OP - I would get a great spine into the squad, made of players available on a free, with a classy midfielder to run it all. I would get rid of Yorkshire Radio and the other loss making companies that are not football related. I would sell the rights to radio to the highest bidder. I would look to the Rest of the World for opportunities in selling LUFC as a football club - a global strategy covering USA, Africa, Australia, Asia - making sure our games were televised every week delayed by a few hours for their peak times for free - build our club up in their eyes. I would control our distribution and manufacturing rights to our products, but allow those products to be sold through as many outlets as possible abroad. Build a sportswear strategy by linking to Leeds University and other Leeds / Yorkshire fashion houses and get those goods on sale through as many outlets as possible. Host a competition to design the new kit with all the Yorkshire Universities. Employ a professional marketer to build up the club and the individual players, get our club into the community so the kids and families feel an affinity. Get prices down to fill the stadium. Reduce expectation by telling fans that we only spend what we make ourselves, but that we are not going to alienate the supporters by charging the earth for it either. That would be for starters
Excellent post, I personally agree with all of it. Prices do need to come down to Championship levels for Championship football to increase footfall. More seats will allow a more flexible approach, I always wondered why Football clubs did not utilise a demand based pricing structure akin to budget airlines. I.e book early for cheap seats, then price increases nearer the match based on demand. Mind you I don't blame Bates for tying to make as much as possible on tickets, but a good business knows when to drop its prices to increase volume.
In the short term I would eliminate any outgoing that does not directly improve the football. I'd shut down Yorkshire Radio and sell the broadcasting rights to the BBC. I'd shut down the Pavilion's activities on non-matchdays at a very minimum, and re-evaluate the cost of keeping it just to open on match days. This would depend on any additional costs (tax, maintenance etc) that are associated with the general running of such a facility and the demand from the fans. Any outgoings that do not add up to much sense would be investigated and suspended as soon as possible. I would suspend any ground developments for the foreseeable future - any that have already been paid for that do not stand to cost money to maintain or keep would continue for whatever has been paid for. I'd re-evaluate ticket pricing structure to be more in line with the league that we are in. I would re-evaluate the match categories, and matches would be categorised based on an arbitrary system evaluating how "important" a match is. For example, West Ham would be a Category A by default, at around £32-33 for the most expensive standard seat, but if it were, say, 3 weeks before the end of the season and we had nothing to play for, it would become a Category C. The Leicester City match would have been a Category B - it's a meaningless fixture but it's still on the last day of the season, so demand for tickets is still reasonably high. I'd introduce a series of price brackets for children and adolescents. I'd introduce concessions - student tickets other than season tickets. Free tickets for schools would be reintroduced. All Category C and some Category B matches would have offers coming out the anus, bogof on kids tickets, bring a friend for half price, etc. I'd even introduce an offer where if you bring 3 generations of your family you get your tickets half price. I'd call THAT generations, instead of lumping in a free surplus shirt as an after thought. Category A would not be viable, as Category A would be reserved for matches with high demand. With the added price brackets for students, concessions, children and adolescents, the offers would not be needed to get bums on seats at these games. All facilities within the stadium would have a strict evaluation. What is the cost of running them? How much are they bringing in? Billy's Bar, the banqueting suites, etc would all be evaluated to determine whether or not they are worth bothering with in the current state of the club. Certain facilities may be viable for complete shut down for the foreseeable future, with compensation provided in the form of ticket discounts. One of the first things I would do would be donate a sum equal to the cost of the Don Revie statue to a charity for motor neuron disease, as an apology gesture for not fronting the cost of it in the first place. A 5 year plan for returning to the Premier League would be drawn up, the aims of which being that the team is not a toy to be played with and changed and swapped around with on a regular basis. It is a living, breathing entity and should be cared for as such. While player turnover is inevitable and required, efforts would be made to maximise the benefit of both keeping hold of players and moving players on where necessary. As part of this, the Academy would undergo a restructure to maximise productivity, with the aim being to bring the Academy up