Ticket prices, we are in a double dipper..

[5waller5]

Yes I used to work with them.

It won't surprise you that they generally aren't the best business people then.

It's what every company up and down the land has to do, they all make projections. I'm sure the business men and women worth several hundred million are quite used to making projections on their business.

Yeah the difference is that every other business doesn't have so many different factors and such a volatile marketplace as the football industry .... weather, opposition, KO time, team performance, manager's popularity, league position, opposition's league position, transport, competitor events, etc etc etc Projections are hard to make in football, they're still made, but it's not exactly a science.

I've looked at the accounts a few times and food, shirts etc is a very small percentage of profits.

Looking at your cut out from the P&L non football is worth the same as gate receipts, presumably the other non football is TV ..... to me that's 33% of profits .... not minor really is it??

[Corky]

I'd quite happily spend £25 to watch us v Forest.

I wouldn't go at home to Burton on a Tuesday night if it was free.

And this is part of the club's dilemma (not a dig at you personally Matt).

Would the club be guaranteed a rise in attendance every game to justify themselves lowering the ticket price to make up the difference? As fleckneymike pointed out it would need a good number of people to turn up to make up that price decrease.

[5waller5]

These are pie in the sky figures. It's bums on seats which bring the revenue steams and sadly its the bums on the posh seats which bring the most.

Food concessions bring in very little income as they are limited in terms of sales and mark up. Essentially you have a 15 minute trading window where you are selling products with little mark up potential. The reasons cinemas are switching to ticket sales at concession stands is to get you to buy popcorn as that is where their money is (4p material cost £4 sale price), those margins aren't possible at football. Any perishable goods like pies, pints, pasties, burgers are a sure fire money loser as any over prep on your part and you're left with dead stock after half time. The money is in pop and hot drinks but not at the £1 levels you imagine

Advertising is a very limited market too. look at some of the boards around the ground, how much do you suppose local double glazing and carpet firms actually pay?

The shirt sale idea is also a fallacy, once you've bought the shirt thats you done. It's a one off cash injection, unless you attract a different new set of fans every home game you aren't going to shift many additional shirts. Also bear in mind that the club also get lumbered with lots of dead stock year on year when the kit cycle moves on.

Clubs do the calculations on food sales, shirt sales etc on a match by match basis and the returns don't justify a price drop.

Which bit is pie in he sky .... they are mainly your figures - 20k against 30k ... the rest is easy to see.

I actually agree on the perishables front ..... it's always seemed a massive waste that the concessions aren't open at full time .... I'm sure I'd buy a pie sometimes for the walk to the car!!!

How many of the ads boards actually pay?? All of them .... they are taken down if they haven't paid.

And talking of posh seats and how good commercial teams are at football clubs - noone has called me despite me not renewing £4k's worth of season tickets ..... seems a pretty lapse attitude towards clients to me!!!

[Guest MattP]

No worries, I completely agree and can see why they do what they do.

Basic maths tells you an extra 10,000 paying 14 earns less than 5,000 paying 30....

If they lower it and then that extra 5,000 disappears anyway they have made a right cock up.

[Jace]

The way football is at the moment for a club the size of Leicester all these things are just little fish Premiership TV revenue and Sponsorship rights that is what all the clubs need and want, directors want 90 million + revenue coming in a season they don't give a shit about the profit on Yorkie bars and Filbert Fox dog food bowls

[fleckneymike]

Which bit is pie in he sky .... they are mainly your figures - 20k against 30k ... the rest is easy to see.

I actually agree on the perishables front ..... it's always seemed a massive waste that the concessions aren't open at full time .... I'm sure I'd buy a pie sometimes for the walk to the car!!!

How many of the ads boards actually pay?? All of them .... they are taken down if they haven't paid.

And talking of posh seats and how good commercial teams are at football clubs - noone has called me despite me not renewing £4k's worth of season tickets ..... seems a pretty lapse attitude towards clients to me!!!

The 3000 kids who mysteriously appear at the ground as if freed from Hamlin.

[5waller5]

The way football is at the moment for a club the size of Leicester all these things are just little fish Premiership TV revenue and Sponsorship rights that is what all the clubs need and want, directors want 90 million + revenue coming in a season they don't give a shit about the profit on Yorkie bars and Filbert Fox dog food bowls

To be fair that is a great point.

[Babylon]

No I'm sure the Thais aren't used to factoring in unknowns working in one of the most volatile market places in the world.

