turnover, both from unitab and pokies from the Horseshoe room.

I went to Globe Derby 3 weeks ago on a Monday night, when last in Adelaide and at 9pm I was the only customer on the premises. It was like that until 12pm when it was closing time. It is my understanding that the patronage of both the pokies and tab at Globe Derby has decreased significantly under the new management of the gaming room, which will have an impact on stake money in the not to distant future.

Q. What is the management doing to try and increase the patronage and ensure the stake money of the harness is at the very minimum maintained at it's current levels??
A. They are turning people away from gambling and drinking on site, which has already had a negative impact on turnover. (be it a small one so far)

I have a mate who works at Globe Derby and he also has a share in our horse. He came into the club to have a small wager on her and to have a few drinks with some mates on his night off last Saturday night and was refused service, due to a directive from the gaming manager at Globe Derby. (Should clarify here that if he was on-duty he wouldn't have even worried, because they are fair rules when working). The result of this is my mate and some other friends will be going up the road to a different pub to spend all their money in future, resulting in a loss in turnover to the club.

The manager has made a rule recently - that all employees (being those from both the gaming room through to the workers in the paceway restaurant) are not allowed to gamble or drink on premises. The manager then proceeded to tell everyone that it was a committee decision, which I know is not correct - this was a decision made by him, for his own motives.

Most of you know - I own a horse, but I recently reduced my share to only 20%. The impact on me is going to be very minimal, given it's only a hobby for me….
But to those owners / trainers and drivers that read this (I know a number of you read and don't post) and try to make a living off harness racing, it's important that you stamp your feet and jump up and down about these kinds of decisions that are made without committee approval - until the committee takes notice of this lack of patronage, which must be affecting turnover.

Now I understand that my mate was going to say something to Tee and Trackman - to try and alert people via the show this morning, but I couldn't listen today due to work commitments I couldn't skip early this morning and I'm not able to listen online here at work - so it may have been also mentioned on this show.

Sorry if I have doubled up with the show this morning - but this is a serious issue that needs to be looked at given the poor prize money in the state already and the fact that it will never get better while people like this are in charge of increasing the clubs turnover.

[bayman]

spot on, perhaps this could get the ball or being the trots i should say the mobile rolling