Giving the greyhound industry a sporting chance

If spinning plates on a stick were an Olympic sport Adrian Neilan would be a strong medal contender. The Irish Greyhound Board chief executive has quite a few on the go right now.

In a fortnight’s time, the sport will have its annual moment in the sun when the ETS Irish Greyhound Derby final is held at Shelbourne Park.

About 5,500 punters will pack the Ringsend stadium for the sport’s showpiece race, with the winning dog earning a €125,000 cheque for its owners.

He’s also putting the final touches to a strategic review to be launched next week that will set out a growth plan for the next five years.

And he has about 30 contracts under negotiation aimed at bringing pictures of Irish greyhound racing to a wider audience both here and abroad, while boosting betting pools and generating revenues for the commercial semi-state.

On top of all that, Neilan is busy batting away criticisms about the way the IGB is run. Many column inches have been expended on its hefty debts and a delay in publishing its 2011 accounts.

If that weren't enough, the Kerryman's €160,000-a-year contract expires in January and there's no certainty that it will be extended by his line minister, Simon Coveney.

Neilan is excited about about the Derby final. More than €500,000 will be bet on the night through bookmakers and the Tote, while the stadium’s bars and restaurants will be humming with activity.

He is chuffed to have secured ETS, a UK investment group, as a sponsor for the next three years in a deal worth €360,000. ETS has helped with introductions to other companies which might sponsor the undercard of races on Derby night.

“We’ve brand new sponsors coming in and that’s very exciting,” he says while sipping a latte. And there are other reasons to be cheerful about Derby night.

“This is the first year that the final is going into 10,000 bookmaker shops in Ireland and the UK. That’s a lot of eyeballs on the product. They’re generating about €150 a shop on the product.”

Irish consumers have reined in their spending since the crash in 2008, hitting the likes of the IGB, which is in the entertainment business.

Turnover last year fell by about €1 million to €31.8 million and its grant from the Horse and Greyhound Racing Fund is down 28 per cent from its peak to €11 million.

Neilan has responded by cutting overheads by more than 40 per cent, but he’s also busily exploring alternative revenues.

Greyhound racing has had a major makeover in the past decade. It ditched the flat cap and shed the worn overcoat by spending millions on the country’s 17 tracks (10 of which are owned by IGB).

Comfortable corporate suites were built and modern restaurants and bars opened so that people could enjoy a flutter while munching on decent food and supping a drink in pleasant surroundings.

“We had to go and get new clients,” Neilan says. “A big focus now will be on sponsorship and branding and how we can use our physical and digital footprint to capture new opportunities.”

Greyhound racing had an impressive 2,000 corporates as customers last year, including the likes of Google and Facebook. It also attracted 40,000 tourists to dog tracks, about 6 per cent of total attendances.

Biggest opportunity
"About 15,000 French came over for the [Six Nations rugby] match [in Dublin]. We got about 1,500 to Shelbourne Park on the Saturday night and to Harold's Cross on the Friday night.

“We tailored the experience for them, with the French tricolour on the TV screens, race cards in French, and all the betting tips in French. These were paying 40 or 50 quid a head.”

The IGB has the technology to stream live pictures from all its tracks to any part of the world, and Neilan believes this is its biggest opportunity.

Last week, it signed a deal with XB Net that will result in Bwin, the world's largest publicly-traded online gaming group, offering coverage of its races around the world. Neilan expects Bwin to target Spain and the United States in particular.

The IGB gets a “clip” of any bet placed via this platform.

Neilan has 30 such contracts in the pipeline while, at home, he’d like to see races shown live in pubs and hotels around the country, where customers could bet via their mobile devices.

The IGB would pay a commission on each bet to the owners of the pub or hotel as an incentive to show dog racing at their venues. This would bolster the IGB’s revenues and boost racing jackpots, making a bet more attractive to punters.

“People will dictate how they want to consume the product. They won’t necessarily want to go to the track on a Friday or Saturday night. They might want to stay in and bet,” he says.

He cites the experience in Australia where only 4 per cent of betting on greyhound races there actually takes place at the track.

Neilan proudly rattles off the key statistics from a report produced by economist Jim Power about the economic impact of greyhound racing.

It supports 10,300 jobs, which generate €21 million in taxes.

Annual grant
Power estimated the total economic benefit is €244 million, money that finds its way into most nooks and crannies in the State through the various breeders and owners.

Neilan argues that the State gets good bang for its buck from its annual grant.

However, it’s not all sweetness and light within the industry. Neilan has taken stick for the €22.5 million debt run up by the IGB, much of which relates to the development of a €19 million track in Limerick built in the recession.

It's brought him a lot of "hassle" and, if he had his time over, he concedes he might do it differently. But Limerick is turning a profit now, he says, and the AIB debt, which is interest-only until 2016, is manageable as the IGB's big capex outlays on stadiums is over.

Plans to sell Irish greyhounds to China have met with stiff opposition from animal rights lobbyists, while questions have been raised about a delay in publishing its 2011 accounts, which still aren’t available on its website.

The accounts, which are scrutinised by the Comptroller & Auditor General, includes a note highlighting instances where goods and services were not tendered for.

The board also overpaid prize money of €296,498 to 1,632 owners and trainers, of which some €49,439 is still to be recovered, it says.

Neilan says the delay was “unfortunate” but insists there is nothing to hide and that some media reports on these matters have been defamatory. The IGB has reviewed both issues and Neilan is confident that they will not reoccur.

“This year we set a target that they [the 2012 accounts] would be [published] a lot quicker and hopefully they will be. The audit has been done, all going well, they will be closed off by the C&AG shortly.”

Neilan grew up doing odd jobs around the family’s 45-acre dairy farm near Ardfert in Kerry, and helping his father out in their pub, since closed.

He says “hard work and thrift” were two valuable lessons learned from his parents.

He studied engineering in Trinity and was employee number four with a campus company after graduating.

In 1996, he secured a role with HP in its Leixlip plant, where he spent almost a decade. By the time he left, he had an MBA under his arm and was in a senior IT role.

Bright future
Neilan felt it was time to move on to a role that was more "customer faced" and retail in nature.

He joined the IGB in 2005, moving his family to Limerick, where the semi-state is based. He became CEO at the start of 2007.

While he has been a key player in devising the IGB’s strategy for the next five years, Neilan might not be around to put it into practice. His seven-year contract expires in January.

The IGB board has recommended that he be given an extension but it’s a decision that will be made by Government.

“At the end of the day, if it doesn’t work out, like anyone else, I’ll have to go and get another job. That’s the nature of the beast,” he says, with a shrug of the shoulders. He hopes to get some clarity in the “next month or so”.

Whatever happens, he feels greyhound racing in Ireland has a bright future.

"I think we're on the cusp of a great opportunity and it would be very exciting to be around to see it through over the next couple of years."

CV: Adrian Neilan

Name: Adrian Neilan

Job: Chief executive, Irish Greyhound Board

Age: 44

Lives: Curraghchase, Co Limerick

Family: Married with three children

Hobbies: "Cycling lately . . . and I like a good read of a book now and then. At the moment, I'm currently reading Henry Kissinger's book on China."

Something we might expect: “My son loves greyhounds and wants to get a dog for Christmas.”

Something that might surprise: “I played hurling badly for Ardfert and, in one particular match, I lost two or three teeth. The following day I had to do my Irish oral exam for the Leaving Cert with Seán Kelly [now an MEP for Ireland South]. I could hardly talk. I researched a sentence about how I got the injury playing hurling because I knew Seán loved hurling.”