Thetownend.com

With what appears to be a PR own goal scored by the club, would it not be a good idea to have a designated supporters group rep on the board?

This way the board can explain their thoughts behind such as ideas as ticket increases and the supporters rep can out a feeler out for supporters views and thoughts on any preposed changes. Also the supporters can putideas to the board for them to accommodate us, I.e. Supply of certain pies, beers etc or ways of getting linters through the door. Thoughts?

This decision is absolutely correct, expect to see more promotional discounts for games to bring punters through... if we get a decent cup run I'm happy to screw the fair weather supporters and away fans for £25... looking after the STH's is the main priority and rightly so...

that's not really that fair on those that just really cannot get a season ticket though. 

i'll be off to france again sometime in november but up till then i'll be at as many games as i can get to. 

i accept that ST are of better value and of course they should be but these prices are a bit mean.  i'm hardly a fair weather fan afterall

No home win since early December, which was also the last time we scored more than one goal in a match at the County Ground, and relegation to the basement after one of, if not the worst seasons in the clubs history. Yes, charging £25 for League 2 football is absolutely correct.

Clueless.

There seems to be a lot of frustration with the £25 charge, even if some frustration may be justified.

This frustration does however seem a little one sided.  What I am referring to is that no-one complains when Swindon offer the £10 matches or kid for a £1 matches or season ticket holder bringing a fan for free, yet are quick to moan about £25.

Bottom line, for once Swindon are looking after the season ticket holders (same price tickets).  If people don't like the £25 per game (some wouldn't actually go if it was cheaper anyway) they still have the option of buying a season ticket (surely the monthly payment option is cheaper than £25 per match).

Just my view on the topic.  Have a great day!

yeah, ok i'll buy a ST for 3.5 months...

I already have a season ticket, I'm not buying another one.

Just buy one less pint before the game.

Would have been much much better if they had kept the matchday prices at £20 and not had a single promotion all season.

This happened before, when we went up to £23 in the summer of 2004. The fans didnt accept it, and our support went backwards.

The club need to have some dialogue with the fans and reach a consensus. The crucial thing is that the hardcore fans promote the club to casual supporters. £25 for div 4 doesnt even give us a chance.

They are much more likely to buy one more at 3pm. A pint is 45 minutes entertainment.

But surely those type of offers which you mention is to entice those newbie fans to come along and hopefully become future stfc supporters.

Ive been a ST holder for the last 3 years and have no complaints whatsoever when offers like these arise, it can only be good for the clubs future.

But then we rise the prices to a ridiculous unaffordable price for many, straight after being relegated to the basement div.

Also not every STFC fan is able to attend every game and may have to pick and choose because of family or work commitments so your advice
for them to just purchase a ST is fucking nonsense.

Im not 100% sure whether i can afford to renew mine this year, after this news today, i fucking hope i will be able to otherwise im likely to miss quite a few games next season

Absolutely, and there was me thinking the board have screwed over the loyal fanbase like the regime before them, failed to deal with last years dire performance and screwing up the off the field business to boot.

Yes my friend I am clueless...

Why should fans have a board presence?

Tesco's don't nominate one of their loyalty card holders to their board meetings, do they?

Football is a business and needs to be run as a business.

Yes, you are right.  The offers are to entice people to attend.  Over the last number of years people have taken the offers, but haven't actually continued to come, i.e. 7k average attendances, same s/t prices for 3 years.

Don't get me wrong, I am all for these offers, especially to try and get the kids to watch the Town, before they start to fully support the likes of Chelsea, Arsenal, Manu ...

My point was that people are only too quick to moan about the higher prices, but don't quote the good things, e.g. value for money with the season ticket.

I always miss about 4-5 matches each year.  All I do is give my ticket to my mates.  Simple.

so what do you do if you're only in the country for a third of the season?

We don't have a strong enough fanbase to warrant representation, perhaps if we had one all encompassing supporters club, but we don't so it's a moot point.

I'll be your new best mate ... any chance of throwing in a return flight to Moscow?

The supporter view used to be put over by the trust in regular meetings with stfc, don't know if this happens anymore the trust are quiet these days

You're clearly just fucked. Part timer... :D

:(

Its pretty hard to justify increasing prices to watch an inferior league.

It wont affect me personally but to suggest there are any positives out of this is crazy.

I,m going to buy 3 more beers so i wont care about £25 . In truth people who moan obviously dont go to bars, the cinema, restaurants etc, they are way more expensive per hour, £25 these days for 2.5 hours or so is still good value, well last season wouldnt have been, but i dont feel it's extiornate.

