What Happened Next: Foxes Trust End Of Season Survey

[Foxes_Trust]

The Foxes Trust can today provide an update on dialogue with the Club regarding our End of Season Survey (full results available here) and the associated Calls To Action.

 

Following our first meeting with the Club, we had requested the following next steps on each of our Calls To Action:

 

1. Jon Rudkin’s Departure – we had requested the opportunity to meet with Top to share survey findings (given that those in the Fan Engagement team we had met with did not have the appropriate remit to discuss this one with us)
2. Reset The Fan Engagement Framework (FEF) – we shared this paper [Read it here] with the Club detailing our full review of the FEF and suggested changes
3. Reduce Ticket Prices – we requested matchday ticket prices be reduced and season ticket holders be offered either a rebate or some form of other compensation given the club’s relegation (with our suggestion being free home cup tickets)
4. Communicate A Credible 5-Year Plan – we recommended the club run a Q&A Forum with fans with senior leaders like Kevin Davies and Jon Rudkin on the panel to answer questions and share plans for improvement
5. Consult Fans On Matchday Experience – we requested that the first Your 90 Minutes session of the new season to be on Matchday Experience and this to be hosted online to allow as many fans as possible to participate, with a record taken of suggested improvements so that progress through the Fan Engagement Framework to the point of actual change/implementation could be tracked as well as each supporter group having the opportunity to meet with the club direct to discuss what they’d like

 

On Friday 26^th June, members of the Foxes Trust board (Jamie Barnard, Steve Potter and Lynn Wyeth) met again with the Club (Anthony Herlihy Communications Director and Jim Donnellly Supporter Liaison Officer) as the agreed next step to re-convene before the end of June, and once the results of the survey had gone live, from our previous meeting on Tuesday 26^th May.

 

It should be acknowledged that the Club’s willingness to meet with us regarding the survey results twice in a just a few weeks shows that they have received the survey results with an openness to listen and hear what supporters who participated are saying. Meeting after the results went live gave us the opportunity to also feedback what we’d heard from supporters following their publication and get an update on what the Club has done with the results and the actions we requested.

 

We shared that the Trust had received a largely positive response to the survey results thus far but that there had also been some scepticism that the club wanted to listen or would take action. The Club confirmed that the full survey results had been shared with the Executive leadership of the club (including Kevin Davies, Jon Rudkin and Kamonthip ‘Monica’ Netthanomsak) for their review which showed us that the results have reached a senior audience within the Club.

 

Our most recent meeting provided the opportunity to discuss next steps on our 5 Calls To Action and the associated next steps we had requested:

 

1. Jon Rudkin’s departure – Club representatives confirmed that matters relating to club staffing sat outside the defined scope of supporter engagement and consultation and, while the right of supporters to express their views was acknowledged and respected, it would not be appropriate to progress the matter through supporter engagement or consultation. It was confirmed that the complete findings of the survey and all five of the Trust Board’s Calls to Action had been shared with the club’s executive leadership.
2. Reset the Fan Engagement Framework – the Club acknowledged that the Fan Engagement Framework is not perfect and that all football clubs are still in the process of learning how they can improve what are relatively new structured processes. That said, the Club acknowledged the findings of the Trust’s review, the time taken to conduct the review and that it raised a number of constructive suggestions. It was recognised that a number of the proposals would have implications for the wider Fan Engagement Framework and supporter engagement beyond the Trust itself. The club therefore explained that these would require wider consideration before any structural changes could be taken forward. The club welcomed the Trust’s continued contribution to those discussions, which the Trust intends to review up to November 2026.
3. Reduce Ticket Prices – the Club is evaluating options and fan feedback received on this topic, alongside wider operational and financial factors. They shared that when it comes to ticket pricing for cup games there are a number of factors that need to be considered such as required split of gate receipts with opposing clubs, the cost of a matchday operation and requirements by football authorities that have to be met. We had asked for progress before the end of July so will wait to see what happens next.
4. Communicate A Credible 5-Year Plan – the Club has heard the sentiment from supporters that they want greater clarity about its direction, and acknowledged the importance of clear communication from senior leadership over time.