You need to focus on Retailing and Merchandising. The rest would barely even be altered by high crowds. I can tell you now they already struggle to sell advertising, and that will only change with premier league football and/or more coverage on tv. Not how many people they get in the ground.

So £1.3m of £17.3. So a full attendance each week would get you roughly another 400k a year at the very most. Hardly worth the risk of dropping your prices. Because a decent run and an increase in numbers paying full whack would go well over that.

[5waller5]

The 3000 kids who mysteriously appear at the ground as if freed from Hamlin.

3 kids to every 7 adults .... i'd say that's a pretty accurate reflection.

[5waller5]

No I'm sure the Thais aren't used to factoring in unknowns working in one of the most volatile market places in the world.

You need to focus on Retailing and Merchandising. The rest would barely even be altered by high crowds. I can tell you now they already struggle to sell advertising, and that will only change with premier league football and/or more coverage on tv. Not how many people they get in the ground.

So £1.3m of £17.3. So a full attendance each week would get you roughly another 400k a year at the very most. Hardly worth the risk of dropping your prices. Because a decent run and an increase in numbers paying full whack would go well over that.

It's not £1.3m, it's all of those bottom 3 lines in the accounts .... £6m.

Anyway, for me, ticket prices are too high .... lower them and you'd have more people turn up spending more money on other products, you'd be able to sell more ads, sell more of the expensive seats, boxes, premium parking etc.

My initial point was that in the simple comparison given none of this was taken into account.

[fleckneymike]

It's not £1.3m, it's all of those bottom 3 lines in the accounts .... £6m.

But only one of those three can be changed by a alteration in match day pricing and thats the smallest figure of 880k.

[Daggers]

The professional game has always been subsidised by benefactors...

...and I'm going to stop you at this point because it's wrong.

The professional game has been mismanaged, fleeced and dicked over by "benefactors" who appear to know less about running a business than I know about D&B.

If you'd like me to start reeling off clubs which are run to break even or run by fans for fans I'm happy to list some - but I suspect you, as an intelligent person, actually know of them already.

To blindly accept that the club has to charge a premium price for a well-below premium product (in the hope that it will become one albeit at an even far greater price) misses the point of a football club and means you adopt a prone position waiting to be trampled over.

[fleckneymike]

...and I'm going to stop you at this point because it's wrong.

The professional game has been mismanaged, fleeced and dicked over by "benefactors" who appear to know less about running a business than I know about D&B.

If you'd like me to start reeling off clubs which are run to break even or run by fans for fans I'm happy to list some - but I suspect you, as an intelligent person, actually know of them already.

To blindly accept that the club has to charge a premium price for a well-below premium product (in the hope that it will become one albeit at an even far greater price) misses the point of a football club and means you adopt a prone position waiting to be trampled over.

Please enlighten me on the history of English professional football and all the community run clubs who have prospered within it.

[5waller5]

But only one of those three can be changed by a alteration in match day pricing and thats the smallest figure of 880k.

Sponsorship, advertising and exec boxes can't be altered by attendances???

Come on .... lets be realistic.

I'm not arguing the point because I don't feel strongly enough to be bothered .... But there is a huge tendency on here to ignore any facts that don't support someone's point .... I'm not making a point just that the original business case that only tickets were involved in the maths is not the case.

All of those bottom 3 lines are affected ... and that's £6m in revenue that could be increased significantly if more people were in the ground each week.

[Daggers]

Please enlighten me on the history of English professional football and all the community run clubs who have prospered within it.

I suspect, from the tone of your reply, that this is best left until tomorrow when you are sober and I'm less tired & inclined to be short with you.

[BlueSi13]

From my own perspective...its far too expensive. A ticket of £30 or over, plus costs for travel, food and drink and perhaps a little bit of merchandise if im feeling it and suddenly im spending over £50. Not even remotely justifiable in my opinion. I will just end up picking and choosing a select number of games instead.

The simple fact is if clubs insist on paying players millions per year, then they are naturally going to continue making the fans subsidise those activities. The only way we to balance things in this country is if we stop attending and stop buying their product and force them to think again. Personally i think it will get that way soon. Our own attendances are shrinking and am i right in saying that demand up and down the country is a lot lower than it used to be?

Football as a sport existed before the money stuck its oar in, and it will survive long after its gone.