You are talking about totally different market forces.

Yep an absolute bargain compared to my usual hooker...

2.5 hours?

I reckon sutton has had those 3 extra beers

I'd say it was £5-£7 more expensive than most division 4 clubs.

Whilst I agree it is a business, it is a business like no other. Unlike a supermarket people tend to be loyal to football club. If you start to piss your supporters off you alienate your customers. Unlike a supermarket which people change like their pants a club if it loses it's supporters loses revenue streams. If I don't like a supermarket or it's too expensive I go elsewhere, if a club prices people out or doesn't play well then it loses support. The thing with a club, our club is that we have an emotional attachment and you don't get that with your local supermarket. Most of us come back because we want to and because we can afford to, when you start pricing people out you then the club starts to suffer.

I think the problem with board representation is essentially letting one busybody be a mouthpiece for all the fans and it won't work in my opinion.

The board just needs to listen to the fans that's all. Any plans which will have major effects on the club/fanbase are going to be met with much scrutiny and varying degrees of protest and revolt.

This.

The more I read and hear about supporter representation at board level the more I cringe.
The club should interface with all fans whether it is individuals or groups and ensure that feedback is taken on board and acted upon where practical. 

You can’t please all of the people all of the time and having representation at board level in reality means fuck all when it comes to actually influencing policy.  If the majority want to push a change through it’s going to happen either way. 

Not all businesses are the same, and as JGIAA points out football clubs are strange businesses.  Take for example the Co-Op model, where the members get to vote for the Board of Directors, who are then expected to make the best decisions for the business and membership.

Of course STFC used to be run as a Co-Op until the mid 80's....when the fateful decision to change the Articles of Association were changed.

WE know the difficult history this has given since....and a fan rep on the Board, was one of the aims, when Diamond Mike and SSW were in charge.  Think people settled back and were prepared to trust the present lot to get things right...this could now be changing, possibly slowly at first.

A director's job is to make the best decisions for the business and the shareholders/members in any situation or sector.

Which was part of the perceived problem with previous incumbents.

Its a hard one really.
I mean as we can tell from this forum all fans have different views,would be nearly impossible for one mouthpiece on the board.
As Herthab says footy is buisness and the fans dont count anymore in reality.
The discounts on matchdays are to entice more in(a good scheme) not to reward the loyal fans who spend big money through a whole season.

The increased cost will affect me directly because I work on Saturdays, meaning I have to try and pick the best of the bunch and book time off.........however this hike in prices should be put into context. Those of us that are saying 'if I could get to the games I'd buy a season ticket' need to think that the extra few quid occasionally will still be a lot less than you'd be spending if you went to every home game. The restrictions in this league mean you have to show you can control your costs within the wage cap. So the board will have had to show a projection of gates and subsequent receipts to produce the budget. It's a direct smack in the mouth from the shit that've all jumped ship this summer. I've been dejected by players before but never have they directly cost me more money, the board are just trying to address the situation. I actually wouldn't be suprised that if we get promotion; the tickets decrease again in league one

A single representative wouldnt work.

The best work around would for the board to invite in a selection of fans (the database has all season ticket holders details) and form a [Apprentice style] focus group.

You would hopefully get a wide range of views and different fans each time.

Read the average Thisis comments section and then get back to me about having a supporter representative on the board.

This,but it will never happen :no:

What if prices somewhere have to rise to get sustain the budget needed for promotion. Say the board ask do we either put season tickets up by £50 or we charge £5 extra on matchday tickets.?

As a season ticket holder what's my agenda going to be? Myself and the fans/mates I see for the majority of home games or the mates and fans who don't make the majority of games?

The only way to do it would have a trust member on the board who is fully accountable to trust members. In fact that's probably the only scenario where it would work.

Maybe instead of doing a design a dicanio poster or design a fucking Pizza they could of been in dialogue with the trust and supporters club.

With the horrific wage bill we have just slashed by getting rid of that shower of shit and the fact the wages we are paying for our new signings will hardly be massive i hope they have something big lined up to warrant the casuals wanting to pay £25 a match.

The fact that dicanio is manager will not justify it because the ones who give a shit have already got our season tickets because we were told we had a deadline that got moved 3 times.