5. Consult Fans On Matchday Experience – the Club has already taken action to do this. There will be a Your 90 Minutes session on Matchday Experience on Wednesday 22^nd July at 6:30pm and this will be hosted online to allow as many supporters as possible to attend (which aligned with the Trust’s recommendations). The Club will also agree to document the key themes that come from this session on the night, so that they can be tracked for progress as they move through the Fan Engagement Framework to the Fans Consultative Committee and then the Fan Advisory Board.

 

We will now await further developments on the above and the Club knows that the Trust is available to consult on and partner with any areas relating to the survey. We will maintain an ongoing dialogue as we continue to fulfil our role and objectives to:

 

• Lobby, campaign and engage in regular, constructive dialogue with Leicester City Football Club, at executive level, and to publicise, when relevant, any resultant actions taken.
• Hold Leicester City Football Club and its owners to account for the highest standards of business management, and operational and commercial decisions that directly affect Foxes Trust members and the wider supporter base.

 

 

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Full membership with voting rights from £5 – Full Membership is currently half price at £5 for adults (22-64 years old) and £2.50 for concessions (65+), young adult £1.50 (18-21) and children free (under 18).

 

Free Membership is also available – This membership does not get privileges associated with full paid membership, but it will still help us to stay connected with a bigger number of Leicester City supporters.

 

Visit our website here to join – Join Us – Membership – Foxes Trust

[JonnyBoy]

Point 4. Is not a satisfactory answer from them:

 

Communicate A Credible 5-Year Plan – the Club has heard the sentiment from supporters that they want greater clarity about its direction, and acknowledged the importance of clear communication from senior leadership over time

 

what even is that response. Just a load of hot air bollocks. They should have a firm date, time and location for a q&a for 50 or so fans no excuses.

 

point 1. Response isn’t good enough either 

 

Still a rotten club then, nothing will change 

[Adster]

So, all a ****ing waste of time then? The answers are just corportate deflection.  

[UniFox21]

2 minutes ago, Adster said:

So, all a ****ing waste of time then? The answers are just corportate deflection.  

Every question was just a different AI response of "**** off" 

[FoxesTez]

Pissing into the wind whilst these lot are at the helm. 

[inckley fox]

Yes, the sum total of nothing as per usual, and - as per usual - it arrives at the precise moment when something very substantial is needed.

[Paninistickers]

Jim Donnelly ffs. No different to speaking to a utility company call center agent and ranting about the price of gas. 

 

The trust would be wiser to stop engaging with the club.  Instead offer practical and detailed manifestos, press releases and open letters arguing a better way to govern..

 

For example, don't ask for 'lower ticket prices';  set out a business plan of what the prices should be, why and what revenues it'd make compared with existing pricing. 

[Chelmofox]

So now we have to hit them hard on socials and with protests. They’ve had a long time to feed back since relegations and have proven they aren’t going to do it with the trust. 

[Iwebema]

I appreciate what the foxestrust reform has done so far, so please dont take this completely negatively and I appreciate its easy for me to type in a response on a forum vs being in the room.

 

But I have to say I would be fuming if that is genuinely the response being received.

 

Descoping things and saying it isnt appropriate is a nonsense, this isn't a corperate business, it's a football club, and his role is literally tied to the footballing operation, there shouldn't be much off limits to the fans through fan engagement. This is (not unexpected) but self preservation at its finest.

 

I would of expected them to provide reasons why they believe his employment remains tenable, what evidence are they pointing to that gives them trust and faith that he can continue. It should be debated not shut down.

 

And I want to echo the 5 year plan nonsense, that is embarrassing, I would expect the trust to say when are we getting one and hold them to a deadline not allow them to kick the can down the road and hide like they always do.

Edited Wednesday at 18:09 by Iwebema

[Richmondfox]

3 minutes ago, Chelmofox said:

So now we have to hit them hard on socials and with protests. They’ve had a long time to feed back since relegations and have proven they aren’t going to do it with the trust. 

And then they will post even more content for the Bangladeshi bot farm to drown out any negative sentiment.  

