Business Advantages of Supporter Community ... - Supporters Direct

costs and the additional ‘buy in’ of customers and partners referred to inother sections of this report – although this is difficult to quantify.Supporter SurveyWe asked questions about fans’ relationship with their clubs including howopen they felt their club was and the levels of trust they felt there werebetween supporters and clubs.Openness● 69% of all respondents believe that their club is open and transparentabout what is happening off the field.● For supporters of community owned clubs, this figure rose to 72.5%,whereas it fell to 56% of respondents who support other clubs.● 89% of FCUM fans felt their club was open and transparent aboutwhat’s happening off the field.● 63% of Lincoln City fans did not believe their club is open andtransparent about off-field events.TrustWe wanted to know about how supporters felt about trust between theclub and supporters and asked which of a series of statements were mostaccurate 12 .● 58% of respondents felt there was a high level of trust betweenthemselves and their club● On average, this figure was 63% amongst supporter community clubs,but fell to 38% amongst supporters of other clubs.Brentford – One BrentfordBrian Burgess at Brentford FC believes that they ‘absolutely have tobe more open’ with supporters because they are a community-ownedclub. Annual accounts are published in full on the website and, whilstclub board minutes are not published, the trust has 3 people on theboard to provide scrutiny and feedback to the trust. Burgess says thatwhen they first took over the club, there was a lot of suspicion and12 These were: ‘There is a low level of trust between me and the club’; ‘There is a mediumlevel of trust between me and the club’; ‘There is a high level of trust between me and theclub’; and ‘Don’t know’.Business Advantages of Supporter Community Ownership 41