Foxes_Trust Posted 23 August 2005 Share Posted 23 August 2005 sure.1 - if Brighton was a grade A game, the attendance would be lower then the ipswich game probably by a few thousand. 2 - So the aim of grading it lower is to sustain the attendance. 3 - So if the attendance is the same this is not a 0 gain it is actually few thousand gain since it would have been lower, and if you have say 22k 2000 higher then it is actually an extra 5k fans. 4 - my point was the board and I expect the foxes trust see it different to me and will try and sell it to the fans that if brighton is a 20k attendance then the fans fixtures has no gains in attendance. 5 - thats why I think a proper way to prove is to regrade a game that is top 12 opposition. 162035[/snapback] Right I'm with you, but would disagree on point 4. Both the club & the Trust would view the Fans Fixture as a failure if it only generated a 20k crowd. If you look at last season, a Fans Fixture like Crewe attracted a 27k crowd & that was only back in February (Sat game) in comparison to say the QPR game which had 23.7k. Would probably say £25k was alright, but Brighton is a Tuesday night which means younger children may not attend. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Posted 24 August 2005 Share Posted 24 August 2005 5 - thats why I think a proper way to prove is to regrade a game that is top 12 opposition. 162035[/snapback] I thought the idea of Fans Fixtures was to try and increase attendances for less attractive opposition, thus making a match against one of the 'bigger' teams in this division a Fans Fixture would give false results anyway. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fox in a Box Posted 24 August 2005 Share Posted 24 August 2005 I thought the idea of Fans Fixtures was to try and increase attendances for less attractive opposition, thus making a match against one of the 'bigger' teams in this division a Fans Fixture would give false results anyway. 162294[/snapback] Here here, I agree with you (suprise suprise!) I also thought that a reduction in price (fans fixture) was to make the stadium accessable to people who are less well off but these typically in the past have been against poorer or less supported opposition (Gills, Crewe, Brighton). I think that since Paul Mace has left there seems no big desire to promote most games in a large way, for all of his bad points he knew how to market games. Barrie Pierpoint for all his bad pints was a genius at marketing. Surely if we marketed ourselves better we would get more of a crowd. We marketed ourselves against Barca and had a sellout, I think the OS lacks punch and many of us at the OPEN MEETING we agreed that emails that keep us upto date with 'important news' would be to out benefit. We need better marketing, and results..... then the attendance would improve. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chrysalis Posted 24 August 2005 Share Posted 24 August 2005 I thought the idea of Fans Fixtures was to try and increase attendances for less attractive opposition, thus making a match against one of the 'bigger' teams in this division a Fans Fixture would give false results anyway. 162294[/snapback] Thats fine but dont use it to prove it doesnt bump up attendances because its an unfair way to compare lower prices. the argument for lower prices is lowering prices for attractive games. Their is an attendance problem with the more attrative opposition as well or so I thight. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Foxes_Trust Posted 24 August 2005 Share Posted 24 August 2005 Thats fine but dont use it to prove it doesnt bump up attendances because its an unfair way to compare lower prices.the argument for lower prices is lowering prices for attractive games. Their is an attendance problem with the more attrative opposition as well or so I thight. 162698[/snapback] As Lisa said the Fans Fixtures are always for the least attractive oppenants, otherwise it could be a very poor crowd. The better teams will obviously overall attract more, so can't see that you logic will be applied. The better teams could get down graded from A to B games but not Fans Fixtures Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Foxes_Trust Posted 24 August 2005 Share Posted 24 August 2005 Here here, I agree with you (suprise suprise!) I also thought that a reduction in price (fans fixture) was to make the stadium accessable to people who are less well off but these typically in the past have been against poorer or less supported opposition (Gills, Crewe, Brighton).I think that since Paul Mace has left there seems no big desire to promote most games in a large way, for all of his bad points he knew how to market games. Barrie Pierpoint for all his bad pints was a genius at marketing. Surely if we marketed ourselves better we would get more of a crowd. We marketed ourselves against Barca and had a sellout, I think the OS lacks punch and many of us at the OPEN MEETING we agreed that emails that keep us upto date with 'important news' would be to out benefit. We need better marketing, and results..... then the attendance would improve. 162311[/snapback] This is a very good question that should be thrown in front of the new Fans Consultation Group for some detailed thinking. Where should the club market themselves would be a good starting point. There are nightly ads in the Mercury (media partner), are these free? - if not are they producing the goods? There needs to be a dinstinction between marketing SPAM & real news. E-mails annoucing new signings would be popular for instance, but 10 e-mails asking you to attend on Saturday (when you already have a ticket) gets very annoying. The feedback we had was that Macey's marketing spiel turned more fans off than on. