Takeover update (3 Viewers)

[Nonleagueherewecome]

I can't dispute that it would help snoz, but where are these fans coming from? Particularly when we constantly serve up second rate entertainment. We've not been well supported for over three decades now and the average attendances are about 5,000 down on the highest season in that period when we had our honeymoon moment in the new stadium.

Even in the unlikley world that we can persuade some of these 5 or 6 game a season fans to expand to full time season ticket holders we would be generate not a massive upturn in finances. If they attend 5 games at £20 that's £100. Average season tickets are probably around £240 if we factor in concessions. That means £140 extra per person. So even if we get the full 5,000 that only equates to £740,000 extra on the season.

£740k is nice and would of course help, but lets not pretend it would help us have saved any of those players who have left or deter the board from accepting a bid one of our current better players when we are losing that £740k on average every two months.

I also think we need to accept that the gates are unlikely to increase any time soon. People won't be signing up to watch a struggling team, which based on a greatly weakened squad we could well be. If we'd kept/replaced King and strengthened the squad as promised, SISU could have maybe surfed the wave of good feeling that AT had generated. Christ, I even came on here praising the "New Openess" a few times. But I fear that ship has sailed with the ill-will generated since.

 

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[rob9872]

I can't dispute that it would help snoz, but where are these fans coming from? Particularly when we constantly serve up second rate entertainment. We've not been well supported for over three decades now and the average attendances are about 5,000 down on the highest season in that period when we had our honeymoon moment in the new stadium.

Even in the unlikley world that we can persuade some of these 5 or 6 game a season fans to expand to full time season ticket holders we would be generate not a massive upturn in finances. If they attend 5 games at £20 that's £100. Average season tickets are probably around £240 if we factor in concessions. That means £140 extra per person. So even if we get the full 5,000 that only equates to £740,000 extra on the season.

£740k is nice and would of course help, but lets not pretend it would help us have saved any of those players who have left or deter the board from accepting a bid one of our current better players when we are losing that £740k on average every two months.

Apologies all for my creative maths. The point is the same but I've just read it back and no ide where £740k came from it should be £700k only.

 

[TommyAtkins]

According to the club, another 9.500 season ticket sales would generate £3-4 million........

 

[cloughie]

another 9500 season ticket holders from where?

 

[TheSnoz]

By my reckoning, if 10, 000 'lukewarm' or stayaway fans decide they want to actually go and support their team on a regular basis - ie, every game. at £15 a ticket average. That is £150,000 a game. Over three million pounds a season. Surely that kind of money would help? In a city the size of Coventry surely that isn't too much to ask?
Sure, we haven't been supported for decades in the main. But the clamour from the absent fans is always for the club to do more. What with, a Tesco coupon and a piece of string? The Coventry football public, I'm convinced there is one, have got lazy. They want a good football team, but they don't play their part in making that happen. I'm talking about those that CHOOSE to stay away.
Imagine the difference a near full house at the Ricoh on a regular basis would make to our players. It would lift them. Jimmy Hill said, 'You can beat a team, but you'll rarely beat a team and a city.' With more fans turning up the picture would change dramatically.
Sadly a lot of people fold their arms, sit back back and say 'I'll come back when the manager/chairman/striker/goalie etc etc goes.'

 

[Il Pirata]

According to the club, another 9.500 season ticket sales would generate £3-4 million........

Plus perhaps push us past that figure (22,500?) per game in 'turn up on the day fans' when we start making some money from the stadium.

 

[BurbageSkyBlues]

Some of the maths is, understandably, a bit simplified - in order to make the point.

The amount of income from additional ST sales, will depend on which fans buy the STs. At present, we have about 60% of our fans with season tickets. The remainder of our gates are made up of the following:

Away fans
Occasional home fans
Regular home fans who cannot afford a season ticket (appreciate there are schemes to help ease this)
JSBs / concessionals

The biggest financial gain for the club, on a per-person basis, is the away fan. Each additional ticket is worth a lot more to the club.

5000 Leicester fans at £20 average is another £100K.
If (big IF) we get that for 15 home games, that's a cool £1.5M So it's clear why the club made such a sacrifice of an entire end of the ground. False economy in my opinion, so many times we have lost 'home advantage' to average or large away followings.

We are not likely to persuade non-attendees to buy a season ticket straight off, at best we will convert those who go to about 10-15 games a season, as this will be around the cleverly positioned break point for the cost of this years STs.

Unfortunately, it's a fact of life that people will wish to keep their options open. If we do not entertain people, with hope as well as style, they will prefer to wait and see, before choosing games to attend. People love excitement and atmosphere, the prospect of a big crowd generates more interest and so it becomes self-perpetuating.

The trick is in creating the initial inertia. Sadly, we don't seem to have the commitment from the existing owners, so we have to hope for good fortune with AT creating success on a shoestring.

We can't blame the Coventry public's lack of interest, given what has happened on the last decade, but we can feel let down by those who were so quick to walk away just a few games into our first season after relegation.

The issue now, is to capture the interest of a lost generation........a five year old in 2000 will now be fifteen, and has not seen top flight footie in sky blue. You cannot blame those (and their dads) for not being season ticket holders. The impetus has to come from within the club, consistently, to convince a sceptical public that we mean business for a whole season , not just a few games.

In AT we trust.......given the support!

 

[Nonleagueherewecome]

The problem is that they aren't that many "stayaway" fans. We were getting much bigger crowds on the back of the boost from The Ricoh opening than we got for much of our time in the top flight. The 80's was particularly dire-gates under 10,000 regularly, and the ground full of away fans in the home end for the big games.

A lot of it is that old story about many Cov families being from elsewhere originally. Even to this day, children of those generations often ending up supporting their parents team-which is usually a bigger side than ours anyway. Plenty of others look to the Birmingham & Black Country sides and the big 3 Premiership clubs.

I'm not saying we can't do it, as matches like Chelsea-and Leeds last season-show. The hunger for top flight football after so long away will probably see us get our best gates since Sir Jimmy-but only if you give them success on the pitch first.

 

[ccfc1973]

the thing is whenever we get a big crowd they normally play poorly and lose and those extra fans say "im not going to watch that rubbish again" and dont turn up till the next big game,
and alot of hardcore fans are now not bothering to go due to "groundhog season" .... new manager,new hope,start season well , mid season slump ,purple patch,slump ,just stay up then manager sacked!....and so it repeats again! although this season might be different for a change (i cant see us starting well or staying up)