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Trust Meeting September 12th

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  • Because people tend to come straight from work & meet up at the ground rather than meeting up early and going to games as a big mob (usually via a pub or two).

  • edited August 2018

    Have to say Mr W that if my marketing manager came to me with a proposal to put obstacles in the way of opposition fans attending the match at the very games where oppositions fans are likely to be numerous and hence very lucrative, I would question whether he would be my marketing manager going forward. Surely if such experiments are worthy, the games to choose for them would be those where very few opposition supporters were expected and hence the inevitable impact on their attendance would be much less significant. Fleetwood say.

    I would then look for evidence that a friday night game would really stimulate home attendance. I would bear in mind the reality that High wycombe is largely a dormitory town and consider whether a friday night game may put off those who work away. I may then consider whether the fact that kids are a significant element of our support and worry about how many of them I would lose too. I would look at the evidence we have from existing night games which invariably result in significantly lower attendance from both home and away supporters and then conclude it would be bloody madness to voluntary have more of them.

    I would expect my marketing manager to have convincing evidence based arguments why my analysis was wrong. What may I ask are they?

  • I realise I am but one season ticket holder but I work long hours and already rarely get to Tuesday games...if all the crucial games were moved to a Friday night you would lose at least one off the gate and it would be certainly be less of an incentive for me anyway to renew my st. Selfish I know

  • Similarly to @Wendoverman Friday matches would be much more difficult for me to attend. I live and work over a hundred miles from Adams Park and, whilst usually just about able to get down in time for Tuesday fixtures, the extra traffic on Fridays would make it extremely difficult to be in the stadium in time for kick off.

  • I have to agree @Wendoverman . Friday night matches would be a much bigger problem to get to for me too. Don't like the idea one bit. Marketeers quite often ignore the existing audience when trying to attract new ones. They call it churn but I think it makes them busy fools.

  • I’m not advocating moving ALL big games to a Friday night. It’s just that Oxford & Luton are local & might attract Premier League followers as they are big games. Remember most Premier League fans are season-ticket holders and have paid for their tickets before the start of the season (hence not so harsh to pay for the odd game at Adams Park). I wouldn’t want to roll this out over the whole season but it would solve 2/23 home games. I realise some people might be inconvenienced by the Friday night but if we drew Spurs at home in the FA Cup & it was moved to Friday night for live TV I bet most of those people would get there somehow. Not ideal maybe but you have to look at the bigger financial picture.

    What I’m trying to do is find 23 different (& varied reasons) to attract more people to Adams Park. Refurbishing the roof of the Frank Adams stand will cost £250k. That doesn’t grow on trees. You either start to look for new ways to bring in revenue or you sell the club - and reap whatever that brings, either good or bad.

  • So Mr W, you are still ignoring the inconvenience and presumably lower numbers as a result for the large number of away supporters expected for those games.

    You ignore the inconvenience and presumably lower numbers of existing home supporters able to attend on a Friday night.

    You ignore the evidence that evening matches attract lower gates than weekend gates.

    All for your dogmatic pursuit of Arsenal, Tottenham Chelsea and Fulham season ticket holders who will flock to the game

    you ignore the fact that next Saturday when Luton come to town, Arsenal, Tottenham and Fulham are not at home on Saturday anyway. No doubt if your theory is true,AP will be full of these supporters anyway.

  • Chiltern Railways are a shambles, as is the access to and from AP at the best of times, Evening games can be very difficult for people not based in Wycombe. Can only imagine what it is like for people from much further afield as it probably isn't even possible to make connecting trains in time or to drive and be able to get to work the next day.
    Maybe local games do make more sense for many midweek but probably not for the biggest crowds.

  • When Dev C is making more sense than Worboys you know something strange is going on...

  • How about a raffle draw for every game - 10 winners get to take part in a half time penalty shootout against Yves? That would pack them in!

  • @DevC Do you have ideas for increasing attendances at WWFC?

  • @A_Worboys said:

    What I’m trying to do is find 23 different (& varied reasons) to attract more people to Adams Park. Refurbishing the roof of the Frank Adams stand will cost £250k. That doesn’t grow on trees. You either start to look for new ways to bring in revenue or you sell the club - and reap whatever that brings, either good or bad.

    I'd be all for playing these games on Friday if it bought in more money for the club. But I doubt very much that it would.

  • @Shev said:
    How about a raffle draw for every game - 10 winners get to take part in a half time penalty shootout against Yves? That would pack them in!

    I REALLY like that idea, Shev!

  • Most people seem to be missing the point. The idea of a one-off (or two-off) Friday night game(s) is to create a “special occasion”. Make people talk about it. Something special to create a wider interest, hence the idea of having a special reason for attending tied to each of the 23 home games.

    It appears that the reality of the finances at WWFC is not hitting home. Apart from one-off transfers the club is losing about £500,000 per season. Add to that the impending £250,000 for re-doing the Frank Adams Stand roof and the reality hits home.

    Those people that advocate the Trust-owned model have got to realise that there has to be a radical overhaul of the operation of the club in order to continue in this way in the future. Although many people will mourn the loss of the Trust-owned model I don’t see enough people wanting to help or coming up with ideas to make it work. That’s probably fair enough because most people just want to turn up, pay their money & watch a game of football.

    For example, I would advocate opening the Frank Adams Stand family section for the Forest Green game. Would there be much difference in cost between opening that and shutting the away end? Forest Green are unlikely to bring more than 200 and they could be comfortably accommodated at the end of the Beechdean Stand. This is the last chance for kids to go to an evening game before the summer holidays and promoting that fact might get some more people to the game. The club nett 45% of the gate receipts after VAT & costs are taken off.

