Pinching the fan for more; Arsenal raise ticket prices

‘I share your concerns that ordinary fans are being priced out of live football. This is bad for the continued health of the game and is driven primarily by escalating and ultimately unsustainable levels of spending on transfer fees and salaries.

‘This is a fundamental issue that football needs to address and is why I have been a vocal supporter of UEFA’s proposals to bring more restraint and responsibility to spending within football.”

 He added: ‘I agree that we need to reduce the club’s reliance on ticket revenue as a source of income to compete at the highest level. At present, we are more reliant on ticket revenue than any of our major competitors.

‘Therefore, we have made significant investment in initiatives to ensure that our squad spending becomes as efficient as it can be and to develop our commercial revenues.

‘Our strategy in terms of commercial revenue has already begun to produce results and I believe can develop significantly over time. We are also working hard to maximise our income from our remaining property activity.

‘The results of those investments will not be instantaneous but they are already beginning to make a difference. Coupled with initiatives to build our fanbase around the world, this will reduce our reliance on the matchday fan as our biggest source of income. We are working hard to get to that point but we are not there yet.’ – Ivan Gazidis’ response to the Arsenal Supporter’s Trust

This week the club we love announced that there would be an across the board 6.5% increase in ticket prices. This ticket raise was met with a unprecedented and unified response by the major supporters groups. In a time of economic trouble and strife having ticket prices go up is essentially squeezing the heart out of the game.

But is the EPL different from any other major global business or sport? In the US, you can’t find a major sport where the average ticket price is less $40-50 per game. It only goes up. For instance, the least televised of the major sports – hockey has seen some of its major clubs raise their ticket prices triple over what they were 15 years ago. That includes a season with a lock out.

Sports is big business and big business is ruining this game. But alas there is no turning back.

But it wasn’t always such, sports used to be the bastion of the working man. In bygone eras it was the place you would go watch blue collar folks like yourself ply their extraordinary talents. It was the place you went to forget the woes of the day. It was why in the United States they played Baseball (in one sense or another) during the wars or depression. It is why football carried on in the war years. Simply put you got rid of your depression by watching lads who at the time we very much like yourself – albeit with sports skills – do great things.

That era however, is long gone. Now, sports are no longer local, they are global. Fans of any given team encompass regions far beyond the team’s immediate sphere of influence. Players are global icons with sponsorship deals and mega- contracts which only make the cost of running a team increase.

Sports is a classic tale of supply and demand. As long as there are people willing to spend their money to go see matches, ticket prices will stay where they are – and likely increase. And while it looks like fans are growing increasingly frustrated over this, the likelihood that mass protests will lead to a chance seems unlikely. Simply because there are people supporting every team who will pony up the money to go see the team they love.

Many fans are trying to resort to watching the games at home but even that hasn’t helped as sometimes the match isn’t even on. So either they have to the match, or try and get down to a pub or sports bar to see their favourite team. But even that is beginning to have issues with the liscensing fees that TV networks are charging to show the match.

It’s a vicious cycle all the way around that has essentially priced the average fan out of the picture.

The rationale behind the Arsenal ticket rise:

Arsenal have done a miserable job until recently of extending their global brand. It is this marketing failure that has led them to be reliant on ticket revenue as one of their primary means of running the club. Not entirely a bad thing, but on the whole when it is the primary source it does require ticket increases to run the team. Ticket rises that create bad blood between club and fan

On that level – from a business operating sense I understand the club’s price rise. I don’t like it. I don’t agree with it but I get it. What Arsenal must do and it seems like they are trying to do is to develop promotional relationships they can leverage so that do not become so dependent on ticket revenue. Manchester United announced a ticket rise of  £1 on the same day Arsenal announced their 6.5% rise. Why are they able to do such a small rise? Because a big source of the club’s operating costs are supported and paid via the great marketing and sponsorhip relationships the club has.

Forget for a moment the on the field product, what Manchester United has done as a business is truly a model of global sports. As much as I hate seeing the Man U brand anywhere, give their office staff due for getting these deals. Arsenal are in their infancy in doing this. They need to find a way to accelerate this and yes, Ivan it won’t happen over night but the fruits of it need to be seen sooner rather than later.

For instance the Arsenal shirt deal was platry when compared to other clubs. It was an add-on to the naming rights of the stadium. And while that seemed a good bet, the loss of revenue they could have is astounding. Liverpool, a club with as much history as our own, but that has been absolute crap these last two season, just signed a new shirt deal worth £25 million. Arsenal’s deal around £4 million (I think).

These are hard economic times, asking for such a substantial ticket increase during these times and also at a time when the club has failed on the pitch seems rather dimwitted to me even if it is understandable. Word on the street is that club debated the increase right up until the last moment. That nugget combined with Gazidis’ own words leads me to believe that the club is very aware of the friction this decision is causing.

I’ve talked to a couple of supporters and as best I can tell many are going to still go to the matches. There is hope that the club realizes it is up against a wall – that it must now show that the price increases will support investment in the club. I would not want to be the management of the team – that includes Arsene Wenger, should the club raise prices and serious work is not done to address improving the team.

It will not be pretty.

Stay Goonerish!!!