attendances

depechemode · 16-02-2008, 18:13

the reason i think we get low crowds is because we have done the fairytale ending , getting back into the league , and thats as far as we will get with our set up . hope am wrong but i think the people who use to come when we where trying for the unibond title ect .. know this hense see no point in coming now .

Jesus_was_A_red_ · 16-02-2008, 19:13

Its many factors. 13 pounds is too much to watch stanley is the general public answer. Rovers is 15 pounds every home game except the big 4 and if you didnt know majority of accrington support either rovers burnley man utd and liverpool id say 70,000 divided by 1,000 tells you 1 in every 70 accrington residents support stanley. In the past myself included have stated that youth is the key factor for building the club, 'the fans of tomorrow' yet i think if the parents support the 4 mentioned above who are the kids going to follow?
maybe trying to entice the arm chair united and liverpool because majority are in accrington, but they say 13 pounds is too much to watch stanley. Round and round. Good players, good form, good publicity, good fa cup runs all put more on stanleys gates. Sad but its true and its the same at almost every single club.

No.9 Dream · 16-02-2008, 19:39

Accrington wanted a cinema...Accrington want a league team.....well we have em both and there both going to the wall because of low attendance...........accrington had a tory mp in the midst of the 30s depression.......perhaps its us eh?

cmonstanley · 16-02-2008, 20:00

its called apathy .......

Give us the old gree · 16-02-2008, 20:08

Quote:

Originally Posted by cmonstanley

its called apathy .......

This about sums it up...

But for me apart from a handfull most clubs are struggling Bury Rochdale The Rovers Bolton all are north west clubs over charging and not offering value for money, most fans i know are on low income and cant afford £13 or whatever price it is we live in a low income area where only the diehards will fork out the cash.

Burnley recently had some good gates with fans incentive's correct me if i'm wrong here but didnt they allow season ticket holders to bring a mate for a fiver ?? i know we have low season ticket sales so it wouldnt make much difference but incentive schemes do work.

Apathy... yeah that about sums it up.

lancsdave · 16-02-2008, 20:10

Quote:

Originally Posted by Give us the old gree

This about sums it up...

Burnley recently had some good gates with fans incentive's correct me if i'm wrong here but didnt they allow season ticket holders to bring a mate for a fiver ??

We have recently had three matches where season ticket holders got 2 free tickets for each match, hence the higher attendances. Will be back to normal next home match.

cmonstanley · 16-02-2008, 20:17

Quote:

Originally Posted by Give us the old gree

This about sums it up...

But for me apart from a handfull most clubs are struggling Bury Rochdale The Rovers Bolton all are north west clubs over charging and not offering value for money, most fans i know are on low income and cant afford £13 or whatever price it is we live in a low income area where only the diehards will fork out the cash.

Burnley recently had some good gates with fans incentive's correct me if i'm wrong here but didnt they allow season ticket holders to bring a mate for a fiver ?? i know we have low season ticket sales so it wouldnt make much difference but incentive schemes do work.

Apathy... yeah that about sums it up.

i agree with the price as well but we are the cheapest in the league,its syphoned down from the greed league

maccawozzagod · 16-02-2008, 23:23

Nobody can compete with the Premier League for the draw of big name players.

But Rovers this season tried to entice the fans with ridiculously low season ticket sales, it didn't really work. They got an extra 2000 season ticket holders by nearly halving the price. For the princely sum of £300 (£21 more than our Clayton End ticket) you have the dubious honour of sitting at the back few rows behind concrete pillars etc etc. The public have voted with their feet and the attendances have gone up by about 12% having knocked about 40% off the price. Cheaper tickets have not worked in that example.

We could advertise the fact that we have the cheapest match day tickets in the entire Football League and that may get a few more on but what would we have lost financially in doing so? We'd have to knock £3 off the price for the Clayton End to sell the 'cheapest ticket in the league' at a tenner. Average 500 people? So we would need an extra 150 people on that end EVERY week to reach break even figure on a below break even attendance. It is do-able I reckon.

IMHO there are a couple of real incentives we should offer.

1. £10 adult ticket - £5 concession keep it simple and don't try to confuse anyone with more pricing than necessary
2. Kid for a quid - every week without fail, member or not. It is too confusing for people to have to remember to go and register then collect their tickets each week. Most people can't be arsed and to say that 300 kids have registered is just nonsense and is bending statistics to suit. My kids were 'Junior Reds' this season and last but I have still not taken them to a game and neither have they received any correspondence through the post. Just charge a quid over the gate and be done with - let the FITC take care of data collating with their work in the schools.
3. Advertise the bloody prices! We know how much it costs and there is a piece in the paper at the very start of a season BUT THE REST OF THE TOWN HAS NO IDEA!!!!!!!!!!! Back of buses, leaflet drops via the paper, adverts in the paper, billboards, leaflet in every carrier bag at ASDA etc. Every thousand pound spent on advertising needs only to bring 10 people to 10 games to break even. If the club won't have a marketing budget then maybe the OSC should make it their agenda?