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Posted 25 August 2005 Share Posted 25 August 2005 Thats fine but dont use it to prove it doesnt bump up attendances because its an unfair way to compare lower prices.the argument for lower prices is lowering prices for attractive games. Their is an attendance problem with the more attrative opposition as well or so I thight. 162698[/snapback] The thing with more and less attractive opposition is that one will get higher gates regardless of the ticket costs. I guess this could be looked at by studying attendances for the last season we had a flat ticket price. Of course we'll get bigger gates for the more exciting fixtures, that goes without saying. We don't need to lower ticket prices to prove that point. Match ticket grading is not a new thing, a lot of other clubs have used this for many years before City adopted this approach. It's not just City that want to exploit higher crowds by charging more for these games. This is the nature of football nowadays, it is a business, not a game. Why has it taken three years for people to sit up and take notice of this? Why complain now, not at the time the policy was introduced? That's what really gets me about this whole argument is that after 3 years or whatever it is of paying these match ticket prices, people have started to complain. This does not suggest to me that it is prices that are putting the fans off, but that people are looking for a 'real' reason to explain their indifference towards the club, and to be fair, we haven't been the most exciting team to watch lately! I don't doubt that there are people who genuinely can't afford to go to games, I was in that position myself once, but it looks like everyone else is jumping onto a bandwagon. I'd love cheaper ticket prices, I think of all the nice things I could buy if a large proportion of my wages weren't going on City, but the problem isn't isolated to LCFC and the board, this is a bigger problem affecting all of football. The reasons why we pay so much are founded in the fact that there are a significant number of people trying to milk as much money out of the cash cow as possible, and if you look at the accounts of football clubs, it is not the clubs themselves who are benifitting. Exactly how many clubs made a profit last season? I bet we didn't. The other factor with lower attendances is that the average attendances dropped for the first time since the introduction of the Premier League. Whilst a lot of fans have been priced out of the game, I would guess that a more significant proportion of fans are now less interested in football full stop. Things go in cycles, and at some point this was going to happen. To go back to our ticket prices, these would have been agreed on, based on a business plan for the season where someone somewhere would have said 'we expect crowds of x amount on average'. I would also guess keepiong prices the same with x supporters gives the club enough money to cover costs, and that the club viewed anything over x as a bonus. If our performances improve, the crowds will increase regardless of prices. Had City taken the step of lowering ticket prices to increase attendances with an initial positive response, but we then turned out to have a poor season there is a chance that attendances would still be poor later on in the season, and with the club losing money. It's not an easy choice to make, and I don't think the board wanted to take the risk. At any open meeting I've been to, they are still concerned and cautious when it comes to finances, and still feel the effect of administration. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Les Miserable Posted 25 August 2005 Share Posted 25 August 2005 True Lisa. I could afford £27. I gave up my season ticket last year as I was coming away feeling totally miserable far too often and for the first time in the 30 years of watching the club I really didn't want to go anymore. The problem I now have is whilst the cost last year was comparable to what I was willing to pay to watch football at this level. I won't pay match ticket prices, membership or not, for what if you take a step back are totally unappetising games against teams in a similar predicament to ourselves. At the Premiership level demand will obviously outstrip supply as Season Ticket sales increase so everyone is gauranteed tickets for the big games, meaning less tickets for the casual supporter. However at this level I think you have to account for a certain degree of price elasticity and I think this is where they've got it badly wrong. On a seperate note I've only been a member on here a couple of weeks but are the Foxes Trust Cliff Ginetta in disguise, some of the stuff you guys are coming out with on here sounds much like Cliff a few years ago! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Foxes_Trust Posted 25 August 2005 Share Posted 25 August 2005 On a seperate note I've only been a member on here a couple of weeks but are the Foxes Trust Cliff Ginetta in disguise, some of the stuff you guys are coming out with on here sounds much like Cliff a few years ago! 163199[/snapback] No, being a shareholder we have much greater access to the financial information than Cliff has for starters, so we do know the financial impact of decisions taken. The club have built flexability into their pricing structure by only announcing match gradings a few games ahead. They did ask the Fans Open Meeting about the first few games & were considering making them both grade A. Those present advised against this & the club eventually chose B for Stoke & A for Ipswich. We have forwarded a few of the suggested packages that fans