Thetownend.com

Hmmm if there is one area the club is not endeering themselves to me personally (off the pitch) at the moment, it's the whole "club red" privalege to buy the black Samsung shirt.

The club has today released an article allowing "one red" members (free for season ticket holders, or £5 else) to fill the orders up... but the club has also hiked the price up by a tenner, making these shirts cost £50 each all but a penny.

"For One Red Members the shirts will be priced at £49.99 each...For Club Red Members the shirts are priced at £40"
http://www.swindontownfc.co.uk/page/MembershipDetail/0,,10341~2209114,00.html

To summarise my point, i've listed the most expensive shirt prices sold by club shops for 3 teams below...

Chelsea  - £42.99
Man Utd - £44.99
Swindon - £49.99 / £54.99 for non ST holders

Something isn't quite right there! :-( Guess I won't be buying a shirt this season then. I didn't bother to join "one red" as didn't see the point at the time (despite being a ST holder). I wouldn't pay £50 for a league 1 shirt out of principle anyway.

Surely this must be a loss for AF? - Opinions (and yes I know i'm a cunt before someone posts that opinion! ;-) )

I think you're right in the sense that it's a PR shot in the foot for the club. Don't think the "club red" thing has been well-handled at all and this just exacerbates it.

But, as with all replica shirts etc, if you think it's overpriced (which it clearly is), just don't buy it. Anyone who spends 50 quid on a replica 3rd kit needs their head examining IMO

The thing is the club knows as its a nice shirt, they can charge £50.00 and people will pay it as they are "limited numbers", Overpriced yes, but the club know they can sell them so..... And to reiterate Paul's point, anyone who pays £50.00 for a 3rd kit needs their head examinin but each to their own!

YEAH

Buy drugs instead kids

And you too could grow up like your Uncle Fred :)

As people have said, if you think £50 is too much then don't buy it. If people had common sense and refrained from buying then clubs wouldn't be able to charge such ridiculous prices.

That's the dream.

The membership scheme is a good idea, but creating a level with added benefits that a season ticket holder doesn't get is just wrong. I probably would have bought the Samsung shirt but they can go fuck themselves if they think I'm going to pay an extra £10 due to me only being a season ticket holder.

Very surprised that Fitton could fuck something up like this.

I suspect 200 shirts cost more than 2000 to manufacture. Hence why they are trying to coin in a premium on them.

It was obvious from the kit launch this could have been a popular shirt, so why the 'limited editioned' it god only knows. Its better than the crappy white shirt anyway and a lot of people didn't buy the red thanks to the stupid looking white bits.



Its not the cost that is the only issue is it, its the principle. In this instance the club are adding a premium over the normal shirt and over "club red" members.

I have the free "red one" membership just in case something like this happened. I am however not paying extra for the privalidge of spending my money on merchandise. It is wrong and I refuse to endorse it. Net result = one less shirt purchase this season.

So in summary you are right :)

And relax...

The first shirt in years that I will not buy. Another less shirt sold.

Well it might not be if it's a limited edition and they sell all 200. 

Think of the oppertunity cost.

If they've only made 200, opportunity cost is a moot point.  If they only mange to sell 198, you'd have a point, but it's the same argument as reducing ticket prices - does the extra volume at a lower price give a higher profit ?

There is only 400 available in various sizes.

I don't know how many they've sold so far, as the number of Club Red members have never been released, but I do know that the club shop was doing a brisk trade on Monday morning.

I got a Club Red membership because at the end of the day the club had reduced my ST price by nearly £100 over the last few years, and half the cost covers the highlights DVD which I got.

I gave the ticket vouchers away to an ex work colleague to entice him to some matches.

Personally they should've waited until after this month until all the Club Red members have bought theirs, and if there are any left over put them on general sale at the SAME price and not charged the premium.

I don't think then, no-one would've really complained.

It's not even that nice... Like some kind of Chelsea training top

I suspect the logic is rather the other way around - that the shirts are being used to drive Club Red membership

I see your point that a sell out of 200 (or 400 or whatever) is still a sellout regardless of who actually buys it. The point is there are people who would normally spend that money in the club shop in any other season who now won't because of the fleecing on the price.  That is undeniably an opportunity cost. The money will be spent elsewhere.