Yes i am in a bad fucking mood

Don't like the idea. Who would pick the fan?
Holding a season ticket doesn't make a better fan though. The board and some season ticket holders should note this. More so the board who bend over backwards to accomodate season ticket holders to the detriment of all the other fans.
They really have made some stupid errors in their time here. Out of touch and clueless about football. The fact they are rich as fuck means they get away with it.

Exactly and to be fair the old adage of well just think where we could of been etc wears a bit thin when they make massive cock ups like this. How anybody can even try and justify that these prices are ok is beyond me.

I think I've seen one person justify them though before you all get your knickers in a twist with people on here ;)

I think the last board's effort at rising prices was what allowed the anti spirit to fester and then grow against them in the end.  That pushed plenty of fans from being positive to negative in frame of mind, which in turn allowed the true failings to be finally met with despise rather than indifference.

This a big fucking gamble, one I think will backfire.  Football fans are a loyal bunch, but when they do stop going, it can take a long old while to get them back.  Once they find something else to do, it can be a lot of hard work to get them to give that up, especially when it tends to be playing football for those young enough, or ending-up being parents as they've so often forgot they are (that's me that is).

I had a season ticket for the past 2 years but decided against renewing simply because of the restrictions and hassle it seemd to create for me - the joy of getting a matchday ticket was that you often ended up in the shit seats which just so happened also tend to be away from the poor moaning bastards you get lumbered with on a season ticket.  I'd got pretty much fed up with the place, oddly not the team!  This may now make my decisions be much more emtionless than they should be.  I'm going to find myself weighing up £25 to watch Swindon against something else, when the reality is I should be left trying to justify to the wife why she needs to lose a day wages to watch the kids.

This smacks of a decision made in a boardroom with nobody else in it.  Idea comes to you, nobody to knock it back so you convince yourself of all the positives and lose sight of reality.

Then all clubs should get rid of that expensive bullshit they call the "community scheme" then I presume. All that fuzzy do-gooding that might bring in a few kids from time to time if you are lucky. Clearly un-economic.

The trouble with putting fans on the board, or individuals is that they they can easily "go native" after a period where they end up representing the board to the fans. It can often be a very effective tactic to neuter opponents. I'd still like to see it happen though.

Community schemes groom fans for the future. What the fuck has that got to do with board representation?

the increased cost for me is from £16 on the day for the town end to............£19. Some context is needed, people still buy boots meal deals (even after their rediciulous price hike) people still take the train even though it cost me an extra £2 every day. It's easy to criticise the board from the outside without knowing the full extent of league two's wage cap and budgeting constraints. I still feel that it's a direct result of relegation, not some potential 'cash in on Di Canio' scenario

You're talking shit.

I work for the largest Co-operative in the world and it doesn't work like that.

Yeah, where are the green shield stamps for a start.

It's more about your assertion it's a business and nothing more and should be run as such. Are schemes actually also about doing good/giving something back or just hoovering up the next generation? Should we check the cost per young fan recruited before we see if they live or die? Ooh I feel my first flame war starting...

Football in the Community is run as a charity and has to raise funds though, if that's what's being referred to?

I agree with Herthab on this one. Fans are notoriously fickle whilst the board have to do what they have to do from a financial point of view. They maybe should interact more etc. but supporters on the board, no.

I hereby win Knight of the day on the fact the Community Scheme is a charity. Mock me as you see fit.

However, the wider point I was going for is what is the actual point of the club? Is it solely to attempt to play at the highest level possible on the professional pyramid, or is it about other, less economic stuff, like being a focal point of the community, or something that does both by developing young football talent?

As we've been pretty useless at the first one for the vast majority of our history and so many people have talked about the social aspect of following the team, should it all be hard nosed economic decisions and if there is some community aspect to the whole thing, then who better represents that than fans?

Hethab should be on the Board.

He bored me and JJ Edmunds shitless at Exeter away.

One of the aims of the Trust is to have board representation. The best way to achieve this is through shareholding.

Spot on.

:D TBF I wasn't sure if it was the bloody game that bored me!

In reality the banter was more amsuing than that shit!

Grella on the bench for the whole game...unbelievable!

Is there still a Trust organisation for Swindon Town? If so, what the fuck have they said about the 25 quid ticket prices for next season?

Apologies. Just found the trust website: Last updated in April. Fuck-all relevant information about anything. Brilliant.

I bet old Jezza is creaming his fucking pants at the proposal of having fan representation on the board. How about a joint effort between the trust and supporters club? The former can provide somone who's 3 months behind the times, says fuck-all and does fuck-all, and the latter an expert on quilt making and knitting. Sorted or what? :clap: