Attracting new fans, maintaining tradition balancing act
Woodbine’s marketing goes co-ed in effort to draw more females to the sport of kings
Two weekends ago, Debbie King attended a Polo for Heart event in Richmond Hill, but her six-year-old daughter stayed home because she wasn’t feeling well.
King and her husband knew they needed a makeup event, and this Sunday’s Queen’s Plate seemed like an easy choice because it offered the same perks — horses, an afternoon outdoors and an excuse to dress up.
The Kings fit squarely within the demographic Queen’s Plate organizers covet. They are young enough to rejuvenate and aging fan-base yet established enough to have money to spend.
Most importantly, they’re racing novices willing to give the sport a chance. But they still needed convincing. “If you’re exposed to something new and you have a good experience it’s more likely you’ll go again,” says King, a 40-year-old who manages a fitness club and publishes a lifestyle blog. “But the idea of (paying) $30 for standing room only with a six-yearold isn’t appealing.”
First contested in 1860, the Queen’s Plate is the world’s oldest annual horse race and organizers realize tradition still sells.
The race draws its biggest crowds on years the Queen herself is in attendance.
But officials also recognize keeping the event relevant means updating it to suit sports fans’ changing tastes.
That means making marketing coed.
If big sports events skew male by default, the Queen’s Plate’s Hats and Horseshoes party — established in 2012 — looks to engage women.
It also means expanding programming beyond the race card, erecting three stages around Woodbine’s campus to host performances by Canadian rock acts like Hedley, the Strumbellas and the Matthew Good Band.
None of these features appeal directly to the die-hard racing fans who populate Woodbine on other days, but that’s the point.
“We’ve invested heavily over the last four years to grow that space,” says Paul Lawson, the senior vicepresident of marketing for the Woodbine Entertainment Group. “We want to respect tradition of the race . . . but at the same time we want to introduce it to a new audience.”
Last July, the race drew roughly 35,000 spectators and Lawson says nearly half were first-time attendees. Though only a fraction were hardcore racing fans who bet as a hobby, the casual fans gambled too. Bettors wagered $11,064,870 on Queen’s Plate Sunday, Woodbine’s highest total for the year.
The challenge for Woodbine is converting one-and-done Queen’s Plate fans into track regulars; it’s a difficult task for an increasingly niche sport.
Where mainstream sports have recognizable stars and fit and neatly into news cycles, sports sponsorship consultant Brian Cooper points out following horse racing closely means keeping track of an ever-changing roster of equine athletes whose season is tethered to one event.
He says sustained success means selling spectators on beyond-thetrack perks, like concerts or casino gambling, that keep them engaged and eager to return.
“It’s an evolving pastime,” says Cooper, president of S&E Sponsorship Group. “They’re not going to build that sport. They’re going to build that experience.”
These dilemmas aren’t unique to the Queen’s Plate.
This year, the Kentucky Derby attracted 167,227 spectators, trailing only the record 170,513 who attended in 2015. In contrast, attendance never topped 160,000 between 1980 and 2010.
While horse racing has less mainstream presence now than it did in the 1980s, the Derby has worked to raise the event’s profile.
Now, race weekend comes at the end of a month-long string of events that includes a marathon, a beer festival and several fundraising galas.
Add in American Pharoah’s run to the 2015 Triple Crown, the Derby profile among fans and sponsors remains high even as the broader sport struggles to retain market share.
“American Pharoah’s Triple Crown win absolutely drove interest among new and currents sponsors,” said Churchill Downs vice-president of sales and partnerships Kristin Warfield in an April interview with the Wall Street Journal. “The demand over the summer was extremely high . . . and that enthusiasm carried over into the fall.”
Lawson says Woodbine’s long-term plans include expanding the Queen’s Plate into a Derby-style multi-day event and bringing some marketing continuity to all three events in Canada’s Triple Crown.
Lawson says the Prince of Wales Stakes and Breeders’ Stakes can each grow if they can continue the momentum Queen’s Plate weekend establishes.
Having a dominant Queen’s Plate winner helps.
“This is a big opportunity for us to look at the Canadian Triple Crown and build the over-arching halo,” he says.
“It is a challenge without a (Triple Crown) contender, because it’s that contender that actually keeps the energy going.”