Does extra quantity at lower price = more profit. Impossible to say without knowing the margins. I reckon these would have sold well at the start of the season. As time goes on the demand will go down as perceived value for money goes down (given they only last a year).

Anyway, this is all detracting the main point of stiffing non club-red members. If the previous regime had pulled this stunt there would have been a 20 page thread about it by now.

What Batch said.

This is the sort of stunt I'd rather hoped Fitton and Co wouldn't want to be accused of pulling.

I thought they had more class than to stiff their season ticket holders who pay up front and contribute a massive amount of cash flow during the lean summer months.

I think the Samsung shirt looks fucking ace, but I won't be buying it at that rip off price.

And while I'm in the mood; the Club Red scheme is the kind of shit marketing tool that's putting genuine fans off football up and down the country. It's devisive, it costs hard cash in hard times and is exactly the sort of crass, unprofessional attempt at small-time marketing that Diamandis favoured.

The smart move would have been to come up with a marketing plan that was inclusive for all fans and that offered decent incentives that turn into increased sales for the club, which is the whole reason to incentivise / market to fans in the first place, surely?

Instead, we now have over priced shirts being worn by those stupid enough to throw more money for an exclusive 'elite' membership scheme, and a section of our supporters feeling pissed off and left out. Well fucking done!

I still think the idea was more to promote Club Red by providing an extra differentiation in price as well as availability. Unfortunately they've chosen to do that by bumping the price for ordinary fans from the already expensive normal price to the extortionate 50 quid. Might have sat better if they'd discounted for Club Red rather than this which looks like scalping ordinary fans. I don't think that's the intention but it's how it looks.

And that's aside from the fact that in looking to promote Club Red in this way, these kinds of things make season ticket holders, the backbone of the loyal fanbase, look like second-class citizens. Not great PR at all.

As Batch rightly says, if Diamandis had pulled this kind of stunt, we'd have screamed blue murder. Although there is a difference in this case, at least we can be sure the money's going to the club :)

Yes that is an important distinction. I hope I didn't imply otherwise.

I guess this has kind of brought the most disappointing aspect of the new regime to a head. And lets be honest they have been brilliant for the club. But a lot of the marketing promotions/decisions seem a bit last minute and ad hock. Case in point the black shirt, where it was unveiled at the kit launch then suddenly a few month later turns into a limited edition club red only shirt. In some ways if this was made clear up front it would have been better. Though I'd still be annoyed :)

And the ticket promotions seem a bit last minute too. Thankfully Baz has put the banner on the front page.

Meh I should email Watkins rather than wobble on here. Its not like they aren't approachable is it.

Nah fuck it, everyone behind the Arkells after the Brentford game :D

Only if Steward T2 is invited.

Why do we need a membership club? It's not like we're big enough to sell ticket allocations etc. Seems to me a solution has been created for a problem which doesn't exist. I cant imagine it makes the club that much extra money either

This is the real problem for me. I don't have a problem with membership schemes but they shouldn't give any benefits that aren't available to season ticket holders. It's a bad step in the wrong direction and I expect better of Fitton.

The stupid thing about all of this is that the extra income being generated is minimal. An extra £10 on even 400 shirts is fuck all money. The extra Club Red memberships sold as a result will be minimal and I suspect the total sold anyway is pretty low. So to make an extra fuck all they've risked pissing off the 6,000 season ticket holders.

