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How Much Is The Gambling Industry Worth Uk

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  • The UK Gambling Commission's twice-yearly reports are always keenly anticipated by key figures in the industry. And, in all honesty, who could possibly blame these leading figures after the latest statistics released on November 30, 2017 revealed that the sector recorded another excellent year of growth.
  • Alarming UK Gambling Statistics, Sports Betting Data & Research 2020 Last updated January 1st, 2020 We asked people in the UK aged 18-54 about their interest in watching sports, betting on sports, and playing casino games.
Industry

In the space of just over half a century Greyhound racing has gone from being the second most attended sport for the working classes, after football, to a minor sport with declining fortunes. How did we go from 34 million people attending dog tracks in 1946 (and remember there were less people overall back then) to now less than 2 million visitors a year?

Key Points: Between October 2018 and September 2019, gambling industr y GGY comprised of £5,509.2m (38.6%) remote gambling, £4,995.1m (35.0%) land based gambling, £3,184.6m (22.3%) National Lotter.

In this article we discuss why dog racing has seen a steady decline in popularity over the years and whether the sport is doomed to die out. We also consider a brighter future of greyhound racing online, with many online bookmakers now streaming live races, and we look at Greyhound racing finest moments in history as well as some more negative aspects the sport has attracted on animal welfare.

History of Greyhound Racing in the UK

Going to the dogs has been a working class institution throughout its history. The modern professional sport is an interpretation of the 'sport' of coursing, this is a hunt with two or more dogs chasing a live animal, usually a hare or rabbit, the winner being the dog to catch and kill the animal. Hardly practiced in the UK now, coursing is regarded as cruel amongst most people. However in its history it was a favoured game to watch and informally bet on amongst the working and lower classes.

The first coursing meeting was held at Swaffham in Norfolk back in the year 1776. These early races involved generally just two greyhounds who then coursed a hare given a head start of a few hundred yards. It would take over one hundred years for the first artificial hare to be introduced as a lure in place of a live animal. In 1876 a meeting held in Hendon in London raced six dogs over 400 yards chasing a fake hare for the very first time. Unfortunately, this didn't catch on quickly in the UK but it eventually did across the pond in the USA. In 1912 Owen Smith invented his own version of the artificial hare to reduce the regular killing of jack rabbits and went on to open the first oval shaped track in 1919. The racecourse in Emeryville in California came with stands, concourse and critically betting terminals.

Britain finally caught up with the times in the 1920's. Belle Vue Stadium in Manchester became the first oval dog racing circuit in the country when in 1926 Major Lyne-Dixson in association with Charles Munn were put into contact with Sir William Gentle who between them raised £22k enabling them to launch the Greyhound Racing Association. The association held its first race at Belle Vue in the same year and by the end of the following year there were over 40 tracks open in major cities and townships around the country.

The explosion in greyhound racing attendances was driven predominantly by increasing affluence among working classes that allowed provision of leisure money. With many races also held at night or in the evening this allowed workers to attend. Greyhound racing was not however exclusive to the lowest classes with spectators attending from all manner of social backgrounds with hierarchical viewing stands and enclosures similar to those seen in horse racing.

Not even the great depression of the 1930's could deter patrons from watching the sport. In the 1930's the totalisator board, or tote as we know it commonly, was introduced to greyhound racing. This allowed pari-mutuel betting alongside the existing on course bookies. In this time, and up until the 1960's, gambling off-course was illegal and with many working class people either unable to afford or unable to travel to the more rurally set horse race meetings, gambling on dog races at local inner city tracks became a national institution among lower classes.

The phrase 'going to the dogs' is a reference to throwing or pilfering money or possessions away. This phrase comes from the all too often occurrence of people blowing their weekly or monthly wages down the dog track. Greyhound racing therefore has always carried a love hate relationship with working families.

Greyhound racing was largely halted during world war two although the ability to arrange and pack away meetings quickly meant there were still many informal races held over the war years. Immediately after WWII the sport enjoyed it's peak in attendance and popularity. In the bleaker days after the war watching dog racing was one of life's only pleasures for the working classes and so in 1946 the sport enjoyed a record 34 million paying punters.

The Demise of Dog Racing in Britain

Greyhound racing continued to enjoy huge popularity in Britain up until the 1960's. In 1960 the Betting and Gaming act legislated that off-course betting was now legal. This combined with changing attitudes and an explosion in forms of entertainment in the 60's marked the beginning of the slow decline of the sport. Over the following decades the sport was looked upon as something for their dads generation with popularity amongst the youngest decreasing the most rapidly.

