On the latest Express & Star Walsall podcast, Joe Masi discusses the cheap season tickets thst Bradford offer their fans and how successful the scheme has been. Joe said he has asked Walsall about it before and they said they considered it but don’t think they would make enough money. Do you agree?
If season tickets were set at says £120 - 150 quid I know at least 4 current non season ticket holders that would get one.
Although I would welcome such a move I don’t think it tackles the key issue; getting the floating/casual fans through the door. To do that requires cheaper tickets for single matches, especially for under 18’s. Fill the place out for a couple of seasons, then worry about converting those folks into season ticket holders.
As someone who hasn’t had a season ticket for the last few seasons now I would definitely get one at that price - I can’t make it to every game of the season but that would more than cover the cost of the games I did get to
But I have to agree with @sirraygraydon, although it would certainly boost numbers in the stadium, think the club wouldn’t sell as much as they need to break even with current ST sales
There are two points I have picked up;
There are approx. 2,000 season ticket holders at an average of say £250? that’s £500k. In order to make it financially viable at £150 we would need an additional 1,500 (ish) ST holders - that’s a big ask. We all know the grey mullet man upstairs isn’t going to subsidise that.
Reducing the cost of tickets is interesting, if you made them £15/game that would equal the price of my ST in the middle.
The issue with significantly reducing season ticket prices is that the club insist that sales contribute directly to the playing budget. So in order to reduce prices in an effort to increase attendances the club would have to subsidise any potential budget shortfall for the first few seasons. This could perhaps be facilitated by a £400,000 rent break for a few years, but we all know that wont happen.
That would be the ideal scenario - the whole 400k isn’t going to happen but if JB would agree to subsidise the losses from the rent for a couple years (say 100k) to experiment with cheaper ST it would have success and get more bums on seats which would also give them extra revenue from food/bar sales
Exactly. The football side suffering as a result of trying to increase crowds would be counter-productive. Bit like losing 5-0 on a day we give away 1,000 free school tickets.
Don’t you have to speculate to accumulate in business? The board could announce a two season trial period with the right to revert back to the old pricing structure if it didn’t succeed / the club were losing money.
It needs to be a compromise. Tickets need to be cheaper… but not as cheap as some of the ridiculous prices I’ve seen some fans demand.
We’re not competitive pricing wise with other local clubs and that’s made worse by us being in a lower division, playing worse football and barely anything being invested back in the team. The perception of us having no ambition also affects this. It’s not attractive to the floating fan or prospective new fans.
If individual match tickets are lowered it will mean season tickets need to be lowered too. The lure of the season ticket is that you’re getting a discount on games across the season. If you take that away it will impact on season ticket sales and be counterproductive.
The first step can be to lower Under 18 prices to below the pricing point of other local clubs. No signing up to Swifty’s special Gary Glitter club or any other nonsense. Make it attractive for the adults to come as a family.
Personally I wouldn’t accept a FREE season ticket under the current ownership
Hartlepool had a scheme a number of seasons ago where the seasons tickets got cheaper the more that had brought one - the reduction in the price of the season ticket would then make it easier for the club to reduce match day prices accordingly.
At the minute i would not commit to a season ticket as i miss too many matches - however if the price was reduced i may consider making more of an effort to make the ones where i wouldnt normally go
One issue is that the vast majority of the additional 1500 will be attending some matches anyway.
For example, if they were attending an average of 8 games x £22 per game then that leaves the club £264k in the hole to start with.
I can understand why the club won’t do this. In my view it is not the price of season tickets per se that is the problem.
I’d definitely buy one at that price point. As others have said, it makes the hit of missing a game(s) more bearable.
Also it would surely afford more opportunities for those ST holders to bring additional people with them at various points throughout the season. Plus, playing infront of an extra 1,000 - 1,500 fans every other week must be more appealing to the players.