[ian__marshall]

Disappointing on many levels. 

 

The club really aren't taking the feedback seriously, and just conducting an appeasement exercise. 

 

@Foxes_Trust - Were you aware that the meeting was only involving Jim and Anthony? If so, may I please kindly ask why the meeting was not declined by yourselves?

 

I know you are genuinely doing your best and I'm sincerely thankful for the time, dedication, and effort you invest in trying to improve the situation, but quite frankly your time is way more valuable than having the club roll out the same individuals time and again who are not in the position to effect change. Jim doesn't have the authority, and despite Anthony's seniority the responsibility for the changes called for, do not sit within the scope of his role.

 

Whilst I appreciate that you are trying to build bridges, I'd strongly encourage you be more assertive, as the perception at the moment is one that seems to favour a softly softly approach which is not too dissimilar to the organisation that went before. That's a shame, as unlike your predecessors you are clearly trying, however the one area I'd suggest requires development is having a ruthless operator amongst the ranks who isn't afraid to put noses out of joint and dictate the terms upon which you wish to engage with the club. After all, no meaningful relationship is ever built on a single party dictating the terms.

 

Apologies, I'm not trying to be overly critical, but just feel at the moment all your efforts (which are great by the way) are not being truly considered by the club, and they seem to hide behind excuses as to why your suggestions either aren't feasible or require further consultation with other stakeholders before they can be acted on.

[Silva Fox]

A set of classic lip service responses as expected.

[Foxes_Trust]

4 hours ago, Paninistickers said:

Jim Donnelly ffs. No different to speaking to a utility company call center agent and ranting about the price of gas. 

 

The trust would be wiser to stop engaging with the club.  Instead offer practical and detailed manifestos, press releases and open letters arguing a better way to govern..

 

For example, don't ask for 'lower ticket prices';  set out a business plan of what the prices should be, why and what revenues it'd make compared with existing pricing. 

 

1 hour ago, ian__marshall said:

 

 

@Foxes_Trust - Were you aware that the meeting was only involving Jim and Anthony? If so, may I please kindly ask why the meeting was not declined by yourselves?

 

I know you are genuinely doing your best and I'm sincerely thankful for the time, dedication, and effort you invest in trying to improve the situation, but quite frankly your time is way more valuable than having the club roll out the same individuals time and again who are not in the position to effect change. Jim doesn't have the authority, and despite Anthony's seniority the responsibility for the changes called for, do not sit within the scope of his role.

 

So the club has a Fan Engagement Team who own all of their consultation with supporters and supporter groups. That's entirely normal and expected for a Football Club.

 

The four key stakeholders in recent times have been Anthony Herlihy (Communications Director), Imogen Ward (Head of Fan Engagement), Louise Hollingsworth (Supporter Engagement Manager) and Jim Donnelly (Supporter Liaison Officer). The Trust board met with that entire team to mark a new start in relations between the Trust and the Club given there had been such significant change to the Trust board in recent months - we wrote about that meeting here.

 

The Head of Fan Engagement, Imogen, has left the club. She was present with the other three stakeholders in previous meetings but has not yet been replaced. Louise was on holiday the day of our most recent meeting, which is why it was with just Anthony and Jim.

 

The Fan Engagement Team have either direct decision-making authority or major influence over 4 out of 5 of our Calls To Action. We understand the inner workings of the club well enough to know who is and isn't able to take action on the requests we make. The only one where they do not is the Call To Action for Jon Rudkin's departure.

 

On that one, we have asked for a direct meeting with Top. We've not been granted that but we have been told that Monica (who he appointed as a direct report to be his link into the day to day running of the club) and the rest of the Executive Leadership team have seen the survey results. There are not many Supporter Trusts that get to meet with the owners of their club. That doesn't mean we don't try, but it is important to recognise that we can only try our hardest to reach the very top of the club (reminder - when we couldn't get meetings last year we posted a hard copy letter to King Power HQ in Thailand in the hope Top would see the results) and there are different avenues to try and achieve that aim.

