The story of the disappearing away seat allocation – Part 2.
Posted on August 11th, 2010 | 141 Comments |
I wrote yesterday about how it appears that our away allocations for the first few away matches of the season have been cut.
If you missed that article, or wish to read it again, you can have a look at it here.
I’ll give a brief re-cap of what was uncovered yesterday. Basically it came to light that our away ticket allocations appear to have been cut for the forthcoming season.
Instead of over 3,000 fans at Old Trafford on Monday evening, we will now have just 1,800. The same applies to Wolves, where we again could have had around 3,000 fans, yet we are only taking around 1,100. This means that a lot of fans are going to miss out, fans that either can’t get to, or don’t want to go to, St James’ Park will now find it more of a struggle to secure a match ticket for an away game. Those £20 memberships may help, but they most definately aren’t as helpful as they once were.
This angered me a fair bit as I don’t like the fans, the heartbeat of any club, being denied the chance to see their own club in live action. It would be different if we rarely sold out away allocations, but we do, most of the time in fact, so I thought I would e-mail the club and question this decision. Here is what I wrote;
“Hi, Just wondering why the club don’t seem to be taking the full allocation of away tickets? Certainly at Man Utd and Wolves this is the case anyway.
I just wondered if there is any reason for this as we pretty much always sell out away ends, and have done for years. I managed to get a ticket for the Wolves game, but I could struggle in future if allocations remain smaller than usual. Will this be an ongoing theme for this season? It’s going to stop a lot of fans throughout the country being able to watch their team.”
Now I didn’t really expect a reply to be honest, but to the credit of the box office they did give me one. Here is what the club had to say;
“Hi there,”
“Opposition clubs offer a number of ticket options to us – some on a sale or return basis and some on a sale only basis. The Club makes a decision on a game by game basis regarding how many tickets it forecasts it can sell based on demand at that time.”
“It is a careful balance between ensuring that supporters have the opportunity to buy tickets for away matches (and having a strong vocal support for these games) and ensuring that we mitigate the risk of being left with unsold tickets that we have to pay for. If we are left with a remnant of tickets this is wasted money that cannot be spent elsewhere, for example, player investment.”
I had speculated yesterday that money could be the motivator behind the decision, and judging by that reply it certainly seems as though I wasn’t far wide of the mark. If these tickets are based on demand at the time, then questions ahould be asked as to how the club can work out that demand has dropped by two-thirds.
The last time I checked we sold out away ends up and down the country, and we have done for years. To me it sounds as though the club are only bothering to take the ‘sale or return’ tickets to negate a potential loss, and to try and justify that by saying it will take money away from player sales is laughable. I mean, would the £50,000 outlay it would have taken for the extra Man Utd tickets really stop our relentless player recruitment drive? Bear in mind that the club would get most, if not all, of that money back.
Anyway, I decided to e-mail the club back again to question why the excuse is so feeble. Here is what I said;
“Thank you for taking the time to answer my question.”
“I am however struggling to grasp the concept of the lack of demand? To the best of my knowledge, we pretty much sold out away ends up and down the country last season, and most of those had an allocation which was comparable to grounds withing the Premier League. In fact we had to go back and ask for extra at times such was the demand.”
“Am I really supposed to believe that Newcastle United has a demand from the fanbase that is comparable with the likes of Bolton and Wigan – Two of the worst supported clubs in the league, with no disrepect to them inteneded of course.”
“We have been selling out away ends pretty much week in, week out for years now, yet now the demand has apparently dropped? Something smacks of poor form here. I’m led to believe that we have only taken 1,800 tickets for Man Utd, and 1,100 for the Wolves match? The tickets would sell, in fact I know a fair amount of people who have already missed out, which is leaving them questioning just why they have shelled out £20 for a membership?”
“On a note unrelated to the box office, if the £50,000 outlay (that the club would have got back) saved by not taking tickets at Old Trafford, or the £68,000 it would have cost for the Wolves game is going to dent our player recruitment drive then I fear we may be in for a very very long season!
Now I really don’t expect a reply about that as I think perhaps I have been a bit too cutting, but the questions needs asking. It’s poor form to a fanbase that has stuck with the club yet again and I intend to not let this drop!
I eagerly await a reply!
toonsy,we look like a bunch of convicts on a prison riot in that photo.lets hope the man from uncle llambias and co give you a reply.