Fans' Forum

[m a hill]

Yes it was worthwhile but it did get a bit out off towards the end but give steve his due he answered most Questions

[KES80]

Hopefully that's a sound (if belated) business decision to connect more with the fans, encourage more through the gate, improve The Walks atmosphere and ultimately increase gate revenue.

(It is a significant drop in admission fee.......at this time of night I am not fully sure what to make of it and the full implications.......)

[Kevin Holland]

It's a good move. The right thing to do.

Watch what happens when you start behaving like a decent club.

[northwootton]

I’m keen to hear all the positives that came out of last night’s meeting.
On twitter, Cleeve says reduced prices only apply to Grade B games, Grade A games are existing prices.
From Mr Hill’s posting I assumed all prices had been reduced!!

[Blue_and_Gold]

I’m keen to hear all the positives that came out of last night’s meeting.
On twitter, Cleeve says reduced prices only apply to Grade B games, Grade A games are existing prices.
From Mr Hill’s posting I assumed all prices had been reduced!!

Thanks North.

Is that different than what was said at last night's meeting?

Personally I can see the reason behind that (not that I think its the right thing to do) but yet again we see the same old issue of poor/lack of communication.

Presumably, if Southend and Chesterfield had not already visited, they would be Cat A as well. 

Cat A games are Wrexham, Notts County, Stockport, and Grimsby.

So that woukd be 6 Cat A games.

I can't see that helping to attract the casual/fair weather supporter, as the reduction appears to  only apply to games that they are probably not interested in irrespective of pricing.   

Difficult one to assess  really. Maybe a smaller reduction, but across all games would have been better. 

[TonyM]

Apologies for the delay, time and Parkrun wait for no man!  Sorry, what was meant to be summary on last nights event as turned into War and Peace.  Hopefully 'what was said' not 'what I thought'

A good attendance (around 50ish), listened to SC explain that last year was 'a disaster' and whilst IC wanted to stop and SC thought the £50k fine would have a better option but that the twelve point deduction would have meant relegation this year

Moving onto the current season, SC accepted that the club hadn't kept pace off the pitch with on it.  Catering 'not great' and on SC's 'to do list'.  New CEO David Hutchinson is full-time, although won't be based at the Walks and is looking at 'bigger projects' and longer term plans, so there will be another appointment to deal with local opportunities.  Still obviously has issues with the council / Alive Leisure re training facilities and talked about the option of going to West Lynn but agreement couldn't be reached (this got a little bit he said / she said with a member of the audience and so the meeting moved onto the Q&A)

I won't list all, as some were pretty specific / individual but this is a flavour of the questions
Q - Why no media, won't build friends.  A - Don't have friends in media and praised Reg and his team from KES who were there

Q - Was it £1000 for a burger van.  A - No, but it was £1000 for 'catering'

Q - Season ticket price can't be justified compared to NCFC.  A - Pricing is difficult and SC was concerned that a large number of season tickets @ (say) £250 would mean just over £10 per game which isn't enough to run the club.

This then opened up to a wider debate on pricing with SC admitting 'I have made a mistake’, particularly with the kids pricing.  ‘Big games’ come with bigger costs (security) and basically that needs to be paid for so SC was worried that lots of kids in the seats would mean a lower income figure than if those seats were sold to adults.  Now obvious that for the smaller games there is enough space so pricing will be adjusted.  It got a little chaotic with exactly what was being proposed but I think we are going to a category system with £3 off across the range of prices for the non-‘big games’ and possibly something else for kids sitting down so let’s wait and see what comes out of the club in the run up to the Barnet game. 