 

[Foxes_Trust]

5 hours ago, Paninistickers said:

The trust would be wiser to stop engaging with the club.  Instead offer practical and detailed manifestos, press releases and open letters arguing a better way to govern..

 

For example, don't ask for 'lower ticket prices';  set out a business plan of what the prices should be, why and what revenues it'd make compared with existing pricing. 

Understand your points and they're heard with appreciation.

 

We have already done some of these things. We did a press release with the survey results (the coverage was disappointing - one journalist even responded to sympathetically say that although we were taking a sound approach we'd likely not see much coverage in the national media as now we're a League One club we're not high on the agenda) and we've deployed Open Letters previously. There's a time and place for both.

 

There's a balance to be struck of the very public and visible challenge and the attempt to maintain constructive dialogue behind closed doors (which requires diplomacy).

 

You can see from our other article that we published today (here) that we don''t think the way the club consults, engages and acts upon feedback is good enough. We've also set out that we will review up to November 2026 and discontinue our participation if we don't see improvements.

 

On the ticketing Call To Action, we've suggested a practical solution: either a rebate or free home cup tickets. Let's see if we get any progress on that in the next few weeks (deadline was by end of July).

[Dan]

Everything should be about getting this owner out. Absolute waste of time trying to be constructive with them. We need to step it up as a fanbase this year.

[Jattdogg]

Absolutely love that you have the conversations with them.

 

Absolutely despise their responses.  Not fit to own our club anymore, get out!

[1972 Fox]

3 hours ago, Dan said:

Everything should be about getting this owner out. Absolute waste of time trying to be constructive with them. We need to step it up as a fanbase this year.

100% this.

 

It's clear that until Top/KP are gone, the no 1 point on @Foxes_Trust's call to action plan - the departure of Jon Rudkin - will be ignored and will not happen.

 

Our ownership regime is no better than it was for Sheff Wednesday under Chansiri and we are heading the same way as they were.

 

IMO the @Foxes_Trust should adopt an new stance by ceasing any further negotiations with the club and go all out publicly in trying to force Top/KP out of LCFC. It worked for Sheff Wednesday and it would soon gather momentum here. The current approach of diplomatic talks with people who have no influence and just pay lip service to the fans is not working.

 

Until there is change at the very top, the decline of our club will continue.

[Trav Le Bleu]

Seems very like, "Yes, we hear you... What? You were expecting a reply?"

[murphy]

More evidence, of it were needed,that this club refuses to learn.

 

When the director of football oversees such catastrophic and repeated failure it is reasonable for fans to assert that his position is untenable and to demand accountability.

 

These filibuster responses show that the club is not taking fans concerns seriously and belie the pure contempt that they have for us.  The whole exercise is no more than an attempt to appear as though they are engaging with fans.

[Officer Doofy]

We acknowledge the clubs complete inability to actually act on any of the points raised. 

 

Zero action, zero commitment, zero accountability. 

 

 

Many thanks 

[purpleronnie]

I guess when fans snap up season tickets no matter what the league the club are in, and fans merely shrug relegation off, then why would the owners care what the fans think? 

 

Of course we'd like owners that did, but when has that happened?  As long as the tickets are sold and there's no descenting voices then everything is ok.

Edited Thursday at 14:41 by purpleronnie

[stevostadium]

Thanks for sharing the responses.

 

Its positive that the club are engaging. Anyone who expected more detailed responses from the club are delusional.

There towing the party line so to speak.

 

If it really has reached the senior management group than that in itself is a win.

[Mapperleyfox]

Top was happy to meet the fans in the streets of Eindhoven etc when things were going well. Now he's turned the club to shit he's scared to show his face. The man is a coward. And so is Rudkin. 

[Nolucklcfc]

How do you know the results have been shared with senior members of the clubs? 
 

I simply don’t believe that. 

[Soar Fox]

I wouldn’t trust a word that comes out of Jim Donnelly’s mouth. He has & always be lost who tells people what they want to hear. 
 

The club is rotten to the core the only change we need is Top & king power out. Once they are gone the rest of the leeches & cling ons will follow.