jonnyl@tic Posted May 8, 2008 Share Posted May 8, 2008 ATHLETIC’S owners have reacted with “huge disappointment” after seeing a major fall in crowds at Boundary Park. Last season’s average league gate plummeted by 16 per cent – or just over 1,000 fans per game – and cost the club an estimated £345,000 in revenue. The average attendance was 5,327, compared with 6,334 the previous year, and was the lowest since season 2000/2001. Managing director Simon Corney warned that he and his fellow owners were not a bottomless pit of cash and, as such, they may need to look at the manager’s budget. He said: “We will stem the flow and keep the team competitive, but there comes a point when you can’t swim against the tide any longer. “I don’t want people thinking we’ll walk away – that definitely won’t happen – but we’ve always said we are custodians of the club with a finite amount of money to spend. “There is a superb hard core of fans, but you can’t support a League One club on the basis of 3,500 people being loyal. “You’ve got to ask whether Oldham can sustain a League One club – do the people want to come here and give us the help we need? “I hear various reasons for people not coming to games but, to be honest, I think most of them are easy excuses. “We’ve tried everything to get more fans into the ground and these schemes don’t seem to work, which is also the case at most other clubs. “We certainly aren’t alone in having a fall in crowds and, whatever the reason might be, it seems to be a deteriorating operation at this level. “There’s so much football on television and it’s very hard to compete – you get Tuesday nights when we are at home to Hartlepool and Manchester United are playing Milan. “What can we do? We froze our ticket prices last year, saw crowds go down significantly and then froze them again for next season. “We aren’t an unlimited pot of money and we can’t do that for ever, so maybe we’ll have to cut our cloth accordingly. “It’s a huge disappointment which impacts on the manager’s budget because if we lose 1,000 people per game, we lose around £345,000 over the season. “I think we have the biggest budget in our league in relation to crowds and – although we’ll keep spending money and we recognise that football isn’t cheap to watch – you need a bit of help when you are trying to build a Championship team.” Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
OldhamSheridan Posted May 8, 2008 Share Posted May 8, 2008 That's just crazy talk!! Man Utd were playing Lyon. Arsenal were playing Milan. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Macca Posted May 8, 2008 Share Posted May 8, 2008 Schemes don't work, they might do for a specific game but they are just used to watch the football on the cheap. What the club don't do enough is to actively promote the games. Yeah they're advertised on here, on the website and in the chron but that's it really. If you aren't a big latics fan would you really be looking at the club website etc? Most likely no. We have a ticket office at the ground but we have no presence in the town centre at all, that's something I feel we really need, even if for starters its just on matchdays with a few people promoting the game and selling tickets to people there. The club are doing everything they can really regarding ticket prices but they aren't selling the club well. We're beconing hopefully on a great season this would be a perfect time to start promoting the club better. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MaskedOwl Posted May 8, 2008 Share Posted May 8, 2008 where is that from? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NIKI1234 Posted May 8, 2008 Share Posted May 8, 2008 Corney in shock throw dummy out the pram rant Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
oafc0000 Posted May 8, 2008 Share Posted May 8, 2008 Schemes don't work, they might do for a specific game but they are just used to watch the football on the cheap. What the club don't do enough is to actively promote the games. Yeah they're advertised on here, on the website and in the chron but that's it really. If you aren't a big latics fan would you really be looking at the club website etc? Most likely no. We have a ticket office at the ground but we have no presence in the town centre at all, that's something I feel we really need, even if for starters its just on matchdays with a few people promoting the game and selling tickets to people there. The club are doing everything they can really regarding ticket prices but they aren't selling the club well. We're beconing hopefully on a great season this would be a perfect time to start promoting the club better. Problem is promoting the club costs money....alot of money... We used to have a town centre shop for a while but it didnt justifie its existence and closed..... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Davros Posted May 8, 2008 Share Posted May 8, 2008 That's just crazy talk!! Man Utd were playing Lyon. Arsenal were playing Milan. LOL! Some of the TTA comments are waring a bit thin!! Low attendances is what you get with a mid table mediocre season!! The real reason fans have been abandoning ship is because of cr*p performances like the northampton home match, hartlepool away, port vale at home to name but a few... Yup performances like that dont phase the die hard fans but how can they expect for people to turn up and watch some of the gash on offer at bp this season, I feel this coment has come 6 months too late and aimed at fans instead of players... I have been to the majority of home games this season but iv come out of most of them thinking why do i bother!!! Its a fact people will only turn up when there is something on the line which is sad but true! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Markoasis Posted May 8, 2008 Share Posted May 8, 2008 To have the season we had last year and to only average 6,500 would be more worrying to me that this years figures. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
