Ticket Pricing, Empty Seats, Box & Club Level Empties

[begeegs]

Said it for ages, the clubs are shooting themselves in the foot by turning their backs on their loyal supporters in favour of chasing the more "desirable" supporters. Don't get me wrong, a lot of the lads who can afford the £1,000+ season cards will be good supporters but many more won't be and their numbers will drop off rapidly the longer the "drought" at Arsenal continues. All clubs will get it, they'll get fans who are sucked in by the Sky hype, they'll fleece them whilst disregarding their real supporter base and when the Sky brigade move onto the next "in thing" the clubs will find that a lot of their traditional supporters have fucked it off in favour of the pub and won't be back as the "match day experience" has become a watered down, plastic version of its old self. The bubble will burst and the clubs will regret their short term profiteering, alas many of the people involved in it now will have already lined their pockets enough not to give a fuck.

I agree with this. To me, it is really very short sighted indeed. If you turn your back on the real supporters, then you are essentially catering (apologies if this has already been stated, but it's early and I am severely caffeinated ) to the fan who who could potentially be very fickle and turn their back on the club once their fortunes decline. In fact, I think that we may be seeing the start of this right now at Arsenal.

[hugh jardon]

I cannot see the bubble bursting, only getting more expensive as demand continues to grow.

The clubs don't care about keeping their traditional fanbase. All prem clubs use twitter, Facebook, marketing emails etc to make them easily accessible to non regular match goers and allowing anybody interested to make themselves feel like a part of the club or think they are a true fan.

Just now I have overheard two colleagues in conversation, one has memberships and attends games at BOTH Chelsea and Man Utd! He said his Man U v Real Madrid tickets cost £50 but he'd willingly pay £100 per ticket! Whilst the other "thinks" he is a member at Man Utd, though he's "Not sure if I'm a member but they keep sending me emails about tickets". Laughable but this is the modern day fan and I'm certain Arsenal have thousands similar.

We are also encountering the first of The Sky Sports Generation, fans who have grown up predominently watching football from the convenience of Sky TV rather than have the experience of going to the game handed down from father to son that cements an unbreakable emotional attachment to the club and attending games.

The occasional game going to general sale makes little difference. The top clubs have massively increased their fanbases and prices. People can probably no longer afford to go so regularly but there are so many members going to just a few games each that the demand is still there.

[Top Londoner]

Agree with comments made by safcftm and hugh j.
Talk shite had a phone in on the subject last night. Plenty of irate supporters, with exactly the same scenarios from any PL club you wish to mention. Supporters are a commodity, simples.
It cannot last, especially in this economic climate.

[BedfordshireGooner]

Usually go to around 90% of home matches a season, and as many aways as I can afford. As a silver member i'd usually find myself booked up around 2 months in advance of games, Man City was the last game i've purchased tickets for and i've got no intentions on going to a home game anytime soon. It's not to do with results or performances (as frustrating as they are) it's due to the fact I've finally been priced out, and i'm struggling to justify spending £80-£100 (on average) a month on tickets. Especially when you add the cost on train, food and alcohol on top of that. I will miss it, and I probably will find myself doing a handful of games and / or watching the others in a pub at Arsenal, but for now I won't be stepping into the Emirates anytime soon.

[safcftm]

Usually go to around 90% of home matches a season, and as many aways as I can afford. As a silver member i'd usually find myself booked up around 2 months in advance of games, Man City was the last game i've purchased tickets for and i've got no intentions on going to a home game anytime soon. It's not to do with results or performances (as frustrating as they are) it's due to the fact I've finally been priced out, and i'm struggling to justify spending £80-£100 (on average) a month on tickets. Especially when you add the cost on train, food and alcohol on top of that. I will miss it, and I probably will find myself doing a handful of games and / or watching the others in a pub at Arsenal, but for now I won't be stepping into the Emirates anytime soon.

I'm fortunate that Sunderland are still reasonably priced, my season card is about £400 a season and I have to spend around £60 a home match on transport and probably get to around 15 of the matches (miss midweek ones sometimes due to work) so after factoring in a handful of away games I'm probably looking at just under £2k a season to support the lads which I can just about justify.

Its just as well that I can though because the simple fact is that if I stopped going I seriously doubt I'd actually miss it. The best thing about going to matches used to be the atmosphere and the chance to see your mates and stand together singing etc. Nowadays you all need season cards together, or you have to take the chance that there's enough spare seats together and that a steward won't move you. There's normally some reason or other why the lads can't all get seats together and its a pain in the arse. Then there's the atmosphere which, particularly at home, is almost always shit.

If me and me mates fucked off the match we'd probably enjoy it just as much (or more) in the pub - stand where you want with your mates, feel free to shout and swear without some boring *word censored* reporting you, go mental when you score, have a few pints whilst the game is on (as opposed to only getting time for one at half time, and that is always overpriced and watered down), those who smoke can just nip outside for a quick cigarette. If I stopped attending games I'd end up just traveling down and watching in the pub and it'd be class. More and more people are finding this and when those who attend nowadays lose interest it'll be hard to get them back in the stadiums

[BedfordshireGooner]

Make you right there mate. Do the majority of Sunderland games go to general sale and also pay on the gate? I find that the biggest problem with giving up tickets at Arsenal is (this may of been mentioned, not read the whole topic) quite often, especially in the "bigger" games, there is likely to always be someone else who will happily take your seat so the club aren't too fussed in that sense, as long as they get there money they're happy. But saying that, as you may of seen from some of our games in the past couple of months, more and more red seats seem to be showing on a game by game basis.

[safcftm]

Make you right there mate. Do the majority of Sunderland games go to general sale and also pay on the gate? I find that the biggest problem with giving up tickets at Arsenal is (this may of been mentioned, not read the whole topic) quite often, especially in the "bigger" games, there is likely to always be someone else who will happily take your seat so the club aren't too fussed in that sense, as long as they get there money they're happy. But saying that, as you may of seen from some of our games in the past couple of months, more and more red seats seem to be showing on a game by game basis.

Yeah, every game except Newcastle at home goes to general sale and we always have pay on the gate so we're definitely different from the Arsenal in that regard but you're right, you can see that Arsenal are getting more spare seats for the less glamorous matches. It'll probably spread and before long even the big games (Spurs aside) will have spare seats (if you aren't challenging for the title people will get sick of paying through the nose to watch AFC v MUFC), but I suppose being in London you'll always have plenty of tourists around so I might be wrong on that score.

[georgeknows89]

Arsenal have just won a trophy........

the earliest season ticket request in the history of football-it must be, surely ?

I have just received an email and a paper mailshot in JANUARY telling me that Club Level renewal window open on 12th February

Not often lost for words but....... desperation ? truly unbelievable bloody cheek and think they got a long wait, if at all before they get my money

[SteveO 35]

Arsenal have just won a trophy........

the earliest season ticket request in the history of football-it must be, surely ?

I have just received an email and a paper mailshot in JANUARY telling me that Club Level renewal window open on 12th February

Not often lost for words but....... desperation ? truly unbelievable bloody cheek and think they got a long wait, if at all before they get my money

They know there's a serious fucking danger of missing out on the Virtual Trophy so will be scrambling over themselves to get people signed up before our fate is known. I would pay good fucking money to see the look on Kroenke's face when Lord Wenger leads us to 7th place and the season ticket waiting list disappears. Good luck selling out the Exec Boxes against Shamrock Rovers chaps....

[Dan_85]

http://www.arsenal.com/membership/buy-tickets

I notice they don't have the balls to display on this page that the game vs Liverpool is on GS

[georgeknows89]

I appreciate that the thrust of ticket price focus and empty seats etc evolves around 'pub level " as opposed to "club level" but cannot under state the hurt that the club are now suffering on the corporate tier and it is here that they will suffer big time quicker and more financially than in the upper tier even if not publicised so i will elaborate to give many a wider knowledge on this area.

BOX LEVEL
There are about 14 Hospitality boxes now available game by game because they remain unsold on seasonal basis and this increases every year.This has a serious consequence for existing box holders who look to monetise their investment by getting the club to resell their box 1 or 2 games a year because the club can't sell existing box holders until they have sold their own - similar to ticket exchange, so this is a self perpetuating problem that increases every year as others will give up when can't get it subsidised and yes Barcelona and Shamrock Rovers have a somewhat different corporate appeal and price

This is also in a period where the Emirates as a stadium has no competition.Those corporates that are not Gooners will in some instances move to the Olympic Stadium when West Ham go there as nearer to city and dare i add that by say 2016 when Spudz have a new stadium then some corporates would have suffered 10 trophy less seqsons of paying the highest standard box prices in the UK- Chelsea's Millenium suites are the only ones considerably dearer.

CLUB LEVEL

This again has big problems building up.The seats sold to overseas hospitality agents have fallen in numbers considerably over the last 6 years and the club have had to move the goal posts to retain many.The original deal made them buy a Dial Square meal package but last year this demand was dropped and they were allowed to buy ticket only.

Although officially sold out, this is crap as their are up to 800 tickets per game now being offered as extortionate prices with a meal included as a matchday vip package.The club initially were relaxed on this as if they sold the big 5 games at say 500-700 each with a meal, this covered the season ticket cost if sold to a customer ticket only but that model is now suffering as well.

All in all, the big income pulling areas are down and anyone on club level regularly will see that the restaurants in Highbury Buffet on West and Woolwich/Wenger Buffet on east are well down on numbers

Yes, corporate and bit better off fans have had enough also.

[Macca]

Maybe upstairs are starting to lean on Wenger a bit as a result of this, maybe that's why he's been more openly critical recently than normal?
Good job...as we've all said a million times, investment and results/winning things will bring people back, it's so bleeding obvious!!

[SPARKSY]

Its definately hitting home. Tried to sell my ticket on the TX for the Manchester City game but "surprisngly" there were no takers and that is with adecent seat lower tier on the halfway line.

Liverpool and West ham at home going to General Sale. Unheard of.

A bloke at work asked me to get him and his boy a couple of tickets for the LIverpool game (they're plastic scousers). Plenty of tickets available, all upper tier. However, even i couldn't believe what i was seeing when it gave us a price of £190 for 2 seats behind the goal. £190!!! is bad enough for any game but when its a 6th place side 20 odd points off the top ofthe table playing a team halfway down the table then the decision not to go is a very simple one.

[BedfordshireGooner]

£190 for a father and son to go and watch 90 minutes of football. Absolute joke.

[Chips and Chocolate]

Don't know if it's been posted already but the FSF Score Campaign: Twenty’s Plenty for Away Tickets takes place tomorrow in Manc and next Thursday at the supporters club near Highbury.

http://fsf.org.uk/latest-news/view/Score-Campaign