We could put 500 people on the gate without too much effort,, but bleating about poor attendances won't do that, begging on the website or in the programme won't do that, we need to tell the people of Accrington what they are missing.

4. Season tickets - A Clayton End ticket would cost £230 for the 23 home games next season assuming we stay up and don't get promoted. Charge £230 but offer a free shirt with every ticket! and a scarf! It doesn't cost the club £40 for a shirt or £7 for a scarf so use the profit margin on that as the discount on the ticket. First rule of discount is to try to give 'goods to the value of' instead of the actual money. Advantages being more definite 'sales' on those items that might just allow us better pricing for larger amounts, and the distinction of having more people actually wearing our colours. How many of our home crowd actually wear a Stanely scarf? less than a quarter is how many, take a look around next home match and tell me I'm wrong. We need to display the colours.

So in short, a family of four can watch the Reds for £22. Maybe even bung it up to £25 for a family of four ticket but put in some sort of meal deal worked out with the vans. 4 burgers and 4 cokes (£16.80 matchday resale value but a fiver in cost value) and four match tickets for £25? I'd buy one meself but not bring em just fer t'extra grub!! You couldn't get saturday afternoon entertainment anywhere else for that kind of money.

Also, we have to bring the cost of merchandise down, it's just too expensive. Community clubs like ours can't survive by being based on a bottom line %GP. We need to rely on bulk turnover to create a net profit rather than small turnover large profit. 400 shirt sales at £40 £16k turnover)or 600 at £30 (£18k turnover)? the first one might produce a profit of £8000 and the second only £6000, but the bigger picture is not in short term figures it is in having 200 extra people wearing red and white and walking around town advertising the product. People of Accrington need to start feeling left out if they are not Stanley fans, Stanley fans need to start becoming the majority over Rovers fans and Burnley fans. Only when the branding takes place will the town of Accrington start to become a Stanley town. When it becomes a Stanley town then local businesses will back us more as it is in their interest not to back Rovers or Burnley. Also, back on the topic of pricing, most fans I have spoken to have said that they feel like they are being rippe doff by the high prices of goods but would probably buy a lot more if a) they could get in the shop on matchday and b) if the prices were more realistic. But again, advertise the products a little more. I wonder how many of the crowd never go in the club shop? hand some leaflets out with the product range on it. £150 for 10000 leaflets full colour A5 printed both sides, its hardly a fortune so push it

We need to start aggressively marketing the club, not just within but also outside of the club, but to do this successfully you need to ahve something to attract the people, something for them to spend on whilst they are here, and something to keep them here.

Oggy · 16-02-2008, 23:55

Quote:

Originally Posted by maccawozzagod

We need to start aggressively marketing the club, not just within but also outside of the club, but to do this successfully you need to have something to attract the people, something for them to spend on whilst they are here, and something to keep them here.

Without having read the small print, another totally sensible, totally committed, post from Rob (aka maccawozzagod).

One of my mates at work said to me yesterday, "Why haven't the club marketed themselves, they've got a great name".

As I fell to the floor, I managed to spit out, "tell me about it".

Wynonie Harris · 17-02-2008, 00:04

Quote:

Originally Posted by Oggy

"Why haven't the club marketed themselves, they've got a great name".

I've been saying this for the last 15 years. Sadly, the present heirarchy at the club don't want to know!

cashman · 17-02-2008, 00:17

Quote:

Originally Posted by Wynonie Harris

I've been saying this for the last 15 years. Sadly, the present heirarchy at the club don't want to know!

thats the bit thats really sad, over 10 yrs ago when i got me bar in spain, EVERY british punter that came in n asked me where i was from soon as i said ACCRINGTON,the reply was always ACCRINGTON STANLEY, majority of population knows who they are n they are too inept to use it.

Oggy · 17-02-2008, 00:23

Quote:

Originally Posted by Wynonie Harris

I've been saying this for the last 15 years. Sadly, the present heirarchy at the club don't want to know!

The return to the league was a license to print money.

Give us the old gree · 17-02-2008, 00:44

Quote:

Originally Posted by Oggy

The return to the league was a license to print money.

