It's an interesting subject. Population does give you potential but there are so many other factors that come in. Even where within your area the stadium is located can have an effect. Interestingly the population of Wolverhampton and Walsall are very similar but look at the difference in support of the clubs.
Some form of history, success or sustained hope of success is a very big factor. Particularly if you are surrounded by many other clubs which are historically more successful like with us and you could argue to a certain extent yourselves maybe.
Demographics play their part, I discussed the Asian market with our CEO a couple of years ago as a market we would dearly love to tap into but it's very difficult as there is a history of being more interested in other sports like cricket. We did try things, played a friendly against the Indian national team a few years back, had a young local Asian lad on the books coming through the youth system, have an Asian food company sponsoring our family stand and push the stadium venue for Asian events. As I say very difficult to crack though. They simply don't have a lot of role models within the game from their community in this country and the historic race hate issues from years gone by haven't helped this.
With football so expensive now, disposable income in the area plays a part particularly in the current economic climate.
Interestingly stadium location plays a part. Our stadium is located right on the border with Wednesbury which borders West Brom and falls in their catchment area. There is an agreement between clubs that they will not do promotional work within schools in other clubs areas. This means that although there is a school just in Wednesbury that you can actually see our stadium from we are not allowed to do any community work in it where as we can in schools right over the other sides of our area but those schools are actually geographically at least as near if not nearer to clubs like Wolves and Aston Villa and so they are more drawn to them.
When talking to our commercial director a while back he said that although our stadium is excellently placed to exploit commercial opportunities in footballing terms it's really in completely the wrong place to draw support from Walsall.
Population does offer potential but there are so many other factors it's not quite as simple as that.
Our one saving grace is that with our growing Polish population in the country we should be o.k, after all surely they should all be supporting Warsaw