I suspect the idea is not so much that it will be of much use/profit now, as Si Pie says, it's hardly necessary with where we are now, but more to get it established as a concept. My guess is that this is one of the ideas they picked up from those brainstorming sessions they had with Norwich. And you could see where a membership scheme would be useful to Norwich, and how it might seem to fit with where the aspirations are for us to be (i.e. I don't necessarily buy it even when we do take the next step up, but I can kind of see the logic). But they've perhaps gone a bit early on it and maybe adopted an idea wholesale without really thinking about whether it's appropriate/necessary for where we are now or even at all. I'm speculating obviously, but you can see the train of thought - "Norwich are an example of where our next step is, what ideas have they got that we can adopt, right let's adopt them". And from there, it's maybe taken on a bit of a life of it's own without anyone taking the necessary step back of going "Oooh, maybe that's not such a good idea for us right now". Or maybe I've made three or four "if, maybe" steps too far :)

As jonny says, it's the relegation of the core season ticket holder base, or at least the perception of it, that really smacks you in the chops. I couldn't give a flying one about being nudged out of buying a shirt I probably wouldn't have bought anyway.

And to their credit, they worked fucking hard to push season ticket numbers to 6000+ from the low figures left behind by the old board.

It seems like the board forget themselves now and then and dont think things through properly. Does anyone know if they still take soundings from the SC or the Trust (if they still exist) on matters like this?

Maybe, instead of blowing smoke up each others arseholes, they should ask around or put ideas up on the club website before launching them. At least they'd get a fair amount of feedback and could make adjustments if required, rather than thinking they hold all the aces and then fucking things up and pissing fans off.

Sometimes its a smarter move to let people think they've been consulted and listened to, rather than marketed to. If the end result is the same in terms of financial and goodwill gains, why risk looking like complete cunts by not being smart about it in the first place??

it's clever timing though - christmas is coming up and the STFC supporting kids will most likely want one

My son has just had his 7th birthday and everything he asked for was Swindon Town related - goalkeeper kit, tracksuit (items which are ridiculously overpriced).  I went and purchased everything in one hit on behalf of various other family members and in total it was a fair old whack of money to which I received no discount, because I'm 'only' a season ticket holder and not a club red member!  I have a real issue with this and pointed out to the girl in the shop that somebody who has a club red membership might only actually watch 1 game a season and therefore isn't actually putting much money into the club whereas my family who hold 3 adult and 1 child season ticket between us do.  She agreed and said there's been numeroud complaints when people have been in the shop.  I don't know if the board are aware of these?  Some of you might say that if I think the items are overpriced, I shouldn't have bought them.  However, anyone with young boys will know how difficult it is to do that when he goes football training twice a week and all his mates are wearing the latest kits.  Anyway, better than spending it on a load of toys that he'll play with once!

"IQ is on yer shirt!"

Im going to email Lacoste and express my outrage that they charge £90 for a polo shirt.

Actually, no I wont, I'll just chose not to buy one.   ::)

only just seen this.£50 for a football shirt is steep but you have it right, spencer, imo.
i aint owned a shirt since the prem season yellow one so wont be buying even if it was 50p

Having a third kit is not an essential part of supporting a football team. You do have a choice.

Just seems bizarre to me. I have to do a fair bit of trading myself, and the fact that this person is moaning, but will still buy the shirt says to me that commercially the club have got the pricing spot on.

I will always campaign against high ticket prices because being able to afford tickets is an essential part of being a football supporter. But the third shirt? Dont fucking buy it, save us your imbecilic moaning!

So you think three tier pricing on a shirt is right then?

Personally I dont have any problem with it whatsoever.

i think tiered pricing is wrong.
how many people are red members anyway?

I think the fucking point, Spenny, is that quite a few fans DO want to buy the Samsung shirt but are being put off by the devisive pricing structure. Like you, I dont give a fuck as I wont be buying one, I dont like the way the club have weighted the pricing in favour of those who signed up to a wanky marketing scheme, though, nor the way that season ticket holders have been fucked over on the discounts previously enjoyed for decades.

Imbecilic moaning? Fuck you.

Season ticket holders being fucked over? Are you serious? Jesus wept... We've got the 4th cheapest season ticket in the football league. Town end tickets at £199 for 23 games.... Some people are so blinkered it's unreal. If the benefits were important to you buy the club red when you bought your ST then it would be just £224. That's a fraction over a tenner a game including discounts/events/priorities etc. By stripping the ST of it's benefits and making it cheaper the club is giving us the choice of bolting on the benefits surely? Don't want the benefits don't buy it. Scrap the membership scheme and the club will just increase the ST price. I didn't want any of the benefits so didn't buy the membership it's that simple isn't it?

