Chester Race Company
Race-day admission, parking and racecards, Annual guest badges, Shareholder Dining Room drinks
Chester Race Company Limited runs Chester and Bangor-on-Dee racecourses. It also lists Musselburgh Racecourse, a catering business and Chester’s Holiday Inn Express among its businesses.
What you get
Chester Race Company shareholders get free admission, parking and racecards at Chester, plus eight guest badges a year and a dining-room drinks discount. The company is private and publishes no public share offer or market dealing route. This page serves existing holders and people receiving shares through transfers the company permits.
Annual guest badges
Shareholders receive eight guest badges a year, with a maximum of four per fixture. Extra badges cost £50 per person including VAT.
What it takes
The published terms do not state a minimum shareholding.
Shares and permitted transfers
The company publishes no public share offer or market dealing route. Its directors can refuse to register a transfer. Exceptions include specified family, family-trust and corporate-group transfers, but these still have conditions: directors may refuse one that would take the recipient above 10% of issued equity. The seller remains the shareholder until the company enters the new holder in its register.
What the company does not say
The company does not explain whether larger holdings receive more, or how joint and corporate holders share the benefits. Confirm your entitlement when arranging credentials.
Before buyingA perk is a minor benefit of owning a share, not a reason to buy one. Share prices fall as well as rise, and dealing costs, spreads and tax can exceed a perk’s value. Unlisted shares may be difficult to sell. Check how transfers work and whether your broker supports the holding. Read about the risks.
Holding through a broker
The company publishes no broker or nominee benefit route. Its share-registration rules do not explain whether beneficial owners qualify for perks.
Chester Race Company does not say whether ISA or SIPP holdings qualify.
How to claim
Annual guest badges
The shareholder page names a metal badge, shareholder card and voucher booklet but does not explain how they are issued or replaced. Confirm which credentials you and your guests need when arranging badges.
- 1. Arrange guest badges with ChesterContact general enquiries and ask for the shareholder team. Confirm how many badges you have left and how guests collect them before inviting anyone.
General enquiries - Ask to be directed to the team handling shareholders: 01244 304600
General enquiries - Shareholder credential and booking questions: enquiries@chester-races.com
Dates
The published terms do not say when you must own the shares, how long you must hold them or when the benefit expires.
Company story
When Chester began charging at the gate
Chester races on the Roodee, between the Dee and the city walls. The Victoria County History says the meetings were open to all; one observer in 1892 put a normal crowd at about 50,000. The company re-formed that year, bought out the stand proprietors and began charging admission in 1893. Tighter crowd control weakened the campaign to stop racing altogether. Cup Day attendance fell to 20,000 before recovering; from 1900, queues stretched along Watergate Street to the Cross.
The company wanted to improve its old stands, but the council’s racecourse committee pressed for new ones. The half-timbered County Stand opened in 1900 with room for 5,000 under cover. Fire destroyed it in 1985; a replacement followed in 1988. Today Chester Race Company lets its shareholders in free.
Sources: Victoria County History: Chester races ; Chester shareholder hub