Changing more liberal attitudes in the 1960s onwards also led to increased exposure of some poor animal welfare in dog racing. With very little regulation in place at the time many owners would house and treat their animals with disgusting cruelty. It was very common amongst some breeders and owners to simply kill a dog at the end of its working life, if it were injured or if it lost form. This exposure tarnished the reputation of greyhound racing serving only to increase its decline with the liberally minded younger generations.

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Licenced greyhound racing in the modern day is now very tightly regulated with prison sentences issued and large fines for any cruel behaviour. Many however will never be able to accept this is the reality with later reports of doping, race fixing and other fraud adding further nails to the coffin.

UK Greyhound Track Closures Over Time

Graph showing the number of Greyhound tracks open in the UK by year, cumulative taking into account number of tracks closed and number of new tracks opened. Graph shows data from NGRC, GBGB, NRGC and BGTCS Licensed Tracks. Some tracks have opened and closed multiple times.

Greyhound racing's decline was not helped by the fact that many tracks were located in inner city working class industrial areas that were progressively becoming run down, redeveloped or even abandoned. In 1946 there were 77 GBGB licensed tracks in Great Britain (+200 unlicensed), 15 in London alone, today there are less than 19 licensed track stills operating (see next section) and 3 independent flapper tracks. Attendances today are under 2 million paying visitors with many larger bookies not even bothering to show up to the track to collect bets anymore.

When Walthamstow closed in 2008 it left London with only one track left from the 15 it once boasted. The last remaining course, Wimbledon, did survive with the help of local protest but has since been closed to allow AFC Wimbledon to move onto the site and build a new stadium. Other famous tracks have also closed including the Manchester's Belle Vue track, Britain's first proper dog racing circuit opened in 1926. It closed in 2020 with the land sold to a housing developer.

Lately the bookmakers themselves have created a twist in this tale. The concurrent success of live streaming of Greyhound racing to online punters has led some of them to start buying up tracks. Coral for example own Romford race track and Brighton and Hove stadium. Attendances are still shocking but the bookie doesn't care as it can stream and sell streaming of races to punters and other betting sites. This is a probably the only way to completely arrest the closure of tracks.

Greyhound Board of Great Britain Registered Stadiums

StadiumLocationOpenedOther
Brighton and Hove Brighton and Hove 1928 Owned By Coral
Crayford Stadium Bexley (London) 1986 Owned By Ladbrokes
Doncaster Doncaster 1929 Originally Speedway
Harlow Stadium Harlow 1995 First Sky Race 2011
Henlow Bedfordshire 1927 Henlow Derby
Kinsley Wakefield 1939 Gymcrack
Monmore Green Wolverhampton 1928 Speedway
Newcastle Newcastle 1928 Renovated 2003
Nottingham Nottingham 1980 1500 Capacity
Pelaw Grange County Durham 1944 First Sky Race 2015
Perry Barr Birmingham 1929 Speedway
Romford Havering (London) 1929 Owned By Coral
Shawfield South Lanarkshire 1898 Only Scottish Stadium
Sheffield Sheffield 1929 AKA Owlerton Stadium
Sittingbourne Swale 1990 AKA Central Park Stadium
Sunderland Sunderland 1940 Rnovated & Expanded 1989
Swindon Swindon 1949 Speedway
Towcester Towcester 2014 First Track Open Since 1995
Yarmouth Great Yarmouth 1940 East Anglian Derby

Table shows registered Greyhound Board of Great Britain (GBGB) tracks in the UK. 18 Tracks are in England and one in Scotland, there are no active tracks in Wales and in Northern Ireland racing tracks are not controlled by the GBGB. For a list of independent stadiums click here.

The Revival of greyhound Racing Online

Physical attendances at dog racing across the UK may be at it historical lowest but the sport is enjoying a success online unparalleled in its history.

Despite the rise in off-course betting from 1960 leading to the initial demise of greyhound racing it also provided a new means to watch racing. Gambling on greyhounds off track from punters watching or listening in betting shops began to rise rapidly with British Afternoon / Evening Racing Services (BAGS and BEGS) broadcasting live races daily form tracks across the UK. This may have helped somewhat but overall couldn't prevent further decline in the sport. The bookies effected a lot of this as they begun to broadcast a far wider range of sports to bettors in shops including virtual dog and horse racing with much lower overheads.