Agree with this, as a season ticket holder I enjoy the low price and the choice of adding the extra benefits. I am a club red member and have bought the black shirt. The kit looked class, at saints in the jpt, with red socks.

I wouldn't have a problem with that but that isn't how the club sold it. The details of the benefits for both season tickets and the various membership schemes were a bit patchy to begin with and they appear to have made things up as they went.

Though I still think season ticket holders should be at the top of the pile and should never have worse benefits than any membership scheme, even if you have to pay extra for a season ticket "plus".

I have no problem with the board looking at extra revenue streams if it means season tickets can continue to be so reasonable, so long as they keep season tickets a priority for cup/big games.

I was back in Blighty last week and decided to go and buy one of the away shirts for my kid.  £32.99 which I was pretty shocked at. 

I was under the impression that if a club changed their shirt every season the maximum they could charge was £29.99. 

Clearly less than 400 people, or they wouldn't have been able to extend the offer (albeit more expensive) to "one red" members...

It's like last season the 'evening with Danny Wilson' was for ST holders as a 'benenfit' but this season it is only the club red or one red members allowed to go, alright it is only an evening with DW but it is the principle of it and chances are only 100 or so ST holders would attend anyway but that is not the point, they seem to be pushing away ST holders with the little things that they are doing, it only takes us to have a bad season certain ST holders will think they can't be bothered and will pick and choose and will not feel vauled as a ST holder, and won't bother renewing and then numbers go down instead of up and all the hard work then went into attracting more ST holders goes to the wall.

I think things like taking away shop discount, 3rd kit only for membership or inflating the price is just a big PR own goal

Agree with all of this.

I think people are just a bit spoilt tbh.

I never used the club shop discount (even when I bought stuff, I kept forgetting I had it) and as others have said, I'd rather have the cheaper ST prices. And I wouldn't have bought the 3rd shirt anyway, even if it had been sensibly priced. But it does still seem to be coming across as excluding the loyal core support.

I think jonny had it right - if the idea was to do it as a "bolt on" benefits thing, it should have been marketed as such and the STs should have been as well. I don't think it's so much what they are/are not doing with the Club Red thing that really makes a huge amount of difference one way or another, it's more the way it's being handled.

If Club Red start to get ticket priority over ST holders, then that would be a real issue.

I think I'm getting one. Depends if santa is reading this forum or not!

season ticket holders didn't give a fuck when the play off tickets were dished out unfairly last season.a bit different when it's something that effects you eh?
purely being selfish, i find it slightly amusing to see them whining now. (even if they have a point)

should have signed up as a red member.stop moaning.miserable cunts.etc.etc...

But one red is free to season ticket holder, so its a bit strange you need Red One memebership to do these things. Seems a waste of a plastic card to me and an incoveniece, but ST holders aren't directly being excluded.

Two or three tier pricing of products I will never agree with. By all means off membership discounts, buit don't treat us as mugs.

As for the club shop discount. Seems fair enough to me. My season ticket is nice and cheap, can't complain about a lack of  discount.

Ticket priority has always gone to ST holders, it's one of the accepted benefits of being a ST holder. After that it should go to those who can demonstrate they attend matches regularly. Don't think anyone's ever argued any different have they?

EDIT: And it should be pointed out, that this was only something I raised as a possible example of something that would be a genuine slap in the face for ST holders, rather than (as currently) more of a perceived snub. It's not something AFAIK that's actually happening. And arriba is just being his usual delightful self.

Just thought I should clarify before we set off a bandwagon of unwarranted worry about something that probably isn't going to happen

It's entirely possible that the ticketing database is not that useful in holding purchasing behaviour, whereas a membership/loyalty card scheme could be.  Tesco got to where they are today thanks to the information they built up on the back of the clubcard.  If our ticketing database just gives name, address, ticket number then it won't be much use in beginning to build up a personal profile of your habits.  When you know someone's habits you can infer behaviour on groups of people and then you know what sells and to who.

