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Another new manager

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  • The club are regularly trotting out the aim of improving the match day experience for its supporters. For some (I accept probably a minority) refreshments are part of this experience and the club should not ignore this side of the business.

    How Dev can say that the improvement of food and drink at the stadium wouldn't make a difference to the bottom line is plainly ridiculous. When was the last time you sampled food at Adams Park Dev? Was it sometime in this century!

  • You must be mad to eat food at football grounds, with a few (very few) notable exceptions

  • On the rare occasion that I have been to the tea bar behind the goal it has taken absolutely yonks to do very basic things - why can’t they have cups of tea lined up and ready to go at half time on a cold night, for example. The layout is hopeless, exacerbated by the the chap taking money failing to then communicate what has been ordered and having a team serving it up quickly. The seasoning and condiments stuck are in a corner that becomes over crowded etc. The structure and position of the facility would be difficult to re-engineer but there are surely some things that could be done to improve the service.

    The Vere is normally pretty good and the second improvised bar near the door has been a good addition in recent seasons. The staff running it are normally pretty good at serving promptly and keeping the queue moving.

  • You will note Mooney that what I said was that improved food and drink on match days is unlikely to make a MATERIAL difference to bottom line.

    In my admittedly rare visits to AP, I see no real difference between our offering and the vast majority of others (although I had to miss FGR). Hardly surprising they all suffer the same problems - large number of people very short windows to deliver it.

    I rather agree with Eric's point above about not buying food from football grounds.

  • The last time you attended a Wanderers home game Mr DevC, you could still get a slice of bread and dripping.

  • edited August 2018

    @marlowchair I get where you are coming from...but beer aside I suspect (and I admit I could be well wide of the mark!) for the vast majority of fans going to football the food and beveridge rating is not a major worry as long as it's well above finding a non-domestically farmed creature in your pie.

  • @Wendoverman said:
    @marlowchair I'm not sure anyone (outside of the men in the WWFC Board car outside your house checking your Gasroom postings) is bullying you about your views...just asking for a bit of clarity or disagreeing with you. But you seem to be saying the food and beverage side of things is crap...but it turns a profit....but it could be more profit. That could be said about most things. Perhaps if it is turning a profit it is not a side the Board feels it has to focus on. That may not be a good thing but it might not be a priority at present. They might have more pressing issues to deal with. Also having told us all for a week now it was poorly run and poor quality food...why did you have a burger at all?
    (As a regular at Adams Park I don't eat my meals there, so you could get Jamie Ramsey's Football Dinners in for all I care and I would not hand over my hard earned...)

    Good point but I thought I'd give it a try and hope for improvement!

  • I agree, and I wouldn't tend to buy food from the cinema either. But lots of people do.

    The food in baseball parks in the States is often of a very high standard - although the nature of baseball is different to football with the game going on for a lot longer with more breaks. The Yankees have a 16 page glossy brochure with all the food options: https://www.digitalpublications-mlb.com/157005/157249/186082/2018-Yankee-Stadium-Dining-Guide/index.html

  • That's as futile a comparison as one is likely to see this season

  • @Chris not eating in the cinema? Who can possibly watch a film without a pile of melted cheese slices and crisps or a delicious tube of reclaimed meat shavings in a roll lovingly prepared by a bored spotty teenager whose hands I am sure are regularly sanitised? You're missing out. Possibly on two weeks in Intensive care.

  • Eating should be banned in the cinema

    As should mobile phones

    And everyone under at least 25 years of age

  • So should hanky panky in the back row!

  • And Michael Bay films.

  • Spot the Kermode acolyte

    Con Air is a work of art. As is The Rock

  • @marlowchair The numbers you are using a pure pie in the sky. The quality is not that great but I don't think improving the standard will improve the profits. Prices can't go up for better quality and we can't increase the time to sell any more. I think the club is deliberately providing the minimum service in classic Apprentice style.

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  • As I work in the area of Facility Management and am a lifetime Trust member this probably falls to me. I will put together a synopsis of the views expressed on here (minus the usual sniping) and send it to @AlanCecil and Gordon Reilly, the Stadium Manager. Raising the level of catering is win-win in terms of customer satisfaction and profit, so it should be seen as a priority even if the way to achieve a higher level is to sub-contract the catering for now. Fact finding mission to Forest Green anyone?!

  • TBH, I too can never be arsed to stand forever, to eventually be served with an overpriced luke warm, unidentifiable piece of meat and tepid chips, with a coffee that I would struggle to recognise had it not got the words printed on the container.
    I will however arrive early and stand in a long Q if the fare is worth it, which is what I regularly do at Lyndys' van outside the gate. A good strong cuppa with T bag still in, freshly cooked egg & cheese burger and a largeish table to the side to add sugar, milk & sauces should you so desire. All at a reasonable cost, when compares to the stadium. I always give my lads some money to buy themselves some overpriced, undersized chocolate bar so that the club make some money, more out of guilt than anything as it would be a lot cheaper to bring it with us.