With the rise in popularity of online betting in the new millennium the landscape was changed entirely. By the early 2000's greyhound racing was being streamed to thousands of online players now betting through fixed odds sportsbooks or exchanges such as Betfair. Today more money is bet on the dogs than at anytime in history with over £2.6 billion staked annually on over 70,000 races that supports over 7,000 jobs directly. Over £1.5 billion of that turnover is off-course.

The buying up of dog tracks in the UK by online bookmakers for the purposes of streaming live racing is a positive sign the industry may recover and possibly even begin to grow again. It is estimated that bookies collectively make over £250,000,000 a year in profit with the treasury collecting over £60,000,000 from the sport. Put it this way greyhound racing is not going to disappear any time soon, unless politicians decide to ban it.

If you want to know more about the best bookies for betting on greyhound racing or where you can watch live races see our greyhound racing sports guide.

Welfare in Greyhound Racing

Greyhound racing has a chequered history with animal rights and welfare institutions as we touched on above. This reached its pinnacle in the 1990's when it was reported that mass overbreeding had led to serious levels of abuse and misuse of animals. With images splashed across the front pages of the British press the industry should have had no choice but to confront these issues once and for all. Unfortunately, over ten years later individual breeders were still flouting the law and in 2006 literally thousands of racing dogs were found buried in mass graves in Seaham. This was followed by a Sunday Times exposé in 2008 showing that unwanted greyhound puppies were in fact being sold to universities for dissection and research.

The vast majority of ex-racing dogs are now re-homed as pets with some owners even setting up their own re-homing organisations. However, with over 8000 dogs retired each year with injury before they have even reached the age of four the question does still remain as to how many actually live a full life. A report several years ago from the Parliamentary Group for Animal Welfare estimates that up to 5,000 animals still effectively disappear each year. Gambling legislation us.

Again the bookies are the ones coming to the rescue. Brands such as Coral that have invested in tracks and races heavily do not want their names tarnished by the same brush. These companies are progressively changing and professionalising the sport again with a focus on providing, proving and maintaining animal welfare both through and beyond the animals career.

If the sport can come through this era and change it's image in the future as a clean, responsible and ethical sport then it will survive. If it does not it will go the same way as smoking on aeroplanes and become a relic of the British past.

For a more detailed look at this issue and the racing life of greyhounds in general, read our specially commissioned page written by a trained vet.

Licensed and Unlicensed Racing

The Greyhound Board of Great Britain (GBGB) regulates all licensed racing. This represents the majority of greyhound racing in the UK. All meetings regulated by the GBCB must comply to rules and standards including welfare, facilities, kennels and retirement processes. Anyone suspected of contravening laws are investigated by stewards and can be banned or even reported to the police. There are around 24 licensed courses in the UK, with all except one of those in England.

There are around 5 unlicensed courses in the UK. The owners of the tracks and dogs must still always comply with the welfare standards set by government but there is no internal regulation. This is known as flapping (click to read more). You will notice if you bet on greyhounds that it is harder to bet on these meetings and even if you can limits are much lower than licensed racing. The bookmaker takeover of the industry is steadily putting unlicensed flapper courses under more pressure.

Greyhound Racing Around The World

The story in Britain is actually quite good compared to the state of dog racing around the globe. In the USA greyhound racing is banned in over 40 states with only 5 still operating active tracks (Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Iowa & West Virginia). China, the worlds biggest country, reported has no more regulated greyhound racing following the closure of the final track in Macau recently.

Even in Australia where the sport is more popualr (per head) the New South Wales government decided to ban greyhound racing on welfare grounds in 2016. Schecter tempest blackjack price. This ban was later reversed with conditions including, fewer venues, breeding caps, bonds to be paid on animals and a clear dog life management strategy.

Around the world greyhound racing is having to reinvent itself to survive. Most tracks now offer hospitality 'a night out at the dog' and other corporate features to attract visitors. Many tracks also provide speedway and other forms of racing to counteract declining revenues from the greyhound meetings.

Owners and Prize Money

Prize money in dog racing is a fraction of that seen in horse racing but then again the costs and overheads to owners are significantly lower. To own a horse you need to invest tens of thousands to millions with very high care and training costs. On the flip side you can buy a grey hound for hundreds to thousands with care and training costs closer to £1000 a year. This means many middle class people can own and run dogs that would never dream of owning a horse.

