The price of football...

[seabs]

Haven't seen this posted so :

Clubs reveal all in BBC Sport Price of Football surveyBy Stuart Rowson
BBC Sport website Editor


Only 11 out of 104 clubs in England and Scotland will offer adults the chance to enjoy a day at the football for less than £20 during the new season.

A survey by the BBC Sport website of every club in the four English divisions and Scottish Premier League showed that fans in the north west have some of the cheapest deals available for matchday tickets.
THE highlights
Eight clubs offer tickets for a tenner: Blackburn, Watford, Rochdale, Preston, MK Dons, Rotherham, Torquay, Plymouth
Arsenal's pie is the country's most expensive at £4
Leeds have the most expensive programme at £4, St Johnstone have the cheapest at £1
The cheapest cup of tea in the country is at Crawley - 50p. Hereford is 80p
Pies in the south west are generally more expensive (Cheltenham £3.50, Bristol City £3.40, Plymouth £2.90, Bristol Rovers £2.85, Yeovil £3)
Inverness Caledonian Thistle offer the cheapest day out in the SPL - £21.90

Clubs were asked for their cheapest and most expensive possible matchday adult tickets, as well as the prices for a cup of tea, a programme, and a pie in order to work out the price of enjoying a day at the football for fans without season tickets.

In the Premier League Blackburn Rovers offered the best deal at £17.50, while Watford's £17.30 represented the best deal in the Championship. Rochdale and Preston in League One and Rotherham and Torquay in League Two also came in cheapest in their divisions, while Inverness are the best value for money in the Scottish Premier League.

This weekend sees the start of the Football League season in England - a competition which attracted more than 16m fans across its three divisions last season.

John Nagle, head of communications at the Football League, said: "Football League clubs are working extremely hard to attract the next generation of fans through a variety of innovative marketing initiatives. As a result, crowds in recent seasons have been at their highest levels for 50 years."

"Much of the focus is on improving the matchday experience for supporters, particularly families. This has seen the League introduce a programme of 'mystery shopper' visits to matches in order to assess the experience and the introduction of the Family Excellence Award, to reward those clubs that are offering a particularly outstanding day out."
Analysis

“
The only question is whether clubs are treading the fine line between providing value for money, or are profiteering from passion and dedication
”
And you can read more of BBC Sport website Editor Stuart Rowson's blog on the price of football
by clicking here

Despite the high attendance figures - an average of 352,260 fans attended Football League fixtures each weekend last season - the chairman of the Football Supporters' Federation Malcolm Clarke says clubs
must work harder to ensure football does not become too expensive for ordinary fans.

"This is an industry that has more money going into it at the top of the game through media rights than it's ever had before," said Clarke.

"It's important that football continues to be attractive to the whole cross-section of society, so it doesn't just become something only middle-class and upper-class families can afford."

But despite the prices demand remains strong. Arsenal have the most expensive ticket in domestic football at £100 for one of five category A games for the new season - representing just 1% of tickets available. More than 60,000 fans turned out to watch them draw 2-2 with Boca Juniors in a friendly at the Emirates Stadium last weekend.

And a spokesman for the Premier League pointed out that fans are not being turned off by the expense.

"With Premier League grounds over 92% full on average in each of the last three seasons, fans are clearly enjoying the football, and the overall matchday experiences, that are on offer," said a Premier League statement.
HOW DOES FOOTBALL COMPARE TO THE CHEAPEST DAYS OUT AT OTHER LIVE EVENTS?
Iron Maiden at the MEN Arena: £43.10
Hull FC Super League match: £27
England v India at Trent Bridge: £41.10
Nottinghamshire CCC: £21.60
Mamma Mia, Prince of Wales Theatre: £29

"It is also worth taking into account that fans want to watch games featuring top talent in safe stadia; our clubs have invested more than £2bn in facilities and continue to invest heavily in developing and acquiring the best possible players to make the whole fan experience as good as possible."

But football matches compare favourably with other live sport. The cheapest day out at Super League side Hull FC is £27, while an equivalent day watching England's four-day victory over India at Trent Bridge would have cost at least £41.10.

Newcastle United were the only club out of the 104 surveyed who did not reveal their prices.

So what so we think ? Is it too much or what? How much do you spend when you go to support your team?


Premier League breakdown

Championship

SPL

 

[Crayo]

Can you summarise it?

 

[seabs]

Can you summarise it?

Football is too expensive for the service they offer (tickets / food & drinks and merch stuff like that)

Examples include Leeds charging £4 for a programme, Arsenal charging £100 for a ticket to 1 match and the general lack of consistency in pricing structures. Blackburn games were as cheap as £17.50 last season but Arsenal charged £100 for some games as an example, I know there is a difference in quality but where is the logic there?

 

[Crayo]

Agreed, definitely. Football is just a 90 minute game of sport, it shouldn't be such an expensive match. However, with the demand being so high and the supply in most stadiums being so small, it would be rather silly not to profit from that. The clubs need revenue and their most important revenue really is attendances. If football payers didn't have such ridiculous wages then I reckon they could afford to decrease the price by a lot, but football at the high-end is a business. You think these rich guys buy clubs to just have fun owning a team? Unfortunately not, they buy it for profit.

 

[seabs]

Then again you have to sustain it, look at Italy for example and how their bubble burst. Make a pound for the rest of your life or 10 for a week, which would you prefer? Plus isn't the PL making some crazy money from sponsorship, even more than before from last year? Surely that could be worked in for them, lower clubs I can understand the fans being a driving force but surely most in PL especially the mainstays could cut their costs,

 

[Crayo]

I don't know enough about how important ticket sales are to revenue but I know it is at least important. The bigger teams would make more from tv rights, sponsorships, and stuff like that. But I'm sure the owners of a club like United for example are going to want to profit largely by a 75,000 seater stadium used like 3 times a week and is constantly full. If you charge say £75 a ticket, then you're making a lot of money per week.

Not sure what Italy have done in detail. I know they have a wage cap though now don't they?

 

[seabs]

I don't know the full story but I know they struggle to fill their stadiums for anything other than the huge games now (CL / Milan derbies and the like) plus the clubs are posting huge losses despite not really spending, AC posted 112 & 84 million euro losses in 08 and 09 as an example (stats for here ) It was only in the 90's and early 2000s it looked to be unbeatable as a league but it imploded on it's self as the crowds dropped due to stupidly high prices, and general interest in the game wavered. The PL looks unbeatable now sure but I can see it sliding eventually, too much money is in it for the bubble not to now.

 

[Crayo]

I'm not sure the PL will burst. I again don't know much about Italian culture but football here is everything. Attendances are always high and there is so much drama, the league just keeps growing STILL. How can't it when we have some of the spectacles we have seen over the years? Maybe at the lower end, but I really don't see the PL struggling in the near future anyway. If they do however, they will be able to deal with it, unlike Italy.

 

[acailler]

I got to Southport FC at least 4 times a season...pay £1.50 for shit in a cup that they call Hot Chocolate...that name fails on 2 counts.

 

[Lacky]

When I saw the thread title all I could think of was.

Ted DiBiase : "Everybody has a price for the million dollar man"