  • Norsquarters, that’s a very generous offer and let’s hope it helps to improve things.

  • No one yet has mentioned the shambolic organisation of the Vere at half time. The doors were locked until about 3 minutes after the half time whistle had blown, by which time the queue was all the way back to the ticket windows. Maybe our relatively prompt 3 o'clock kick off time instead of the 15:05 caused some confusion...

  • If supports aren’t happy with things. Attend the fans council meetings at the club, every month. Michael Davies is always there and has a very open ear and takes note and things do change.
    One Example being an improvement in the burgers last season.
    So see you all down there

  • Well said true blu, that’s the positive way to deal with genuine grievances.

  • edited August 2018

    I spent a few quid on Saturday. Three bottles of warm water cost me £4.50. Three coldish bottles in the Woodlands (£11.10) as only warm pints were available, a carvery (£12.50 and quite decent), a bottle of Diet Coke £2 and a double cheeseburger £5? for one of my guests (seemed to go down well) and three coffees (£6) at half time - I drink black coffee normally but only white coffee was available. The delightful lady in the kiosk said the only black coffee they had was Bovril so white it was!

  • Well at least this has proved once and for all that @marlowchair has no inside information on the club as if he has I would have thought he could have easily told us what the actual figures and net profit (if there is any) actually is.

    His claim that better run catering facilities could buy us two Bayos, is however ridiculously tenuous.

    As others have pointed out the queues are already long and presumably the “dog food” is cheap and cheerful so better quality food may actually reduce profit (at least in the short term).

    However as @Chris and @fame_46 have also pointed out it’s not just about the profit on the day. It should be about customer experience and the better the experience the more likely the customer is to return.

    I never eat at the club so I can’t comment (or particularly care if I’m honest) on the quality of the food, but I think from the comments on here the OP is valid and a little more customer-focus on this side of things would be welcome and may ultimately help increase profits in the long term.

    Where the club does do very well (usually) is catering for the CAMRA fraternity, who are obviously their most important, eloquent and well-informed customer base. The range of beers (and usually quality) in the Vere is unmatched at any other club i have been to recently. This does encourage me to get to the ground an hour earlier than I would otherwise, giving me a warm glow that as well as getting comfortably in prime football watching condition I am also subsidising the club with every sip I take...

  • Letter duly sent; I shall include points in @StrongestTeam 's post in my follow up. I must echo @true_blu 's sentiments as regards turning up to the fans' forum this Thursday night. No pitchforks mind you, just a genuine desire to hear what steps the club is taking to ensure that the level of quality rises in terms of temperature, timeliness and variety leading to a better match day experience.

    It would also be great to have the fans' forum on a skype conference call but seeing as their email is still down I don't like our chances! Peace out

  • As supporters > @Croider said:

    No one yet has mentioned the shambolic organisation of the Vere at half time. The doors were locked until about 3 minutes after the half time whistle had blown, by which time the queue was all the way back to the ticket windows. Maybe our relatively prompt 3 o'clock kick off time instead of the 15:05 caused some confusion...

    Have to say that being able to go in the Vere at half time (especially in winter) has been a great move by the club so hope this was a one off problem.

    Hope the club/Trust also ask the fans/members for help if they need it. We all want the club to do well.

  • @NorsQuarters said:
    As I work in the area of Facility Management and am a lifetime Trust member this probably falls to me. I will put together a synopsis of the views expressed on here (minus the usual sniping) and send it to @AlanCecil and Gordon Reilly, the Stadium Manager. Raising the level of catering is win-win in terms of customer satisfaction and profit, so it should be seen as a priority even if the way to achieve a higher level is to sub-contract the catering for now. Fact finding mission to Forest Green anyone?!

    Happy to receive your report but given that the fans council meet this Thursday (9th) could you also send it to their Chairman Tony Sutton email: [email protected] and to Michael Davies - the club's General Manager - as these matters fall under his control rather than Gordon Reilly who deals with safety and security at the stadium

    On a separate note, I believe his various clues have helped me to identify who @marlowchair and whilst I don't intend to 'out' him (not yet), he might like to consider standing for the Trust Board at the November AGM and putting his time and talents to good use there.