Prize money for races is usually in the low thousands of pounds. The biggest race, the greyhound derby, commands a prize pot of over £300,000 these days with over £150,000 to the winner (2nd £20k). There is certainly enough money on offer to make it worth your while, a win a year can easily pay your costs.

Due to the unprecedented growth in the online gaming sphere, Ben Jones, Marketing Executive at ICS-digital LLP, examines how this sector has the potential to shape the future of entertainment
RECENT GROWTH OF ONLINE GAMBLING
In the past decade, the world of online gaming has expanded massively. The industry was worth $41.78bn by the end of 2016 and that's set to hit the $80bn mark by the end of 2020. Just to put it in perspective, 11% of total internet traffic now comes from online casino players. The UK's remote gambling sector has seen a 300% increase since 2014's new legislation, reaching nearly $6.7bn by the end of last year.
But it's not just the remote-betting industry that has seen an increase, non-remote betting, which includes bookies and casinos, has also seen a strong improvement in recent years. Bingo halls being the only non-remote gambling sector to not see some form of increase.
You would assume that the huge increase in remote gambling is due to more and more punters favouring the online methods of gambling and making the shift away from traditional methods. But this isn't the case; we can see that both industries have seen a strong increase in numbers, showing that online gambling appeals to more than just those who have never gambled as a new, convenient and engaging way to place wagers. Existing non-remote gamblers are also embracing the digital age, whilst still enjoying the experience of visiting non-remote betting outlets.
SO EXACTLY WHY HAS ONLINE GAMING BECOME SO POPULAR?
When we look at the global gaming industry as a whole, it's no surprise that the online gaming industry has seen such huge growth. By the end of 2017, the global gaming industry hit a record breaking $107bn, which is more than we spent on film and music for the year combined.
The main reason for gaming's huge increase in popularity is down to huge technology advancements in the last decade. It seems pretty straightforward, but the better the technology gets, the better the gaming experience gets. One huge factor to online gaming's increase in popularity is the monumental advancements in mobile technology. As the technology improves, connectivity and accessibility also improve. This allows more players to take part in remote gambling from anywhere in the world, providing they have signal.
Gaming has very successfully made the migration from console to mobile in recent years, with mobile gaming becoming the fastest growing platform in the industry, making up nearly 45% of the global gaming market, which sat at a cool $47.5bn by the end of 2017. This is a huge increase of 20% in the previous year. If you think that the average person spends up to 40 hours a week on their mobile device, it is much easier for developers and remote gambling brands to market and attract attention from new players through a mobile device. Online gambling used to be perceived as a desktop-only way of gambling. However, developers are now creating mobile-only applications as we switch to a more mobile-focused world of online gaming. Players being able to place wagers whenever and wherever has played a huge part in the popularity; pundits can put a last-minute wager on their favourite team or even get given new odds and bets halfway through a game.
As mobile gambling becomes more and more popular, the saturation of the online gambling market also helps improve the industry. Essentially, as more and more people join the industry, we see player pools increase and payout rates improve. Another huge contributing factor is that you are now able to place a wager on more or less anything. Whether you're a football fan, a royal family enthusiast or just really into politics, you can place a wager on practically any outcome in popular culture. It is no longer just sports fans who are taking part in online gambling with the premise of winning money while still following a genuine personal interest. Non-remote gambling sectors simply can't offer this level of variety or convenience.

How Much Is The Uk Betting Industry Worth

How Much Is The Gambling Industry Worth Uk

In the space of just over half a century Greyhound racing has gone from being the second most attended sport for the working classes, after football, to a minor sport with declining fortunes. How did we go from 34 million people attending dog tracks in 1946 (and remember there were less people overall back then) to now less than 2 million visitors a year?

Key Points: Between October 2018 and September 2019, gambling industr y GGY comprised of £5,509.2m (38.6%) remote gambling, £4,995.1m (35.0%) land based gambling, £3,184.6m (22.3%) National Lotter.

In this article we discuss why dog racing has seen a steady decline in popularity over the years and whether the sport is doomed to die out. We also consider a brighter future of greyhound racing online, with many online bookmakers now streaming live races, and we look at Greyhound racing finest moments in history as well as some more negative aspects the sport has attracted on animal welfare.