have been posted on message boards to the club for consideration. When many are lobbying for big price cuts on an ongoing basis, 2 factors seem to have been largely ignored. a) The attendances at last seasons games, the increase in attendance for Fans Fixtures did not show 10,000 additional fans, it was less than half of that. b) The biggest hole in last years budget was lost revenue due to falling ticket sales, the club is well aware of this impact & is willing to listen to fans views more than ever now. The Trust will continue to feedback supporter opinion to the club which is one of our roles. In the same way we try to feedback the clubs thinking to fans & our posts can reflect this which then gets interpretated as the Trust not questioning the clubs approach. This is not the case, we are just trying to make fans aware of the clubs thinking. We do keep referring to the membership scheme as we feel it does offer real benefits to fans Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Harpenden Fox Posted 25 August 2005 Share Posted 25 August 2005 I’ve been reading the boards for a few weeks now, and love all the City chat. I live about 75 miles from the Walkers now, and my son, Dad and I have been season ticket holders in recent years, but we haven’t renewed this year. It isn’t cost, it’s the fact that in the last two years particularly the standard of football has been so dire. We’d leave home at 12.30, hack it up the M1 full of optimism, get to the ground at 2.45, and typically get bored. I remember being 0-1 down to Plymouth last autumn – and my son turning to me (aged 8 at the time) and saying plaintively, why don’t we support a good team? Thankfully we won 2-1 and all was fine again. Although I indulge in a bit of swearing like the best of them, we were usually surrounded by people fxxxing and blinding – I don’t mind a bit, but I don’t particularly want my lad to hear it, and swearing doesn’t constitute atmosphere. Sorry if I sound like a prude, but it just all felt too grim at times. We still love the City, always will, and son has his new replica shirt for his birthday today which he’s wearing proudly, but I just felt the standard last season was truly awful, lacking in passion, and ultimately why we didn’t renew our tickets. We’ll be back up the M1 during the season, not just when results improve, but less frequently than last season. I’m not too bothered about promotion to be honest, I just want to see us moving in the right direction, playing decent football, and looking like we care – as much as we supporters do. PS I go to a gym on the edge of Luton where their squad do weights etc. I’ve tried to suggest they need to heavily mark De Vries on Saturday, and not worry about Connors, but I don’t think they’ve fallen for it sadly. I could just drop some weights on their striker’s foot instead …… Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chrysalis Posted 25 August 2005 Share Posted 25 August 2005 When many are lobbying for big price cuts on an ongoing basis, 2 factors seem to have been largely ignored.a) The attendances at last seasons games, the increase in attendance for Fans Fixtures did not show 10,000 additional fans, it was less than half of that. 163266[/snapback] I apologise for coming across a bit agressive, but I would like you to address my point made in another post. I am not saying 10k fans are gained on fans fixtures I know that doesnt happen, but what I am trying to explain is when you are working out increases gained from fans fixture pricing you are working it out from the attendance level of a grade A fixture, so if eg. Ipswich is 20000 fans and Brighton then gets 24000 fans, you are calling this a 4000 gain, when in truth it isnt because if Brighton was grade A the attendance would be lower then ipswich, so the base level where you adding the gain of attendance is lower, say 17000 making 7000 extra fans as result of fans fixture. The big question is and is a big question, these extra fans that attend fans fixtures, are they the same fans that are lost from more attractive fixtures like ipswich or are they different fans who only come out when the prices are lowered. On the membership scheme I dont deny its a good deal given the right cirumstances but I think you would get much better success if given free when buying your first Grade A or Grade B ticket, the membership would last for the rest of the season. This serves 2 purposes. 1 - It encourages people to goto that first game that isnt a fans fixture since they are getting something free with their purchase. 2 - You will suddenly have many more membership holders then when you selling them, now that means more people who will have a lower matchday price and be more tempted to attend knowing they have a discount. Its a loss leader approach, give them away and the rewards follow. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Vestan Pance Posted 26 August 2005 Share Posted 26 August 2005 Although I indulge in a bit of swearing like the best of them, we were usually surrounded by people fxxxing and blinding – I don’t mind a bit, but I don’t particularly want my lad to hear it, and swearing doesn’t constitute atmosphere. Sorry if I sound like a prude, but it just all felt too grim at times. 163452[/snapback] Were you sitting in the Kop Harpenden Fox? I'd be surprised if you were cos' it's full of O.A.P's and kids who don't sing or swear! Seriously though I wouldn't worry too much about the swearing, he will hear much worse at school and it didn't do me any harm standing on the kop from an early age. If it was in the family stand then yes, out of order. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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