Q – How much does it cost to run this season.  A – Obviously difficult to say depending on trips etc but ballpark figure of £80K was mentioned.  Lots of costs to going full time, not just players wages – training pitch was again brought up, plus we now have a full time physio and full time analyst.  Only time will tell if going full time was the right decision.  Current (external) loans – Bounce Back £50K which we have started to repay, £430K Sport England which repayments don’t start for another four years but then its £4-5K per month

Q – Money for new striker (from Robbie Back).  A – depends on crowds
Q – Is the club sustainable at NL level.  A – Not on current crowds.  Discussion around what people really want
Q – Why 2 year contracts.  A- Only way to get some players, also anyone we paid a fee for automatically on a two year deal to ‘protect’ the investment.  Some first team players are on one year deals

[TonyM]

A few personal thoughts on last nights meeting. 

Fair dues for SC for holding such a meeting, no-one likes admitting their mistakes in public but he did so and has tried to address it with the price deduction for the lesser games, I guess he now has to wait and see if those who did cite the price as the reason for not going respond. 

I think he is starting to appreciate that the club can't be run by him and a bunch of volunteers and expertise needs to be brought in on a number of fronts, catering being the most prominently mentioned last night but my guess is that there are plenty more areas where this applies.  Whether he can attract and retain the right people and the club can afford them is a whole different story

Whilst I don't think the meeting and the price reduction have solved everything, I hope the big takeaway from last nights meeting is that, in the most part, fans were prepared to listen to SC explain his reasoning for decisions and are maybe more realistic than SC himself about the clubs 'natural' position in the footballing world.

[Mallard]

The 80k figure Tony, is that meant to be 800k ?

How does Bigger crowds equate to costing more per head ?  Just by adding security

[TonyM]

The 80k figure Tony, is that meant to be 800k ?

How does Bigger crowds equate to costing more per head ?  Just by adding security

Mall, apologies the £80K was monthly.

The big crowd issue was twofold - higher security requirement so increased cost and also linked into the issue of the pricing for child seats in the main stand.  Basically if the club 'could' sell all those seats at adult prices then it would be losing out if it heavily discounted those seats for children as there is only a finite number of seats available.  I suppose as we have come up the leagues the seating at the Walks, except for a very few 'big' games has always been big enough to cope so people have got used to that and now that is no longer the case (for example when Southend visited) you can understand why SC wants to maximise his income from those seats.  Hopefully the Category structure will accommodate both views

[Mallard]

Difficult to know what to believe with SC.  Maybe he forgets what he says.  On a podcast of his he claimed the running costs of the Club were in excess of a 100k per month.   Now we are full time the cost has dropped 20%.   

[Blue_and_Gold]

Difficult to know what to believe with SC.  Maybe he forgets what he says.  On a podcast of his he claimed the running costs of the Club were in excess of a 100k per month.   Now we are full time the cost has dropped 20%.

Mark Hearle must have been on one hell of a salary!   

[Mallard]

Like Tony I feel it’s a big plus that SC has seen the error of his ways and has finally pushed the doors open to welcome and indeed embrace some public debate into the running of the club.   Shame it’s taken all these years for him to get to this point.   That however is being negative and the  direction  to look is forwards.

The ‘employing’ of a full time Commercial Director is a massive commitment especially when he will be based away from the area.  We have had so many false dawns on this particular subject, so pardon me for being a little reserved on this appointment.

I hope SC will now seek further help with regard to people sticking money into the club and who knows maybe he will put a phone call into The Trust and offer the pipe of peace to see if there is a way forward in this area.   To my mind SC cannot afford to refuse any area of help and expertise to keep the club sailing.

Was there any mention of a back up meeting/forum to this one ?

[Mallard]

Difficult to know what to believe with SC.  Maybe he forgets what he says.  On a podcast of his he claimed the running costs of the Club were in excess of a 100k per month.   Now we are full time the cost has dropped 20%.

Mark Hearle must have been on one hell of a salary!   

Quality doesn’t come cheap.

[gs50]

Is it right that David Hutchinson is the CEO and not Commercial Director.Does this  mean he is taking on the management of the club.

[m a hill]

Well done Tony I don’t think you missed much out,and it takes a big man to admit he was wrong ,mallard there was no mention of further meetings but I believe there will be