[yorkie1999]

I think the owners don't really give a shit about the club not making money, their ambition is to get to the premiership so the king power name can be branded all around the world. For all we know they could be prepared to throw 50 million at Leicester every year so they can make 100 million a year in king power branding. I know that a lot of f1 teams are run just as an advertising board for their parent company and lose 100s of millions a year.

[fleckneymike]

Sponsorship, advertising and exec boxes can't be altered by attendances???

Come on .... lets be realistic.

I'm not arguing the point because I don't feel strongly enough to be bothered .... But there is a huge tendency on here to ignore any facts that don't support someone's point .... I'm not making a point just that the original business case that only tickets were involved in the maths is not the case.

All of those bottom 3 lines are affected ... and that's £6m in revenue that could be increased significantly if more people were in the ground each week.

I don't believe exec boxes can be influenced by lowering match day ticket prices. I don't believe pitch facing sponsorship boards can experience a significant mark up by lowering ticket prices in an attempt to increase attendance. The sponsorship figures are inflated because they include naming rights and shirt sponsorship, both of which belong to our owners who possible wish to subvert financial fair play by paying over the odds for both.

The thread is about reducing match day ticket prices to increase revenue. I do not believe that such a move would be financially advantageous.

[fleckneymike]

I suspect, from the tone of your reply, that this is best left until tomorrow when you are sober and I'm less tired & inclined to be short with you.

I am perfectly sober, I am intrigued to know which community run clubs have prospered since the inception of professional football. You seem to be operating under the misapprehension that I am advocating on behalf of corporations, I am not.

[Lost4words]

you all seem to be forgetting the club dont do the food/drinks/beer... it is 'sold' to another company to do this so the extra money from extra bums on seats doesnt go to lcfc it goes to the company paying to provide the food/drink/beer.. etc...

the club only cares about how much money it earns... if you look at football manager this will give you a rough idea of how this is done... to say that some of you can out think some of the minds at our football club with some ideas youve came up with in a few seconds is quite frankly - stupid.

the people at the club do all sorts of calculations to determine the right prices which will get enough bums on seats to earn enough money...

im not disagreeing that footballers are paid too much (van persie 250k a week? really?) im just saying that if anyone could come up with a strategy to earn the club more then quite a few well paid people would be out of a job...

its all great - 'lower prices mean more people would come' - that could be true but realistically its just a dream - it would be great for all of us to go see 'our' club for less money - but if we arnt/wernt paying the prices we are now our club would end up like portsmouth - dead wood ready to disappear in a flash.. its the sad truth... but our club, like it or not is a business... it doesnt have 'owners' for no reason... they are the owners to make money...

if anyone wins the lottery and feels like being clever and taking over the club and does this 'good deed' by lowering prices or keeping them the same... id probably say your money would be gone very soon... the owners arent stupid.. they dont run a multi million pound foreign company for no reason... (yes they may have very clever people working behind the scenes etc) but they are the owners... its their club to do what they want with...

[Daggers]

I am perfectly sober, I am intrigued to know which community run clubs have prospered since the inception of professional football. You seem to be operating under the misapprehension that I am advocating on behalf of corporations, I am not.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_fan-owned_sports_teams

[fleckneymike]

http://en.wikipedia....ed_sports_teams

Is that it? A wikipedia entry listing.

Could you offer me any more detail because from the tone of your initial post I was anticipating a slightly more comprehensive response as to how the professional game in Britain had been maintained by the common man and not rich benefactors.

Again I am not shilling for corporations just perplexed by the romanticised notion many have of football's past and demonisation of its present.

[Daggers]

Is that it? A wikipedia entry listing.

You asked for a list, you got a fvcking list.

[THEFATBASTARD]

Really loving the debate..decent points being made for a change...nobody has all the answers or wisdom on this...not even the very well paid executives at LCFC...I know several fans who would love to be "regulars" but its totally out of reach for them...which is sad.... I think 35 quid for one match is too much...(with no guarentee of what your going to get)... With a bit of "out of the box thinking" surely things can be improved on all fronts...catering.....ticket deals...merchandise etc.... ok ,it needs a bit of guts and vision.... but who dares wins...

[Grey Fox]

Basic supply and demand, it would and does.

Have you never heard of price elasticity of demand?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Price_elasticity_of_demand

It is possible for demand to be inelastic and show only a very small response to price changes.

Woah this is getting a little heavy for my numbed senses at this time on a Friday night.