    All I’m saying is financially the club has its back to the wall & we need to try a few initiatives to help improve the situation or we face the lottery of private ownership again.

  • That £250,000 (for the Frank Adams stand) is even more than I thought. I am even more surprised to learn that we are losing half a million a season. In a perverse way, quite an achievement. My low mood is only partially palliated by the mighty Spurs victory at Old Trafford - the third goal scored by the young 5’8” Brazilian. Man of the Match.

  • How exactly are we managing to lose half a million pounds a season? It seems like an extraordinary figure.

  • Why do we even need to redo the roof? It doesn't seem to be a problem atm

  • @WanderingDays said:
    Why do we even need to redo the roof? It doesn't seem to be a problem atm

    Must be near 20 years old by now? Probably never been "maintained" properly due to lack of finances. I shall ask the surveyor, I know him well and find out.

  • If that figure is true, we cannot carry on like that or we will be fairly quickly back at the level of debt we had at the end of Sharkey's reign.

    If the playing budget is drastically reduced then the standard of players we can sign will drop and the probable result of that will be relegation. Relegation is likely to reduce income the following season so further cuts will be necessary.

    As it stands, we have to hope that we can develop young players each season for subsequent sale, and/or have profitable cup runs. With Gareth I have confidence we can do that. However if he left and we got some idiot like Nolan we would be in big trouble.

    The cost of ground and pitch maintenance, electricity and most other overheads will basically be the same whether we are in the football league or in non league.

    I was originally strongly in favour of fan ownership and still am, but my view is gradually weakening. Whatever direction we take has associated risks.

  • @floyd said:
    How exactly are we managing to lose half a million pounds a season? It seems like an extraordinary figure.

    Running a full time football club is very expensive these days. I'm amazed it's not more of a loss tbh?

  • We were close to breaking even this time 2 years ago.as was reported by The then chairman of the trust , financial director and then football club chairman at the AGM of Late 2016

    disciplined growth & good cost control was in place. If we are losing £500k per year now (big if as I don’t know the number exactly) that is a huge turnaround in 24 months .Or A Worboys could be wrong.

  • I really hope he is.

  • LX1LX1
    edited August 2018

    A_Worboys is the kind of person we need on our board. I don't think all his ideas would work. I think some will. The important thing is he has ideas. And the expertise that is currently lacking.

    We understand how much time it involves...I would encourage you to bring your skills to the table.

    By that I mean stand for Board

  • LX1LX1
    edited August 2018

    Supporters owned since 1884

  • @marlowchair said:
    We were close to breaking even this time 2 years ago.as was reported by The then chairman of the trust , financial director and then football club chairman at the AGM of Late 2016

    disciplined growth & good cost control was in place. If we are losing £500k per year now (big if as I don’t know the number exactly) that is a huge turnaround in 24 months .Or A Worboys could be wrong.

    Exactly this. We need to be realistic, rather than throwing the baby out with the bathwater. 5 year plan now not working again, or going really well?

  • @marlowchair said:
    We were close to breaking even this time 2 years ago.as was reported by The then chairman of the trust , financial director and then football club chairman at the AGM of Late 2016

    disciplined growth & good cost control was in place. If we are losing £500k per year now (big if as I don’t know the number exactly) that is a huge turnaround in 24 months .Or A Worboys could be wrong.

    I thought that prevoously servicing debt was one of the main problems and we now have less debt so that should have helped? I know theare still the chairboy funders debts and that these have been an issue recently. I can imagine cash flow over the summer is a problem given wages are still to be paid. I really hope we can get a fair and clear resprentation of the current financial postion that is easy for us all to understand.

  • I think we will get exactly that and that it will be used as a large stick to beat us (nicely) into accepting investors as the only way forward.

    I will be wanting to know how we have turned around our trading position so poorly during a relatively prosperous on pitch period of cup wins player sales and gates over the past 2 seasons from a greatly reduced debt servicing position nearly breaking even, to a position of needing to sell to stay relevant. I will want to know where the increased spend has been , where the reduced revenue has been , who is tasked with accountability for those areas in paid roles and volunteer roles, and if the performance has indeed turned around to the point of needing investors now to fill the gap of such poor performance, see them held accountable.

  • If our financial position has deteriorated so much, why have we recently signed Jason Mccarthy for allegedly a transfer fee?

  • The club put on a "finance forum" every year, Marlow, if you were as interested in the finances as you now seem to be, you would have to have been a right benny not to go along to actually understand the numbers. The base numbers are published on the trust website (although unhelpfully 2015 figures are not available as only abbreviated accounts are supplied)

    As you plainly don't understand the numbers, perhaps it would be better to wait until the meeting so that you can understand them before throwing out your accusations of poor "performance" or do you have a policy of not letting the facts get in the way of spreading your vitriol and your desperate efforts to use scare tactics to undermine those in authority. You are the Nigel Farage of the forum.

    The club is where the club is. We have a buffer this season from the fear of one bad season resulting in relegation from the league and with Conference finances as they are, probable financial meltdown. We have a window for some mature reflection of the best structure to avoid this risk. I would suggest that instead of insinuation and confrontation, we do that calmly. Ask difficult questions of course, but ask them without confrontation and constructively and listen to the answers. Perhaps ask for the management accounts for the last four years as the statutory accounts as always hide more than they tell. And from that information form a judgment on the facts on what is the best way forward rather than preconceptions.

  • @EwanHoosaami, from what Michael Davies said at a recent Fans Council meeting, the Surveyor's report stipulates that we must replace the roof within three years, at an estimated cost of £250k.

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