to the top level standard, saving us from having our best talent poached. Thorp Arch would be evaluated and if it's as much of a **** tip as we're told, and if it's having a serious detrimental effect on the productivity of the Academy, then a refurb would be carried out. A bare minimum refurb, no luxuries, just the essentials to get it back up to the standard we require. A 10 year plan for buying back Elland Road and Thorp Arch would be drawn up. If it was not feasible to secure a loan to buy back one or both of these facilities, a sum would be set aside each season based on the goal of buying them back within 10 years. How much is set aside would depend on how much money is available, but on the basis of what the club supposedly can afford to piss down the drain at the moment, a figure of £3-5 million would be set aside for the buying of Elland Road, the intention being activating the buy back clause. Thorp Arch would be a secondary priority, with the buy back clause having expired. As part of this plan, efforts would be made to repair relations with Leeds City Council. Cooperation with the council would be the first step in doing so, as well as a welcoming atmosphere, and presenting them with any and all plans for the development of the club and how they stand to benefit the City of Leeds on the whole. After all cost cutting and setting aside money for the buy back of our facilities, all money left over would be pumped into the team. The aim would be to spend 70% of turnover on players, with 55% set aside for wages and 15% for transfer fees. Depending on the amount of money available and the 10 year buy back plan, the amount of money set aside for the buy back plan and the amount of money set aside for the playing staff are both flexible. If the manager were to say "I can get us to the Premier League on £15 million" for example, there would be more money available to put into the buy back fund. If the team was running on an £18 million budget for the season (wage costs for the season plus any transfer fees paid) and the manger came to me in January and said "We've got a cracking team really going for promotion but there's one missing piece and he's going to cost us £1 million plus £10k a week", money would be moved from the buy back plan into the team budget. All players currently on short term contracts would have their contracts evaluated - this is something I would discuss with the manager. We would identify 3 categories - MUST keep, SHOULD keep, and let go. - MUST keep are your Snodgrasses, Howson and Gradels. These are the players that get the best contract offers. A policy of offering these players what we genuinely believe they are worth in today's market would be implemented immediately. The club would bend over backwards to ensure the player knows they are wanted by the club. A firm but generous approach would have to be carefully considered and employed - "We want to give you an offer you can't refuse" kind of deal. This would not mean offering the most the club can afford straight away - it would be about offering a generous, affordable deal that other clubs would be hard pressed to match. If demand comes in from other clubs and the player is swayed, the bar would be pushed higher until we've gone as far as we can afford and physically cannot push it any further - again, dependent on other factors such as how much an offer is worth to the club, a further more detailed evaluation of how much the player is worth to the club. It would be stupid to offer Robert Snodgrass £20k a week in the Championship if a club were offering £5 million for him, for example. - SHOULD keeps are players that should be offered good deals, again ones they can't refuse based on what it is reasonable to expect they would be offered by other clubs at the same level. They are ensured they are wanted by the club, offered generous offers that they'd have trouble refusing, again with a little wiggle room, but the limit of how far we'll go is less. If there is high demand for the player and the cost of keeping the player is disproportionate to the value of the player to the manager and the club, then the player would be encouraged to move on. The key is ensuring that the player knows they are wanted by the club, but there has to be a limit. I would put Adam Clayton in this bracket - while he has had a somewhat up and down season, he is a young player and the kind of player with promise that it's important to hold onto and develop. This is the kind of player that while they aren't at the level of a Snodgrass or a Gradel, they are important to keep hold of, but due to the "unfinished product" factor it is not worth the same to the club to push the boat out on wages. - Let go. Based on cost of player vs benefit to the playing staff. Danny Pugh is not worth £9k a week (on top of the £500k transfer fee) to be a squad utility player when he's as bad as he is. It is important to pay squad players decent money and make sure they are not far off the first team, because if you don't you just end up with crap in your squad, but Danny Pugh is far off the mark. Get rid. Even though Warnock clearly values him, I'd have to have assurances that he's worth the money we're paying for him and this would be a matter of discussion.