OldhamSheridan Posted May 8, 2008 Share Posted May 8, 2008 I feel this comment has come 6 months too late and aimed at fans instead of players. Absolutely spot on. I'd rather they cut back on the playing wages that fit a team our size rather than constantly harping on about how much money they are losing. It isn't going to go away. The crowds aren't going to increase by any great deal. It's tough, but cut your cloth accordingly. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Macca Posted May 8, 2008 Share Posted May 8, 2008 Problem is promoting the club costs money....alot of money... We used to have a town centre shop for a while but it didnt justifie its existence and closed..... I can see some media advertising is gonna cost a fortune and not get many more supporters through the gates. I agree waste of money. What's wrong with a few posters in the town centre, I see nothing at all about upcoming games when I'm there, how much would that cost? Maybe a club shop wouldn't be good business either but why not hire a few temps, get them in town promoting the game and get some tickets sold there, use the chrons newspaper stand near TJ Hughes, again something that wouldn't need to cost a fortune but I'm sure would get many more tickets sold and attendances higher. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NIKI1234 Posted May 8, 2008 Share Posted May 8, 2008 (edited) Problem is promoting the club costs money....alot of money... We used to have a town centre shop for a while but it didnt justifie its existence and closed..... Sometimes you need to speculate to accumalate!!!! Down here if you go shopping in Milton Keynes town centre there are attractive young females badgering shoppers to buy MK DONS tickets..... I guess they are commision based and if they dont sell they dont get paid...... Whats the harm in trying that in Spindles As somebody has mentioned many times on here, spend a bit of money on a big Bill Board at the top of Sheepfoot lane advertising up and coming matches Have the club send out email promotions to their database of recorded supporters promoting up and coming games These sort of things are not going to break the bank and might pay for themselves Finally and most crucial, get the performances right on the pitch and people will come. To many games this season have been non events and to be honest if I was a pay on the day floater I would not have been encouraged to return on many occasions between August and March Edited May 8, 2008 by NIKI1234 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BigfinLatic Posted May 8, 2008 Share Posted May 8, 2008 Ah well... at least i like the sound of the last sentence! “I think we have the biggest budget in our league in relation to crowds and – although we’ll keep spending money and we recognise that football isn’t cheap to watch – you need a bit of help when you are trying to build a Championship team.” As mark says above, its chicken and the egg... if we were top 6, we would get an extra 500-1000 easy, and I also bet that figure includes the playoff crowd from last year... There is alsoa simpler solution... keep our players fit and on the pitch and you wont have to pay for new ones - easy! We stay top 6 and everyones happy... As is also said, we have heard all this before, its wearing thin.. we just need to get the product right on the pitch and we will get to the 6k mark - confident on that.. any more and I would be surprised... and we might scrape 7k in the champ... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Macca Posted May 8, 2008 Share Posted May 8, 2008 Absolutely spot on. I'd rather they cut back on the playing wages that fit a team our size rather than constantly harping on about how much money they are losing. It isn't going to go away. The crowds aren't going to increase by any great deal. It's tough, but cut your cloth accordingly. A lot of fans will be moaning though when we aren't doing as well next season because the budgets were cut. If we had got an extra thousand through the gates we would have broken even this year by the sounds of it. Although yeah they shouldn't be surprised attendances fell after the bad start we had to the season. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Macca Posted May 8, 2008 Share Posted May 8, 2008 Sometimes you need to speculate to accumalate!!!! Down here if you go shopping in Milton Keynes town centre there are attractive young females badgering shoppers to buy MK DONS tickets..... I guess they are commision based and if they dont sell they dont get paid...... Whats the harm in trying that in Spindles As somebody has mentioned many times on here, spend a bit of money on a big Bill Board at the top of Sheepfoot lane advertising up and coming matches Have the club send out email promotions to their database of recorded supporters promoting up and coming games These sort of things are not going to break the bank and might pay for themselves Finally and most crucial, get the performances right on the pitch and people will come. To many games this season have been non events and to be honest if I was a pay on the day punter floater I would nave been encouraged to return on many occasions between August and March Exactly what I am on about! Stay away fans need to be encouraged and they aren't being at the moment. If they want more fans when success isn't there then they need to start doing this. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BigfinLatic Posted May 8, 2008 Share Posted May 8, 2008 Sometimes you need to speculate to accumalate!!!! Down here if you go shopping in Milton Keynes town centre there are attractive young females badgering shoppers to buy MK DONS tickets..... I guess they are commision based and if they dont sell they dont get paid...... Whats the harm in trying that in Spindles The harm.. or rather the problem is that you would have to find some attractive young females in Oldham.. It just wouldnt work... its still new and exciting with a new and exciting team playing in a new and exciting ground.... get scholesy in and build the stadium, then put an england legend in charge and we might have a shot! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NIKI1234 Posted May 8, 2008 Share Posted May 8, 2008 (edited) It just wouldnt work... its still new and exciting with a new and exciting team playing in a new and exciting ground.... get scholesy in and build the stadium, then put an england legend in charge and we might have a shot! I see your point but they have been doing this since the move in 2004 and It was not very exciting when they were playing in the Hockey stadium with two open air golf stands and fighting relegation..... I guess the past year will have been a lot easier for them now they are getting over 10K a week but you cant walk through the town without seeing various promotions Edited May 8, 2008 by NIKI1234 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
laticsmad Posted May 8, 2008 Share Posted May 8, 2008 Ah well... at least i like the sound of the last sentence! As mark says above, its chicken and the egg... if we were top 6, we would get an extra 500-1000 easy, and I also bet that figure includes the playoff crowd from last year... There is alsoa simpler solution... keep our players fit and on the pitch and you wont have to pay for new ones - easy! We stay top 6 and everyones happy... As is also said, we have heard all this before, its wearing thin.. we just need to get the product right on the pitch and we will get to the 6k mark - confident on that.. any more and I would be surprised... and we might scrape 7k in the champ... Agree with all you say except if we did get into the champiuonship I do feel 8-10k would be achievable on a regular basis due to the increased interest of home supports and the bigger away following that we would certainly achieve. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BigfinLatic Posted May 8, 2008 Share Posted May 8, 2008 I see your point but they have been doing this since the move in 2004 and It was not very exciting then when they were playing in the Hockey stadium with two open air golf stands and fighting relegation..... I guess the past year is a lot easier for them now they are getting over 10K a week but you cant walk through the town without seeing various promotions oh, dont get me wrong I totally agree with you, its just easier when you have something to bring to the market... at least when they moved it was 'new' .. then they got 'good' then they got a 'new ground'. . suddenly when they have a new good team with a new ground they are rolling through the doors... be interesting to see what happens if they get battered next year... but I doubt they will... You definitely make someinteresting points, and hopefully with the high points of a promoted/promotion chasing team with a swanky new stand, people might come back... and the club might shout about how great it is to watch oldham again... Somehow I doubt it though again... the problem is that the TTA are great salesman, and salesman inherently dont understand marketing... they feel if you shout load enough things will happen, and get annoyed when they dont... and this is exactly what is happening now.... it i no surprise that when the club had the biggest buzz about it we had a real marketer at the club - Sean Jarvis... love him or hate him he knew exactly wha he was doing - fair enough he had cash, but the marketing activity the club is doing now is pitiful... anyone can see that... from what i know the marketing/sales department is all about how much corporate sponsorship they can get, rather thna bringing the club to the fans... its a whole different ball game, and quite frankly the club are pathetic at this... .. and before anyone says, do I think I could do a better job - Yes I bloody could! I know I could.. even if it was me on the streets handing out flyers! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NIKI1234 Posted May 8, 2008 Share Posted May 8, 2008 (edited) A very silly badly timed pram rant Simon...... Timing is everything.... Will this encourage those who hesitate to pay up in front for an ST? Don't think so myself. Getting players of right quality signed up now for July just might. Simon mentions excuses but this is just don't expect a decent crop of signings rant, honest maybe, ill timed certainly! IF Shez is going to have a further reduced budget the optimism amongst the hard core will be tested sadly. To be quite honest whilst I appreciate everything TTA have done for the club I am sick of Corney and his negative whining! I dont see what he is trying to achieve with those comments apart from alienate the same supporters that he is trying to win over Edited May 8, 2008 by NIKI1234 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jsslatic Posted May 8, 2008 Share Posted May 8, 2008 (edited) Schemes don't work, they might do for a specific game but they are just used to watch the football on the cheap. What the club don't do enough is to actively promote the games. Yeah they're advertised on here, on the website and in the chron but that's it really. If you aren't a big latics fan would you really be looking at the club website etc? Most likely no. We have a ticket office at the ground but we have no presence in the town centre at all, that's something I feel we really need, even if for starters its just on matchdays with a few people promoting the game and selling tickets to people there. The club are doing everything they can really regarding ticket prices but they aren't selling the club well. We're beconing hopefully on a great season this would be a perfect time to start promoting the club better. I'll second that about schemes. Let's take a non-Tics related example. Notts County for the last couple of home games offered a scheme...they gave the Kop (where the away fans sit) to the home fans and charged a fiver to get in. They got big crowds, won their two games, and stayed up. I went along for the second game against Wycombe. It was a quality atmosphere, nice day, decent football (albeit played by the away team). Would I go again? No, not at full price. I may go to a couple of games next year if I'm at a loose end, but that's it. I saw my uncle recently, who lives in Notts, and took his lad to the Accy game (the first £5 game)...I asked if he enjoyed it, yes he did. Would he go again at full price, no. And there lies the problem. Gates would go up if we dramatically cut prices. But the point isn't that fans have left in their droves and have 'forgotten' about how great live football is...they'll come back when it's cheap. And when it's not, then they stay away, regardless of the enjoyment level. It's only the diehards that remain...us muppets who pay a ridiculous amount to watch out club all over the country, and the guys at Colchester who are paying £598 next year to watch L1 football. It's a big problem for TTA, the long and short of it is that it's just too expensive. It's not their fault that ticket prices across the country are soaring, and they were high well before TTA arrived. But the only way the crowds will pick up significantly is if the prices are halved, even success on-the-field would only add another couple of thousand onto the gate. They'd probably bring in about the same amount of money, as the gates would probably double, plus they'd have extras buying food, programmes etc. If I was them I'd do it, SC throwing his toys out of the pram again doesn't help. He can't guilt the casuals into coming to BP, there needs to be a price cut if they want to dramatically improve gates. One off £2 games etc don't bring people back for life, it just gives them the chance to finally, for one afternoon, be able to afford the pleasure that they've been gradually priced out of. Edited May 8, 2008 by jsslatic Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
chaddy the owl Posted May 8, 2008 Share Posted May 8, 2008 Will be interesting to see how many STs Udders sell at £100 a time as a hook. Up to last Tuesday they had sold over 8000 and i think they had only been on sale a week. A lot of people are saying they will buy them in a week or two. They are expecting to sell about 18000 at least from what i was told. They are not all £100 per season ticket, that is for certain seats. They range from £100 to about £175 in the best seats. I still thinks its a big chance for the club to take. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BigfinLatic Posted May 8, 2008 Share Posted May 8, 2008 (edited) And there lies the problem. Gates would go up if we dramatically cut prices. But the point isn't that fans have left in their droves and have 'forgotten' about how great live football is...they'll come back when it's cheap. And when it's not, then they stay away, regardless of the enjoyment level. It's only the diehards that remain...us muppets who pay a ridiculous amount to watch out club all over the country, and the guys at Colchester who are paying £598 next year to watch L1 football. I think this is a great post, but I still dotn quite buy the fact that if you give a good product, that fans wouldnt come back.... clubs have done it very well recently, such as Blackpool, Bizzle City, even swansea this year (take out the kids incentive)... all these teams dramatically increased the attendances by playing some fantastic football at our level... i'll say this once and once only - but I would have paid to have watched blackpool last year, they were sensational, because they got the right mix of players, and luck with injuries... and hey presto... I think fans are more fickle than you think.. suddenly if the few kids at school/college/workers at workplace go in week in week out saying how great latics are, we would see 1500 on the gate easy... fans havent forgotten how good live football is, they ahve forgotten how live football is watching Oldham... for example in the winning away streak, i couldnt wait to get to each match, whereas the fans at home were deserting in droves... Playing attractive, winning football, at home is the only way to bring people back.... as you rightly say sod price schemes... but getting a good product, marketing that, and getting word of mouth going is the only way to get fans back... Edited May 8, 2008 by BigfinLatic Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
