Business Advantages of Supporter Community ... - Supporters Direct

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8 Match Day SpendingKey Question:Does supporter community ownership help generate greater levelsof match day spending?Top Three Findingsi) Clubs felt that fans were more minded to spend money on a matchday at club owned facilities (where they existed) because they owned atangible stake in the club.ii) Most clubs did not have any figures to substantiate this feeling, however.iii) Some clubs had developed innovative ways for supporters to contributemore whilst also maintaining affordability.Match day ‘second spend’ is a keyMatch day ‘second spend’ is a key element of income for all the clubselement of club income for all surveyed. However, ensuring thatthe clubs concerned. However, spending was far more achievablecapturing that spending was far when clubs owned their own facilities.more effective when clubs owned For those that did not own theirtheir own facilities.facilities, securing that spending was amajor motivation for developing them.Facilities permitting, many of the clubs interviewed felt that supporterswould be more likely to spend a greater amount of money within theground because they knew it would benefit the club directly.However, the ‘added value’ of community supporter ownership in thisregard is very difficult to quantify in any meaningful sense, because it isalmost impossible to compare like with like, although a few of the clubs hadsupporting statistics.One club who have calculated current match day spending is AFC TelfordUnited, whose current second spend is about £2 per head. They are alsodeveloping ways in which they can monitor this more effectively, includingadoption of practices seen at much larger clubs, such as an AFC TelfordUnited club card. AFC Wimbledon estimate their match day secondspend at around £2.00 per head, which on crowds of 3,000 is a significantrevenue stream.34 Supporters Direct Briefing Paper No.4
FC United of Manchester do not currently own their own facility andthis means that they miss out on the vast majority of match day spending.As part of their plans to develop their own ground they surveyed 1,400supporters in 2009 to ascertain what supporters currently spend on food,alcohol and soft drinks. This suggested that average spend was around £9on all additional items other than admission to the match. In addition theclub asked how often fans would use a club bar and over 50% said everymatch, with 20% saying they would use it ten times per season. The clubalso asked whether fans would use club house facilities on a non-matchday, as a private hire for functions, and 27% said that they would, with47% saying they would possibly use it depending on the development.FC United of Manchester – Pay What You Want!FC United introduced an innovative scheme for selling season ticketsfor the 2009-10 season, that has continued to date. In order to meettheir obligations to provide ‘affordable’ football in the face of a creditcrunch and increasing unemployment, the club introduced a ‘paywhat you can afford’ policy for season tickets.Although they set a minimum of £90 (around 50% of average matchday entrance costs for the league), fans were asked to pay a donationover that figure if they could afford it. Season ticket prices hadpreviously been £140. At the end of the ‘pay-what-you-can-afford’campaign, people had paid on average £160 for their season ticket.Also, the club offered a facilityThe club offered a facility for those for those that could not afford thethat could not afford the minimum minimum £90 fee, putting in place£90 fee, putting in place a standing a standing order scheme so thatorder scheme so that people could people could pay by instalments.pay by instalments.One supporter said he could afford£10 a month over ten months andwhen the club checked he was in fact paying in £20. The supporter’scomment was that because the club had trusted him to carry onpaying and that it was a club he co-owned, he decided he would pay£20 a month, because he’d have to pay more than that if he waspaying on the gate.Business Advantages of Supporter Community Ownership 35
Page 2 and 3: About Supporters DirectSupporters D
Page 4 and 5: IntroductionThis paper is the fourt
Page 6: Community Benefit SocietiesThrougho
Page 10 and 11: 1 Strategic PartnershipsKey Questio
Page 12 and 13: The council took over the freehold
Page 14 and 15: the stability of the football club
Page 16 and 17: Erik Samuelson, AFCW’s Chief Exec
Page 18 and 19: supporters’ trusts.AFC Wimbledon
Page 20 and 21: the club crest and manufacturer whi
Page 22 and 23: Supporter community owned clubs hav
Page 24: 5 ResilienceKey Question:Does commu
Page 27 and 28: 6 Co-operative ‘Added Value’Key
Page 29 and 30: community club can be an advantage
Page 31 and 32: at a “normal” football club, yo
Page 33: Exeter City - Valuing Supporter Vol
Page 37 and 38: the area of donations. Many clubs w
Page 39 and 40: with specific skills - in areas suc
Page 41 and 42: costs and the additional ‘buy in
Page 43 and 44: goodwill within the wider community
Page 45 and 46: Category Average Score of Average S
Page 47 and 48: ● 73% of respondents from support
Page 49 and 50: community ownership, the community
Page 51 and 52: The Supporters Direct Briefing Pape

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