History of Greyhound Racing in the UK

Going to the dogs has been a working class institution throughout its history. The modern professional sport is an interpretation of the 'sport' of coursing, this is a hunt with two or more dogs chasing a live animal, usually a hare or rabbit, the winner being the dog to catch and kill the animal. Hardly practiced in the UK now, coursing is regarded as cruel amongst most people. However in its history it was a favoured game to watch and informally bet on amongst the working and lower classes.

The first coursing meeting was held at Swaffham in Norfolk back in the year 1776. These early races involved generally just two greyhounds who then coursed a hare given a head start of a few hundred yards. It would take over one hundred years for the first artificial hare to be introduced as a lure in place of a live animal. In 1876 a meeting held in Hendon in London raced six dogs over 400 yards chasing a fake hare for the very first time. Unfortunately, this didn't catch on quickly in the UK but it eventually did across the pond in the USA. In 1912 Owen Smith invented his own version of the artificial hare to reduce the regular killing of jack rabbits and went on to open the first oval shaped track in 1919. The racecourse in Emeryville in California came with stands, concourse and critically betting terminals.

Britain finally caught up with the times in the 1920's. Belle Vue Stadium in Manchester became the first oval dog racing circuit in the country when in 1926 Major Lyne-Dixson in association with Charles Munn were put into contact with Sir William Gentle who between them raised £22k enabling them to launch the Greyhound Racing Association. The association held its first race at Belle Vue in the same year and by the end of the following year there were over 40 tracks open in major cities and townships around the country.

The explosion in greyhound racing attendances was driven predominantly by increasing affluence among working classes that allowed provision of leisure money. With many races also held at night or in the evening this allowed workers to attend. Greyhound racing was not however exclusive to the lowest classes with spectators attending from all manner of social backgrounds with hierarchical viewing stands and enclosures similar to those seen in horse racing.

Not even the great depression of the 1930's could deter patrons from watching the sport. In the 1930's the totalisator board, or tote as we know it commonly, was introduced to greyhound racing. This allowed pari-mutuel betting alongside the existing on course bookies. In this time, and up until the 1960's, gambling off-course was illegal and with many working class people either unable to afford or unable to travel to the more rurally set horse race meetings, gambling on dog races at local inner city tracks became a national institution among lower classes.

The phrase 'going to the dogs' is a reference to throwing or pilfering money or possessions away. This phrase comes from the all too often occurrence of people blowing their weekly or monthly wages down the dog track. Greyhound racing therefore has always carried a love hate relationship with working families.

Greyhound racing was largely halted during world war two although the ability to arrange and pack away meetings quickly meant there were still many informal races held over the war years. Immediately after WWII the sport enjoyed it's peak in attendance and popularity. In the bleaker days after the war watching dog racing was one of life's only pleasures for the working classes and so in 1946 the sport enjoyed a record 34 million paying punters.

The Demise of Dog Racing in Britain

Greyhound racing continued to enjoy huge popularity in Britain up until the 1960's. In 1960 the Betting and Gaming act legislated that off-course betting was now legal. This combined with changing attitudes and an explosion in forms of entertainment in the 60's marked the beginning of the slow decline of the sport. Over the following decades the sport was looked upon as something for their dads generation with popularity amongst the youngest decreasing the most rapidly.

Changing more liberal attitudes in the 1960s onwards also led to increased exposure of some poor animal welfare in dog racing. With very little regulation in place at the time many owners would house and treat their animals with disgusting cruelty. It was very common amongst some breeders and owners to simply kill a dog at the end of its working life, if it were injured or if it lost form. This exposure tarnished the reputation of greyhound racing serving only to increase its decline with the liberally minded younger generations.

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Licenced greyhound racing in the modern day is now very tightly regulated with prison sentences issued and large fines for any cruel behaviour. Many however will never be able to accept this is the reality with later reports of doping, race fixing and other fraud adding further nails to the coffin.

UK Greyhound Track Closures Over Time

Graph showing the number of Greyhound tracks open in the UK by year, cumulative taking into account number of tracks closed and number of new tracks opened. Graph shows data from NGRC, GBGB, NRGC and BGTCS Licensed Tracks. Some tracks have opened and closed multiple times.

Greyhound racing's decline was not helped by the fact that many tracks were located in inner city working class industrial areas that were progressively becoming run down, redeveloped or even abandoned. In 1946 there were 77 GBGB licensed tracks in Great Britain (+200 unlicensed), 15 in London alone, today there are less than 19 licensed track stills operating (see next section) and 3 independent flapper tracks. Attendances today are under 2 million paying visitors with many larger bookies not even bothering to show up to the track to collect bets anymore.

When Walthamstow closed in 2008 it left London with only one track left from the 15 it once boasted. The last remaining course, Wimbledon, did survive with the help of local protest but has since been closed to allow AFC Wimbledon to move onto the site and build a new stadium. Other famous tracks have also closed including the Manchester's Belle Vue track, Britain's first proper dog racing circuit opened in 1926. It closed in 2020 with the land sold to a housing developer.

Lately the bookmakers themselves have created a twist in this tale. The concurrent success of live streaming of Greyhound racing to online punters has led some of them to start buying up tracks. Coral for example own Romford race track and Brighton and Hove stadium. Attendances are still shocking but the bookie doesn't care as it can stream and sell streaming of races to punters and other betting sites. This is a probably the only way to completely arrest the closure of tracks.

Greyhound Board of Great Britain Registered Stadiums

StadiumLocationOpenedOther
Brighton and Hove Brighton and Hove 1928 Owned By Coral
Crayford Stadium Bexley (London) 1986 Owned By Ladbrokes
Doncaster Doncaster 1929 Originally Speedway
Harlow Stadium Harlow 1995 First Sky Race 2011
Henlow Bedfordshire 1927 Henlow Derby
Kinsley Wakefield 1939 Gymcrack
Monmore Green Wolverhampton 1928 Speedway
Newcastle Newcastle 1928 Renovated 2003
Nottingham Nottingham 1980 1500 Capacity
Pelaw Grange County Durham 1944 First Sky Race 2015
Perry Barr Birmingham 1929 Speedway
Romford Havering (London) 1929 Owned By Coral
Shawfield South Lanarkshire 1898 Only Scottish Stadium
Sheffield Sheffield 1929 AKA Owlerton Stadium
Sittingbourne Swale 1990 AKA Central Park Stadium
Sunderland Sunderland 1940 Rnovated & Expanded 1989
Swindon Swindon 1949 Speedway
Towcester Towcester 2014 First Track Open Since 1995
Yarmouth Great Yarmouth 1940 East Anglian Derby

Table shows registered Greyhound Board of Great Britain (GBGB) tracks in the UK. 18 Tracks are in England and one in Scotland, there are no active tracks in Wales and in Northern Ireland racing tracks are not controlled by the GBGB. For a list of independent stadiums click here.

The Revival of greyhound Racing Online

Physical attendances at dog racing across the UK may be at it historical lowest but the sport is enjoying a success online unparalleled in its history.

Despite the rise in off-course betting from 1960 leading to the initial demise of greyhound racing it also provided a new means to watch racing. Gambling on greyhounds off track from punters watching or listening in betting shops began to rise rapidly with British Afternoon / Evening Racing Services (BAGS and BEGS) broadcasting live races daily form tracks across the UK. This may have helped somewhat but overall couldn't prevent further decline in the sport. The bookies effected a lot of this as they begun to broadcast a far wider range of sports to bettors in shops including virtual dog and horse racing with much lower overheads.

With the rise in popularity of online betting in the new millennium the landscape was changed entirely. By the early 2000's greyhound racing was being streamed to thousands of online players now betting through fixed odds sportsbooks or exchanges such as Betfair. Today more money is bet on the dogs than at anytime in history with over £2.6 billion staked annually on over 70,000 races that supports over 7,000 jobs directly. Over £1.5 billion of that turnover is off-course.

The buying up of dog tracks in the UK by online bookmakers for the purposes of streaming live racing is a positive sign the industry may recover and possibly even begin to grow again. It is estimated that bookies collectively make over £250,000,000 a year in profit with the treasury collecting over £60,000,000 from the sport. Put it this way greyhound racing is not going to disappear any time soon, unless politicians decide to ban it.

If you want to know more about the best bookies for betting on greyhound racing or where you can watch live races see our greyhound racing sports guide.

