Must admit, after 3 seasons in tier 3, i didnt think that attendances would remain as high as they have. Yesterday, 15,500 in middle of august when a lot of people are on holiday was very good. Can see gates of 20k+ should we stay in top 2 against teams with a reasonable support, unlike scunny yesterday.
Its been very good, 8,500 ST's without any major marketing attempts like the likes of Hartlepool and Bradford etc(not knocking what they're doing by the way) is superb effort
Ben, did they publish a final figure for Season Tickets? I was looking for this to complete the prediction thread I started when we began to sign players in earnest. I saw one about a fortnight before the season started (8400-ish), but nothing since. If we're there or thereabouts after 20 games (what am I saying, of course we will be), I can see an all-out rush for half-season tickets when they go on offer. As a marketer, I thought the Hartlepool experiment was bold and fascinating and brilliant. The immediate results are extraordinary, with two crowds of over 5000 already (I don't think they were getting more than 2000 odd last season) and the capacity is only about 7000. In marketing terms, what you're losing in the promotional price - and it's possible they aren't losing anything, as they sold so few full-price STs last season, is more than made up for by having double your captive audience to sell shirts, hotdogs, programmes and Bovril to. Tremendous move.
Yesterdays programe stated 8,501 season tickets sold though that figure was up to the season kick off so maybe a few more can be added to that. Looking at yesterdays league 1 attendances sheff weds got just over 1000 more through the turnstiles than us at their game yesterday..after that we got 4,000 more than Huddersfield 5,000 more than preston and we pretty much doubled and trebled every other league 1 attendance.
Well, I can say that there was definitely a bigger crowd in the West Upper towards the away end yesterday. Probably another 150-200, and the queue for the hot-dogs was tangibly longer. So as Tewks says, the knock on is great for additional profits made from merchandising and food etc. I hope the match experience will tempt the majority back as many were kids who looked and sounded to be having a great time. Obviously the low Scunny turn-out brought down the overall attendance but I think a continued run of form will ensure good crowds for this season. Tewks: I believe we discussed the Hartlepool ticketing experiment pre-season and were interested to see how it panned out. It looks to be a good move on their part and they must be congratulated on making the match day experience more accessible to a greater audience.
That's the figure I'm after, Mike - thanks. I'd expect at least 1000 half-season tickets to be added to this when they're available and surely the higher we are when they go on sale, the better the sales will be. If we pulled in 15,500 on Saturday including 350 diehard Scunnies and 8500 season ticket holders, that's 6650, give or take, paying on the gate, which is more than the average total attendances at 18 League One clubs so far this season. Excellent news. "...the queue for the hot-dogs was tangibly longer." That's a litmus test if I ever saw one, Ponders. The queue at Hartlepool must stretch twice round the ground...
