Minnesota Thoroughbred raceway Canterbury Park is bucking the industry trend in terms of on-track attendance and handle. The track’s CEO, Randy Sampson, is citing a change in traditional business philosophy for the upswing. “It’s almost like we’ve got the biggest live entertainment outdoor sports bar,” he has said.

“It really wasn’t like we had it all figured out at the beginning,” he told Pat Borzi in an article for minnpost.com. “We kind of learned along the way what works.”

The report explains that more than 40,000 people showed up over the July 4th holiday weekend, including a Thursday night crowd of over 7,600 and more than 20,000 on the Friday. Total handle was $1.26 million on Thursday – not too shabby for a facility that went broke in the early ‘90s.

When he took the helm, Sampson instituted a different type of game plan for the track. The days of the dark, dingy raceway would be gone, replaced with a clean, bright environment that preached fun and entertainment.

“I said to everybody even back then, that’s the model for horse racing. We’re not going to be major league,” Sampson said. “We need to be the best at the minor leagues that we can. So we need to shoot T-shirts in the crowd and have bands and do fun things to create a fun atmosphere. We’re fortunate we had a relatively new and modern facility, because some of these tracks that have been around 50 years, it’s hard to get families and people out.”

(With files from minnpost.com)