Welfare in Greyhound Racing

Greyhound racing has a chequered history with animal rights and welfare institutions as we touched on above. This reached its pinnacle in the 1990's when it was reported that mass overbreeding had led to serious levels of abuse and misuse of animals. With images splashed across the front pages of the British press the industry should have had no choice but to confront these issues once and for all. Unfortunately, over ten years later individual breeders were still flouting the law and in 2006 literally thousands of racing dogs were found buried in mass graves in Seaham. This was followed by a Sunday Times exposé in 2008 showing that unwanted greyhound puppies were in fact being sold to universities for dissection and research.

The vast majority of ex-racing dogs are now re-homed as pets with some owners even setting up their own re-homing organisations. However, with over 8000 dogs retired each year with injury before they have even reached the age of four the question does still remain as to how many actually live a full life. A report several years ago from the Parliamentary Group for Animal Welfare estimates that up to 5,000 animals still effectively disappear each year. Gambling legislation us.

Again the bookies are the ones coming to the rescue. Brands such as Coral that have invested in tracks and races heavily do not want their names tarnished by the same brush. These companies are progressively changing and professionalising the sport again with a focus on providing, proving and maintaining animal welfare both through and beyond the animals career.

If the sport can come through this era and change it's image in the future as a clean, responsible and ethical sport then it will survive. If it does not it will go the same way as smoking on aeroplanes and become a relic of the British past.

For a more detailed look at this issue and the racing life of greyhounds in general, read our specially commissioned page written by a trained vet.

Licensed and Unlicensed Racing

The Greyhound Board of Great Britain (GBGB) regulates all licensed racing. This represents the majority of greyhound racing in the UK. All meetings regulated by the GBCB must comply to rules and standards including welfare, facilities, kennels and retirement processes. Anyone suspected of contravening laws are investigated by stewards and can be banned or even reported to the police. There are around 24 licensed courses in the UK, with all except one of those in England.

There are around 5 unlicensed courses in the UK. The owners of the tracks and dogs must still always comply with the welfare standards set by government but there is no internal regulation. This is known as flapping (click to read more). You will notice if you bet on greyhounds that it is harder to bet on these meetings and even if you can limits are much lower than licensed racing. The bookmaker takeover of the industry is steadily putting unlicensed flapper courses under more pressure.

Greyhound Racing Around The World

The story in Britain is actually quite good compared to the state of dog racing around the globe. In the USA greyhound racing is banned in over 40 states with only 5 still operating active tracks (Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Iowa & West Virginia). China, the worlds biggest country, reported has no more regulated greyhound racing following the closure of the final track in Macau recently.

Even in Australia where the sport is more popualr (per head) the New South Wales government decided to ban greyhound racing on welfare grounds in 2016. Schecter tempest blackjack price. This ban was later reversed with conditions including, fewer venues, breeding caps, bonds to be paid on animals and a clear dog life management strategy.

Around the world greyhound racing is having to reinvent itself to survive. Most tracks now offer hospitality 'a night out at the dog' and other corporate features to attract visitors. Many tracks also provide speedway and other forms of racing to counteract declining revenues from the greyhound meetings.

Owners and Prize Money

Prize money in dog racing is a fraction of that seen in horse racing but then again the costs and overheads to owners are significantly lower. To own a horse you need to invest tens of thousands to millions with very high care and training costs. On the flip side you can buy a grey hound for hundreds to thousands with care and training costs closer to £1000 a year. This means many middle class people can own and run dogs that would never dream of owning a horse.

Prize money for races is usually in the low thousands of pounds. The biggest race, the greyhound derby, commands a prize pot of over £300,000 these days with over £150,000 to the winner (2nd £20k). There is certainly enough money on offer to make it worth your while, a win a year can easily pay your costs.

