To Suggest Neither Norfolk or Suffolk are particularly affluent doesn't have much clout when you are sat in Coventry..
In your current situation then you dont need to encourage fans in so kids for a quid would be bad but we have no fans so need to start working on it. Your club is working on a basis that they have done the hard work of getting people interested but they still need to keep working to make sure they all stay. unfortunately they will probably fail in the near future as 'greed' will take over with more demand than supply. The wages issue shouldnt be too hard to enforce if all clubs decided to work under sensible guide lines. Unfortunately there is always one club that tries to buy success which starts a domino effect with others trying to compete. I think all clubs should enforce the league 1 and 2 regs that wages must stay under a certain percentage of income. For example if we get £10m in next year then our wage bill can not go past £7.5m
interesting post. my concern, which you've touched on, would be that my own club are resting on its laurels. it will require a new generation of fans to come through and if its impossible for them to get to matches, they won't catch 'the bug'. cup games are an ideal opportunity for them to lower prices but they've failed to do this. ok, its not on the same level as ipswich at the moment and your concerns are more than that of mine, but there are still concerns. i do think capping will come in eventually. naturally, there will always be a way around it but i think it has to happen. it will be interesting to see how many league one and two clubs make a profit over the coming years.
To throw a good example in there, Sheffield United have a good pricing strategy where they have a low level ticket price of £10 and also run a lot of different initiatives to get the kids along from local schools and coaching schemes as well running a few 'family days' throughout the year where Under 16's can enter for just £1 - this is run in conjunction with their 'United Initiative' similar to our local 'ITFC charitable trust' and 'Norwich City community Sports foundation' something every Professional football club must have. The success of the 'United Initiative' is that it gives youngsters in the local area a positive exposure to Sheffield United football club and as we know young lads are quite impressionable and therefore develop an interest and support from an early age. Personally I don't think Ipswich do it very well (I no longer live in the area so I'd be happy to hear if anyone disagrees) and Norwich do it some degree of success but there is a real scope for improvement
Sorry to wade in but according to official statistics Suffolk has the far greater income per household than Norfolk. Afterall you have got Gt Yarmouth!
Supers - I don't have, know, or care about figures, I'm basing it on a) the fact it's an hour faster by train and b) that my gut is that people are more likely to move to Norfolk later in their careers or for retirement, a three or four hour round trip to work five days a week isn't very practical and I would imagine most people who do it are natives. That's my gut. I don't remember saying there are more wealthy people in Norfolk, I said they're a different breed and in my experience they are. The point is that those same people definitely do not for the most part reside in Barnsley or Huddersfield. The same thing applies to London. Different areas of London have a different socio-economic population so what the punters around the grounds of Millwall or Brentford or Charlton can afford to and will pay will go into the thinking of setting ticket prices. If you have got people willing to pay £1000 for a season ticket in the 'best seat' (for me those are behind the goals anyway) then why on Earth is that an issue? It's the cheapest ticket that determines whether the hard up can afford to go and watch the game. People in between wont base their attendance on the ticket price but on how they feel about the club. It doesn't stop me eating if I go and watch a game but I barely go at all now because it feels like a monumental waste of £100 for two tickets and petrol at the moment and I'm not prepared to pay it when I could do other things with that money. In fact if the tickets were free it still wouldn't be worth the cost of £40-odd quid in petrol and refreshments.
Going back to an earlier post about lowering ticket prices, I thought that at the time of Jim Magilton. I thought its worth taking a big hit to the clubs' revenue to get the stadium rocking. I think it's too late for that now and I don't think it will draw people back unless prices are radically reduced. The discounting thing backfired horribly last season when we charged for the called off and rearranged matches against Middlesbrough.
would love to see where you got this info from warky as five minutes research says otherwise, but don't post it on here, as is everyones wish - DM me if you can be bothered!
surely match ticket prices are going to keep going up (for example the most expensive norwich one of £50 in the beeb article is for last season, as it's £60 now for A+ grade matches) until something is done about players wages, i know it's stating the obvious! Reduce them then everything else can come down. Also, if there is demand for it as someone said above, people willl pay it. they will moan about it, but will still pay for it, certainly in norwich's case
as said above, it'll be interesting to see in a couple of years time the results from league one and two. i suspect it will stabilise clubs rather than let them make profit but that's better than nothing. i went to a league two match at the weekend and the ticket was £14 terrace, no roof. is that too much? i think so - should be a tenner at most, so its 40% over priced. it goes through the divisions.
I just looked at prices in the Ladies Super League, at Lincoln, you can get a season ticket for £25!
dave, i heard this morning on breakfast news that you can watch arsenal ladies for £6 a match i think it was, compared to £125 for the mens team! there are of course numerous reasons why there is a gargantuan chasm between the two prices but in the end, you still get to see a game of football. there's a balance to be found - its obviously very difficult to price matches - there's no right or wrong way - but if prices continue to go up at this rate there will be some clubs with no fans in the ground! where is the tipping point?
different sport, but rugby is a lot cheaper as well - either ther premiership / pro 12 or heineken cup. my brother-in-law has a season ticket for cardiff blues and its something like £150 including cup games.
wages, wages, wages! that's what it all boils down to, players wages – that's what we're paying through the nose for. reduce them and theoretically, ticket prices could come down.
