Homepage Article Fan Advisory Board Statement On Price Rises

[davek]

The last few decades aren't especially relevant in a lot of cases. The landscape has completely changed.

The new breed of owners aren't local theatre impresarios or Christmas Hamper magnates. They're remote, removed and influenced only by the ongoing value and return on their investment.

The last guy went because he, and Uncle Uzzy, were financially done with the club due in part to global events and in part to his own incompetence - not because he was cowed by a graffitied bedsheet or lids squawking at Anthony Gordon's car.

Hicks and Gillett were forced out, Lerner was forced out, the Glazers were never accepted and eventually forced out.

The "landscape" will always remain the same in football: a struggle over those who own shares and those who see themselves as the real owners.

 

[Street end man]

Again, ill go back too...how do you know what the market is like if you haven't tested it?

They've set the price. If they have the worst ST sales for a decade, it'll get lowered. If they sell and we fill out HD every week...its working.

Totally agree with your sentiment re. testing the market but not really in this instance.
Why do they need to test this particular market?
As said by lads many times above the increase is but a drop in the ocean compared to the other revenue sources.
Yet it will be the straw that broke the camels back for some. Especially if they have a couple of kids in tow.
Why would Everton want any true fans to be priced out?....why even test it with a rise over inflation?
Coupled with the rejig of the family area it does seem they are confident those abandoned seats will be filled with big spending day trippers.
I personally think there's not a cat in hells chance of that happening.
Conference footie won't change that either.
As i keep saying they are hell bent on following utd's model yet the 2 clubs are leagues aparts in terms of pulling power....at present.
Too much too soon. They should walk before they can run. They are also creating a money divide amongst fans since the move which is horrible to see.

 

[davek]

Not just in price but in relation to demand. They've made it line up with same price as the RS - more so as we've a new facility. The Friedkin's would've looked and asked why aren't our prices the same as there's IF we're supposed to be a big club? Or we sticking in the same price bracket as Brighton, Forest etc.

As for squeezing out, its in related to how they operate. You don't go to a couple of games at United, they revoke your season ticket because theres a waiting list and they fill out OT. Which then leads to all clubs being their own ticket touts in their resale platform.

City aren't bothered who turns up if at all. Spurs/Arsenal - yes London but both moved stadiums and charged a premium.

I absolutely disagree with it, it should've been incremental rather than a full 12% if they were going to do it. But i also see why they've done it and not surprised.

They'll be looking to see how much they can get away with, without rocking the apple cart too much

They'd have known the answer to that: we're less successful and our support base are not the type that can easily stretch their budget to these sorts of prices they're charging now.

Yes, they'll look what thy can get away with. But that doesn't take away from the fact that this is cutting off your nose to spite your face. The supporters who are being asked to make a far greater contribution relatively speaking from their income than the owners are will know that the amount raised by the owner's price hike wont amount to a hill of beans in terms of making this club a success on the pitch and the resentment wont be buried any time soon.

It's probably the thickest decision from a commercial point of view that there's been at the club since the days of Wyness and Elstone giving away club food and drink and kit contracts for a bag of shiny nails. And I hope the fans utterly hammer them on not buying food and drink and programmes at the new stadium.

They were supposed to be hammering commercial partners to keep fan ticket costs down...they said that 5 weeks ago. But they hammered the fans instead...and they wont even acknowledge that by addressing the fans - and that makes them utter snide as well as being thick.

 

[mahermi1]

Hicks and Gillett were forced out, Lerner was forced out, the Glazers were never accepted and eventually forced out.

The "landscape" will always remain the same in football: a struggle over those who own shares and those who see themselves as the real owners.

Sure the Glazers still own the majority of Man United Dave.

 

[davek]

Sure the Glazers still own the majority of Man United Dave.

Didn't say they didn't...

 

[mahermi1]

Didn't say they didn't...

Sure you said the Glazers were forced out in you're post Dave..

 

[ClausThomsen]

Hicks and Gillett were forced out, Lerner was forced out, the Glazers were never accepted and eventually forced out.

The "landscape" will always remain the same in football: a struggle over those who own shares and those who see themselves as the real owners.

The Glazers are still majority shareholders aren't they? I know they sold a stake to Ratcliffe but the fellas who leveraged huge amounts of debt onto a world famous club are still drinking in the profits. All the yellow and green scarves in the world haven't altered that.

Lerner was arguably 'forced out' more by his disastrous decisions and cut his losses. I very much doubt he'd have been buckling and reluctantly selling under fan pressure if the finances were better for him personally.

H&G were forced out by the 2008 financial crash. There was a background of fan protests but it was very much the background and was in no way the primary mover in them selling - Royal Bank of Scotland and ultimately the High Court settled it as H&G still tried to block the sale to FSG at the last minute. Those aren't the actions of men running from fan power.

The only real top flight 'fan power' movement that could be argued the primary motivator in change in recent years was the protests against the European Super League and the Scab 6. Those were unified protests of a scale that would be hard to imagine being replicated over season ticket prices at a single club.

During those protests there were calls for owners to go. How many of those 6 clubs are under new ownership since then?

The fan groups won their battle (and good on them) and the owners scaled it down and found other ways to at least make the CL access ladder very slippery if they could no longer pull it up behind them.

 

[davek]

Sure you said the Glazers were forced out in you're post Dave..

You did, because I did say that.

They dont govern United though. They were forced to take a backseat because of their toxicity for fans.