Due to the unprecedented growth in the online gaming sphere, Ben Jones, Marketing Executive at ICS-digital LLP, examines how this sector has the potential to shape the future of entertainment
RECENT GROWTH OF ONLINE GAMBLING
In the past decade, the world of online gaming has expanded massively. The industry was worth $41.78bn by the end of 2016 and that's set to hit the $80bn mark by the end of 2020. Just to put it in perspective, 11% of total internet traffic now comes from online casino players. The UK's remote gambling sector has seen a 300% increase since 2014's new legislation, reaching nearly $6.7bn by the end of last year.
But it's not just the remote-betting industry that has seen an increase, non-remote betting, which includes bookies and casinos, has also seen a strong improvement in recent years. Bingo halls being the only non-remote gambling sector to not see some form of increase.
You would assume that the huge increase in remote gambling is due to more and more punters favouring the online methods of gambling and making the shift away from traditional methods. But this isn't the case; we can see that both industries have seen a strong increase in numbers, showing that online gambling appeals to more than just those who have never gambled as a new, convenient and engaging way to place wagers. Existing non-remote gamblers are also embracing the digital age, whilst still enjoying the experience of visiting non-remote betting outlets.
SO EXACTLY WHY HAS ONLINE GAMING BECOME SO POPULAR?
When we look at the global gaming industry as a whole, it's no surprise that the online gaming industry has seen such huge growth. By the end of 2017, the global gaming industry hit a record breaking $107bn, which is more than we spent on film and music for the year combined.
The main reason for gaming's huge increase in popularity is down to huge technology advancements in the last decade. It seems pretty straightforward, but the better the technology gets, the better the gaming experience gets. One huge factor to online gaming's increase in popularity is the monumental advancements in mobile technology. As the technology improves, connectivity and accessibility also improve. This allows more players to take part in remote gambling from anywhere in the world, providing they have signal.
Gaming has very successfully made the migration from console to mobile in recent years, with mobile gaming becoming the fastest growing platform in the industry, making up nearly 45% of the global gaming market, which sat at a cool $47.5bn by the end of 2017. This is a huge increase of 20% in the previous year. If you think that the average person spends up to 40 hours a week on their mobile device, it is much easier for developers and remote gambling brands to market and attract attention from new players through a mobile device. Online gambling used to be perceived as a desktop-only way of gambling. However, developers are now creating mobile-only applications as we switch to a more mobile-focused world of online gaming. Players being able to place wagers whenever and wherever has played a huge part in the popularity; pundits can put a last-minute wager on their favourite team or even get given new odds and bets halfway through a game.
As mobile gambling becomes more and more popular, the saturation of the online gambling market also helps improve the industry. Essentially, as more and more people join the industry, we see player pools increase and payout rates improve. Another huge contributing factor is that you are now able to place a wager on more or less anything. Whether you're a football fan, a royal family enthusiast or just really into politics, you can place a wager on practically any outcome in popular culture. It is no longer just sports fans who are taking part in online gambling with the premise of winning money while still following a genuine personal interest. Non-remote gambling sectors simply can't offer this level of variety or convenience.

How Much Is The Uk Betting Industry Worth

How Much Is The Gambling Industry Worth Ukraine


Another really important factor to consider is the increase in female online gamblers in recent years. Back in 2015, the female gambling population accounted for just shy of 50% of users in the UK. Many studies have shown that women not only prefer to gamble in private, but they also prefer a mobile device. So, they can play comfortably, confidently and feel they are less likely to be intimidated by male players. Some huge gambling brands have even created female orientated platforms such as 888Ladies and Pink Casino to help drive this continuously emerging market.
GAMBLING AS A FORM OF ENTERTAINMENT
Gambling, whether remote or non-remote has never been seen as such a genuine form of entertainment. This is heavily down to the strong emotional connection between the player and the game. You can't interact with traditional forms of entertainment - for example, you can't dictate the plot line of a movie or a piece of music.
But, when it comes to online gambling, players can place wagers on genuine interests and actually create their own narrative. The journey and experience are solely based on the players' decisions and talent, with them becoming emotionally invested in the outcome and this is magnified the minute a wager is placed.
Online gambling also appeals to a wide range of demographics. About ten years ago, you would think that it was majority adult male sports fans that would place wagers. But, as mentioned earlier, not only can you place bets on practically anything, but remote gambling also appeals to a wide range of people. The older generations are becoming more and more comfortable with technology and are enjoying using mobile devices more and more, so the concept of online gambling is becoming less and less intimidating. This allows communities to build where people sometimes spend whole days with friends in online bingo halls and casinos. Gambling is also becoming more and more appealing to the younger generations. It's an exciting premise being able to win money via your favourite sports team's performance, whilst still being able to enjoy the match as a spectator. Younger audiences have always been known to be very understanding of new technologies, with most 11-year-olds now being able to navigate a modern smartphone very easily. So, it is no surprise more and more young adults are starting to get involved with online gaming.
It is these huge advancements in technology and a frankly huge variety of gambling that is allowing the online gambling industry to thrive. Thanks to new emerging markets and the mass appeal of online gaming, the industry will continue to grow and become a regular form of entertainment.



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