  • @NorsQuarters I don't know if this has already gone in your letter, but if you do send an email to Tony Sutton etc. may I suggest selling cold drinks from the Bisto hut in the terrace (don't know if there are huts in other parts of the ground). Fairly cheap and simple to run and would reduce queues at the main tea bar. It never seems to be open usually, but I thought it was a good move at the Stevenage game last season, although I only noticed it by chance and I'm not sure many Wycombe fans were aware they could go there and avoid queuing.

    I rarely eat in the ground, but I am also put off getting a HT drink due to the long queues - dangerous levels of dehydration are of course preferable to possibly missing an early second half goal. Cheers

  • edited August 2018

    This is an interesting one that I've enjoyed reading about.

    I think I'm with @marlowchair and @fame_46 on the whole while recognising that there is a starting position among football fans of general indifference to the typical football ground offerings. This, I fancy, is based as much on cultural tendencies rather than the quality of the product on offer, that would need to be changed to effect a meaningful difference to financial outcomes.

    The comparison with Yankee Stadium, while not exactly a like-for-like one(!), highlights that English specatators, at least at lower league football grounds, are not accustomed to, and therefore do not expect, a great deal of choice or quality. Thus, people like @Wendoverman and I - and clearly we represent the (old) man on the Cressex omnibus as well as any - go to the game to watch the game and not necessarily planning to spend much on extras. Thus, if the beer is off one day, or the burgers so-so another, it's not really either here or there and doesn't impact us. There's an upside to that, of course, in that our expectations are not shattered, but it ought to be possible to aim higher.

    I fancy that the world has changed enough in the last twenty years that people might actually be willing to part with a bit more money these days given the right incentives. Without any experience or expertise in the subject, it would be extremely arrogant and presumptuous of me to offer some ideas so here goes:

    1. Get the basic infrastructure right.
      Saturday in the bars sounds like it was a car crash. One sympathises with what I expect were real issues but getting these things right REALLY matters, not least on the first day of the season. Was the problem really unforeseeable? Which leads to

    2. Get the staff up to speed.
      I bought a "cold" drink from the terrace servery that was lukewarm. I got a different - cold - one when I asked but there shouldn't have been any warm ones in there and, given that there was a cold one available, the kid serving should have been much, much, much more careful about what he gave me. I'll not hurry back to a stall run by him and his ilk, will I. Get yourselves organised and get the fridges fully stocked well in advance. I asked for a drink and was given a warm one when there were some cold ones available. This is basic. The young people who work the terrace shop are, I am sure, estimable types but get some bloody gumption. Expectations of the standard of service to be provided need to be 1000% higher among the workers. I like Michael Davies very much and think him an apparently fine and competent fellow but the setting of such standards needs to come from the top down, doesn't it? Be prepared, smile, be proactive and communicate with each other (like the previous poster, I notice the minimal communication between those taking the orders and those filling them). Expect, and plan, to do a great job and provide a great service.

    3. Move the mountain to Mohammed.
      The ice cream stall on hot days is a great idea but why stop there? The bars have limited capacity and are, in any event not suitable for every part of the visiting demographic (and I will never stand in a queue to get into a place like that). Get out to the people. Get the barbeques going in the car park regularly. (The burgers from them are always better than inside the ground.) Have stalls by the entrance to the ground, by the tent (which tent is an excellent idea, btw). I've seen a barbeque there at times but get it there every time If I'm mistaken and it's always there, it's because I don't see it on my way into the ground. Put the bloody thing right in front of me. I always see the programme stall and the badge table. Get this stuff in front of people and they'll buy it if it's appealing enough.

    4. Aim to provide a better quality of food.
      If it's good, people will pay for it, seems to be the modern way. This, I admit, is where my lack of knowledge of this area puts me on uncertain ground and it may be that there is good evidence that football fans are a staid crew with limited, unmoveable horizons. However, stale burgers and/or buns are obviously not good enough. If you can't turn a tidy profit on a £4 burger and produce it to decent standard, there's something wrong with the way you're set up.

    5. Draw the people in earlier.
      This is, perhaps, the big one requiring a significant cultural shift. If you can get more people there more than ten minutes before kick-off, you'll sell more of everything. Give them a reason to get there. There was a lady singer at the last game of last season, singing outside the tent. Not my bag particularly, but it contributed to the occasion. Do it again - offer young local bands/ singers a venue for 45 muntes. And do other things. What is that football shooting game set-up that's always by the entrance? It's rubbish - no-one really uses it with any enthusiasm and it seems to have no purpose. Use the space differently. Get Bodger outside the ground at 2pm. Balloons? I bet you could get a children's entertainer for about £200. Face-painting for kids? You could probably get some volunteers to do some of that. Whatever.

    I recognise a lot of this is literally fair-weather, possibly, fanciful stuff. But there it is. It's the perfect time of year for some blue-sky thinking.

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