Or, I could be talking tosh and it's a wonderful scheme to irritate people.  Personally, the season ticket purchase was made based on it's price.  If it was more expensive but gave me discounts I wouldn't buy it.

The club have already got a lot of new season ticket holders and a lot of good will as a result of the excellent pricing structure this year (and last)

This is a perfect time to introduce a membership scheme whilst you've got all these new customers floating around feeling they've got value for money etc

I signed up a junior red, I've done my bit for the scheme for now.

Yes, I said when it was introduced that I think that's exactly what it's meant to be for. And in future seasons, I'd expect to see the "loyalty card" merge with the ST once we have the capability (electronic turnstiles) to do this. But at the moment, it all seems a bit unclear and the attempts to build the "loyalty card" are, inadvertently I'm sure, pissing off the core "loyal customers", ironically.

The club should've launched the membership schemes at the same time as the ST's, but they launched it 2 months afterwards in June/July, when most had already bought their ST's. They could've explained the whole membership scheme with a letter when they sent out renewal forms and said due to the fact they've reduced the ST prices they've taken away the shop discount, but this would be available via the Club Red scheme, and you would get x, y and z extra.

how am i being my "usual delightful self" if i'm usually a miserable cunt,when this has slightly amused me?

moaning about play off tickets.

I didn't say you were usually a miserable cunt

you didn't need to

"Curmudgeonly twat" was more the phrase I had in mind :)

"clueless fuckwit" would be my take

any advance...

i'm flattered.had to google it as i've never heard of it before though .aint you clever knowing them big words.

I think you'll find 'twat' is a common term for vagina. Surprised you didn't know that :)

te he.good work neville

http://www.swindontownfc.co.uk/page/MembershipDetail/0,,10341~2209114,00.html

That is truely excellent.

I'm not sulking any more....

Club listens to supporters again...shock !!!

Fair play. I wasn't going to buy one anyway but I might do just as a gesture of support for their gesture. (Not really, but I might get my bum into gear to join the One Red thing)

If you do join Paul, can you get me a shirt?

Sure, but I wouldn't rely on it. It's more of a musing on a messageboard than a definite plan. I'll let you know if/when I do

but you are a ST holder and membership is free for ST holders !

Good man.

You scratch my back.... wink wink.

I was charged £49.99 yesterday.

They better refund me. I'm trying to get through now but the line is busy.

Credit where credit is due. They tried ringing me this morning to refund the £9.

Just rang them and it's sorted.

Ha, ha, assumed he wasn't and that was why he was asking me. Sippo, you plank :D

Crispy won't be buying one because it's black.

 :D

Yesterday morning i paid £49.99 for this shirt to wake up this morning and read that on the site im more than pissed off!!

Calm down, you can get the difference back off the club

But that means I need to register for that crap. Can I really be arsed?!?

Do you really want a shirt ?

I don't know now...I have just changed power suppliers to npower and hopefully get £45 shirt voucher, so If I get that I'll sign up.

I ain't spending money I can spend on beer on a shirt.

Im confused.com

So am I...

There won't be any left by the time you get the voucher, I signed up to N Power in August and am still waiting for the voucher. Apparently it takes 6 weeks from the moment your contract with N Power starts before you get the voucher.

Are they one of the ones that can help you switch power suppliers? Then you could qualify for a free shirt once they've run out of them. It's all one big virtuous circle of marketing incentives

How do you know that ? It didnt say anything on the official site ?

Read page 5 of this thread. The bit where I posted.

thanks Ralphy i will have to pop in the shop on saturday morning

You can get a refund over the phone if that helps?

Or you can join online here :

http://www.stfconlineshop.co.uk/shop/prodtype.asp?strParents=&CAT_ID=162&numRecordPosition=1

And the black shirt is very nice, and the Samsung logo is not as big as the picture on the OS.

Signed up for free one red membership, and purchased a "large" shirt for £41... a lot of money still but I really like the shirt :-)

Word of warning to all, most people will need to buy a size larger than normal, they're a slim fit. Make sure you try it on in the club shop if possible before ordering or...  :headhurts:!

Oh b*****s. Oh well, need to lose weight anyway.