England’s top football clubs used to prize season ticket holders, but now they have to tread a fine line with fans between maximising atmosphere and revenue, writes Ed Warner.
We all know it’s the hope that kills, every time. Another football season is over, ending with what ifs for most. But the next fixture list is less than four weeks away and your season ticket renewal already sorted. You do realise that you’re a seat blocker, don’t you – depriving your club of valuable cash and with it the means of competing?
A die-hard Spurs fan this week pinged me an old meme which sums up the annual victory of heart over head that fans of the majority of clubs must experience. “I get my hopes up: I get disappointed: I start to believe again.” Might as well add “I renew my season ticket.”
For decades, regular fans were invaluable assets for England’s leading clubs. Stadiums were rarely full. Season ticket sales eased cashflow, often spent to cover losses before the new season even kicked off.
They cemented the relationship between club and supporter and offered few perks beyond a discounted average matchday entry price, a regular seat (unless you chose the terraces) and priority access to a cup final ticket if that happened to be your team’s year.
As the popularity of the Premier League has exploded, so the season ticket equation has reversed. Where the balance of advantage traditionally rested with clubs, now fans find themselves incumbent owners of scarce assets.
Waiting lists are the order of the day, memberships are sold to monetise the scramble for scarce single match tickets and clubs crank up the prices of hospitality experiences to satisfy the once-in-a-blue-mooners.
The tales may be apocryphal, but fans tell of season ticket holders at the biggest teams dying and their friends and family holding onto the tickets for years. Such is the length of waiting lists.
It can cause a problem if a twenty-something is using a deceased senior citizen’s ticket that had been sold at a concessionary rate, but that’s always been a challenge at crowded turnstiles five minutes before kick-off, whether the named ticket-holder is dead or alive.
If you doubt leading clubs’ interest in the season v casual ticket equation, look no further than the aforementioned Spurs phasing in a halving of its discount for over-65s in the coming years.
The same fan describes his team’s season ticket base as being “as sclerotic as Japan”, hypothesising that the club is taking action because it faces a “tsunami of fans about to turn that age in the next few seasons.” The BBC reports that Spurs claims to have four times as many older season ticket holders in its new stadium as at its previous White Hart Lane home.
A one-off attendee is likely to spend a multiple of the amount of cash on a matchday as a regular. Think club shop souvenirs followed by early entry to the ground to be fed and watered.
A half-and-half scarf bought from a street vendor might deprive the club of a few quid, but all the rest offers a fat margin while the die-hard is happily ensconced in their favourite pub or chippy, happy to make it to their seat moments before the teams take to the pitch.
The die-hard, though, is an integral component of the stadium experience for the casual spectator. Where do you think those songs come from and do you even know the words?
The challenge for clubs is to weigh loyalty and the atmosphere that comes with it against revenue maximisation. Little wonder that stadium expansions are so popular, bringing with them not just total capacity increases but also the opportunity to sell premium seasons and one-off seats without displacing long-term supporters.
Fulham FC provide one pointer to football watching’s future. A sparkly new stand (albeit well behind schedule for a full opening) whose best views have a season price of £3,000 will boost Craven Cottage to around 28,500 seats.
Only a little over half of this overall capacity will be available as season tickets, a much lower proportion than at London’s other Premier League clubs.
What comes next? Expect the arrival of dynamic pricing, enabling clubs to clear the market for scarce seats at the highest possible level. It happens for music gigs and US sports, why not here?
Also, more add-ons to tickets that cost clubs little but act as a fig leaf for expensive seats. Again, the music industry already shows the way.
Look too for penalties when season ticket holders leave seats empty rather than recycling them through a club’s resale channels – get a refund on your ticket which is then resold at a massive premium, or else.
Brentford, for one, has already got there, announcing a purge on fans who consistently fail to show or resell their ticket through club channels for league games.
Points deductions for Everton and Nottingham Forest this year highlight the imperative to comply with the league’s financial regulations. Be assured, loyal fan, that every single pound counts in your club’s battle to compete within the rules. Do your duty: sing up or resell your ticket!
Tangoed
One in three Americans is arrested by the age of 23. Each year, three per cent of the US population is arrested. Scottie Scheffler is 27.
Perhaps we should be less surprised whenever our sporting heroes cross officers of the law, whatever the circumstances.
Batting towards a century
Cricket’s civil war over The Hundred continues. A reader and committed supporter of red ball county cricket asks me if I think it will still exist in 50 years’ time (the cricket that is, not this newsletter).
He says he doesn’t care if they live beyond him, but he needs public bus services and the County Championship to see out his days. He’s 52 years old.
Total attendance at all Championship matches across the 18 counties last summer came to just under 400,000 – over a fifth of them at the Oval and Lord’s combined. That’s an average of only about 3,000 per four day match. Little wonder that reader gets anxious whenever bus timetables are updated.
Meanwhile, close watchers of domestic cricket politics are awaiting Lancashire Cricket’s AGM next Thursday to see whether disgruntled members vote against the reappointment of Andy Anson as chair.
If worrying about county cricket is your thing, do read The Cricketer and sign up to this Substack: The Grumbler.
Ed Warner is chair of GB Wheelchair Rugby and writes his sport column at sportinc.substack.com