help_shiny Posted May 8, 2008 Share Posted May 8, 2008 Bradford's ST's are dirt dirt cheap and they're making their first profit in 8 years. They've got big crowds, a real buzz about the city, are selling lots more merchandise and all this for a bog standard Division 4 team. Mr Corney - or anyone else at Latcis - if you are reading this please go out and buy - VEECK AS IN WRECK - I was considering sending it to you a year ago when we allegedly 'couldnt' sell out enough tickets for the home playoff. http://www.amazon.co.uk/Veeck-Wreck-Autobi...6423&sr=8-1 You have got to go out and sell the club, they arent going to come to you - go to them. Without a famous cup run or a promotion the crowds arent going to rocket unless you proactively do something about them. Read that book and if you come away without any ideas as to how to sell a sports club to people then I'd be very very surprised. There are a million and one ways to go about raising the profile of the club - we do next to nowt. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rudemedic Posted May 8, 2008 Share Posted May 8, 2008 (edited) Marketing Oldham when City have had a great season, Rochdale have done well and United are in a close race for the title and are in the final of the European Cup is not easy. Plus FC united still get a fair few through their gates and have loads of schemes to get more. I'm not saying to do this but what would those fans of City and United do on a saturday at 3 o'clock if they weren't watching their team illegally on TV in various pubs and clubs around Greater Manchester (it wouldn't take much to get this stopped). Some might go watch Oldham if it was cheap enough. Selling cheap season tickets might work but only if you have enough fans that buy the extra and bear in mind our home capacity next season will be at most 9,500 ('have' to leave 1,500 for the away fans and we don't have the Lookers stand) if you were to half the season ticket prices you'd have to get twice as many people to buy them to make more money. Realistically due to our reduced capacity we can't reduce prices for season tickets, however, if say both United and City were not playing at home when we were we might tempt in a few with some cheaper seats and some decent promotion. I've said this before that if we want to promote ourselves seriously we need to do more than post some adverts than in the Chron as a lot of people who live close enough to be tempted to go watch Oldham don't read the Chron (its very hard to get outside Oldham) and they wouldn't go and read our website either. What the club needs is for Leeds and Rochdale to both be in our divison next season as I can't see us getting big away crowds with the other teams (now that Forest and Swansea have both left). Our average gate was down this year compared to last but with a big gate for Leeds and a cup game against Hudders with a full ground this is down primarily to the fact that realisitcally our season was over way before it should have been and we were never really in a shout for automatic promotion only an outside chance of the play-offs. Oldham playing well at home scoring goals and playing entertaining football doing well in the league does wonders for the attendance (see Rochdale this season as I'm sure a lot of floating fans starting watching them instead of us). If it was a case of us or Leeds for something next season we might not even need a gimic as I'd wager we'd get a few 'united fans' coming to support Oldham because they don't like Leeds that much. Edited May 8, 2008 by rudemedic Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LaticsPete Posted May 8, 2008 Share Posted May 8, 2008 (edited) To be quite honest whilst I appreciate everything TTA have done for the club I am sick of Corney and his negative whining! I dont see what he is trying to achieve with those comments apart from alienate the same supporters that he is trying to win over Sick as in glad to see the back of him? Or will you put up with your "sick" as long as he is , along with the other two, putting hundreds of thousands of pounds into our cl;ub? A couple of points: A) we don't know if this is a statement issued or a response to a question. B. Negative whining! Let's ignore the positive like statements about not walking away, money for the team every year, plans for improving the ground, etc etc. I'd hate to see your response to someone who didn't do anything for the club1 He's part owner of a club that has had little backing from the community whether formally, as in the council, or informally as in the paying public. If that's not disappointing then what is? Uncomfortable it may be, but his statement is fair. Too many people in Oldham look for an excuse not too come to Bp. I accept that means the club (and us the hard core supporters) have to work as hard as we can to get them to turn up , but if SC wants to wring his hands every so often , fair play to him. I see that according to the unscientific poll on here about 12% of ST holders are saying they won't renew . What do they want? A guarantee of promotion? Edited May 8, 2008 by LaticsPete Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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