Transfer targets would be categorised similarly, something discussed with the manager. MUST gets, SHOULD gets and ONLY IF WE HAVE TO. - MUST gets get the same treatment as the MUST keeps. Make an offer they can't refuse - to club and player. Push it until it's going to cause financial concern for the club. Around £1.5 million would be the limit for a transfer fee of a player in this category. Wages should be offered in the same manner as MUST keeps, with the transfer fee considered. Club must send a message of "we want you to play for this club, no isn't an option". - SHOULD gets, again similar to SHOULD keeps. Make clubs and players offers they can't refuse, but if the demand is too high, don't push the boat out. Move on. - COULD gets. Good quality players that the manager wants, but we're not going to push the boat out to get them at all. The original offer should be generous but not in the same vein of "We won't take no for an answer". A delicate approach is required to ensure the message of "we want you to play for us, but we can only afford this much for where you fit in with our strategy" is properly communicated. Getting turned down by these players isn't a big deal as the manager should identify several of these, and many will be back ups in the event MUSTs and SHOULDs turn down our offers. A representative for one or more of the various supporters organisations would be immediately appointed to the board of directors. A substantial share in the club would be offered to an appropriate supporter run entity, most probably LUST, as the infrastructure for fan ownership through supporters trusts is already in place courtesy of the Football League and all the other Football related organisations. Preferably around the 20% region, but due to cost a smaller share might be preferable. Regardless of the initial size of the share, as a transitional measure I would ensure any share of the club owned by the trust would be treated with respect and any representation would be taken seriously and have a large say in the running of the club. This transitional measure would be provisional on the trust continuing to buy shares over a pre-negotiated but flexible time period. Accommodations would be made for the views of the fans as a whole during my tenure, regardless, but the shares would be to ensure the continued and inalienable contribution by the fans in the future, regardless of who else owns the club. I think that just about covers it.
Marko, your relentless doom & gloom offerings are tedious enough (we get it - do you get it that we get it??), but now you're entering into the world of conspiracy theory/fantasy. Think you need a long break. I know we do!
Actually what I've just read about ken bates basically confirms my worst fears that he goes ahead with terrible business decisions on the exact basis that I have outlined.
It will happen. Just it will cost so much that it will kill our chances of promotion for a long time.
Why would they do it when they're barely getting 25k? They're not stupid, they're successful businessmen. It won't happen till you can fill it. There is talk of increasing the KP to 45k when we're established in the PL (IF we get established)
No offence meant but could you fill 45,000? Were you sold out when you were last up? For us it is not about the capacity, its about bringing the ground up to Premiership standards for a future return.
The same argument could be aimed at us. Sounds just a touch arrogant. Is that right? How do you know? You sure we are not just spending money on infrastructure we don't own because someone else owns it and if the club spends on the upgrade, then the ground is worth more (to someone else)? But the cantilever stand will double the West Stand capscity minimum, so our capacity will be at least 45k to 50k. Our grounds 3 times too big for us?
It would be too big for us in the Championship, but to say it would be too big generally is pretty inaccurate IMO given we got 35-40k week in week out last time in the PL.
Simon - IMO, once people have left LUFC because of the level of prices, they will not return just because we get to the Prem. IMO, we will struggle to achieve 30,000 average in the Prem if we maintain our current pricing levels. I'm not going to say whether this is accurate or inaccurate because it is my opinion and is worthless until we see ourselves in the Prem under the same pricing structure
I have to agree and no offence to Leicester I couldn't see them ever filling a 45k seater stadium. We were selling out and hitting near capacity every home game last time we were in the premiership, IF we managed to establish ourselves again I would be amazed if we were not hitting at least 39k again so the extra 6k for big games should be a breeze.
It wouldn't surprise me if the Kop & South Stand were closed for the smaller (i.e. regular) crowds, and the more expensive East/West seats only made available. That would be a kick up the arse for the 'morons', love from Uncle Kenny.
We often sold out watching the same old **** when we were last in the PL. with the owners backing and a good squad we could sell 45k. We have a stupid amount of glory supporters who come out when it's rosy, not to mention we'd probably steal the glory supporters from other east midland clubs of our size who seem to be dwindling. If we went up next season we wouldn't fill 45k. But after a few years we could easily.
define "successful". Shaun Harvey has overseen more administrations than I've had hot dinners, and bates made all his millions from insolvent companies and syphoning money out of the country. They will do it, they are idiots.
And it's all well and good having a 45-50k seater stadium, but we're unlikely to fill it with the current pricing scheme and the "we don't want you here" attitude towards customers, and we'll never go up when football isn't the first priority of a football club.
How much money have they made between them? You're not under ownership of a football club the size of Leeds without being successful.