Sadly our printer is broke

Give us the old gree · 17-02-2008, 00:51

Quote:

Originally Posted by maccawozzagod

Nobody can compete with the Premier League for the draw of big name players.

But Rovers this season tried to entice the fans with ridiculously low season ticket sales, it didn't really work. They got an extra 2000 season ticket holders by nearly halving the price. For the princely sum of £300 (£21 more than our Clayton End ticket) you have the dubious honour of sitting at the back few rows behind concrete pillars etc etc. The public have voted with their feet and the attendances have gone up by about 12% having knocked about 40% off the price. Cheaper tickets have not worked in that example.

We could advertise the fact that we have the cheapest match day tickets in the entire Football League and that may get a few more on but what would we have lost financially in doing so? We'd have to knock £3 off the price for the Clayton End to sell the 'cheapest ticket in the league' at a tenner. Average 500 people? So we would need an extra 150 people on that end EVERY week to reach break even figure on a below break even attendance. It is do-able I reckon.

IMHO there are a couple of real incentives we should offer.

1. £10 adult ticket - £5 concession keep it simple and don't try to confuse anyone with more pricing than necessary
2. Kid for a quid - every week without fail, member or not. It is too confusing for people to have to remember to go and register then collect their tickets each week. Most people can't be arsed and to say that 300 kids have registered is just nonsense and is bending statistics to suit. My kids were 'Junior Reds' this season and last but I have still not taken them to a game and neither have they received any correspondence through the post. Just charge a quid over the gate and be done with - let the FITC take care of data collating with their work in the schools.
3. Advertise the bloody prices! We know how much it costs and there is a piece in the paper at the very start of a season BUT THE REST OF THE TOWN HAS NO IDEA!!!!!!!!!!! Back of buses, leaflet drops via the paper, adverts in the paper, billboards, leaflet in every carrier bag at ASDA etc. Every thousand pound spent on advertising needs only to bring 10 people to 10 games to break even. If the club won't have a marketing budget then maybe the OSC should make it their agenda?

We could put 500 people on the gate without too much effort,, but bleating about poor attendances won't do that, begging on the website or in the programme won't do that, we need to tell the people of Accrington what they are missing.

4. Season tickets - A Clayton End ticket would cost £230 for the 23 home games next season assuming we stay up and don't get promoted. Charge £230 but offer a free shirt with every ticket! and a scarf! It doesn't cost the club £40 for a shirt or £7 for a scarf so use the profit margin on that as the discount on the ticket. First rule of discount is to try to give 'goods to the value of' instead of the actual money. Advantages being more definite 'sales' on those items that might just allow us better pricing for larger amounts, and the distinction of having more people actually wearing our colours. How many of our home crowd actually wear a Stanely scarf? less than a quarter is how many, take a look around next home match and tell me I'm wrong. We need to display the colours.

So in short, a family of four can watch the Reds for £22. Maybe even bung it up to £25 for a family of four ticket but put in some sort of meal deal worked out with the vans. 4 burgers and 4 cokes (£16.80 matchday resale value but a fiver in cost value) and four match tickets for £25? I'd buy one meself but not bring em just fer t'extra grub!! You couldn't get saturday afternoon entertainment anywhere else for that kind of money.

Also, we have to bring the cost of merchandise down, it's just too expensive. Community clubs like ours can't survive by being based on a bottom line %GP. We need to rely on bulk turnover to create a net profit rather than small turnover large profit. 400 shirt sales at £40 £16k turnover)or 600 at £30 (£18k turnover)? the first one might produce a profit of £8000 and the second only £6000, but the bigger picture is not in short term figures it is in having 200 extra people wearing red and white and walking around town advertising the product. People of Accrington need to start feeling left out if they are not Stanley fans, Stanley fans need to start becoming the majority over Rovers fans and Burnley fans. Only when the branding takes place will the town of Accrington start to become a Stanley town. When it becomes a Stanley town then local businesses will back us more as it is in their interest not to back Rovers or Burnley. Also, back on the topic of pricing, most fans I have spoken to have said that they feel like they are being rippe doff by the high prices of goods but would probably buy a lot more if a) they could get in the shop on matchday and b) if the prices were more realistic. But again, advertise the products a little more. I wonder how many of the crowd never go in the club shop? hand some leaflets out with the product range on it. £150 for 10000 leaflets full colour A5 printed both sides, its hardly a fortune so push it

We need to start aggressively marketing the club, not just within but also outside of the club, but to do this successfully you need to ahve something to attract the people, something for them to spend on whilst they are here, and something to keep them here.