Ticket Prices Rant

[Mark H]

The point is though while people still keep paying £26 for kids and up to £43 for adults to watch that garbage the club will continue to charge it. Complaining about it on message boards won't lower the price, the only thing that will do that is to stay away and refuse to pay the disgusting prices.

I agree with the principal of what your saying - but you try looking a 7 year old in the eye and tell him that he cannot go for his birhtday as I am making a stance against the prices !

[Blackcountry Villa]

The point is though while people still keep paying £26 for kids and up to £43 for adults to watch that garbage the club will continue to charge it. Complaining about it on message boards won't lower the price, the only thing that will do that is to stay away and refuse to pay the disgusting prices.

I agree with the principal of what your saying - but you try looking a 7 year old in the eye and tell him that he cannot go for his birhtday as I am making a stance against the prices !

Fair enough mate that is a dilemma, but what i said is right and the only way prices will drop is if fans stop paying it. Like you say parents like yourself are in a tricky position, although you should have taken him paint balling or to the cinema or something, he'd probably have enjoyed it more than being punished by being made to watch that dross!

[TimTheVillain]

We can argue all day long about prices of £30/£40/£50 for this game or that.
All I know is that for youngsters the prices should be rock bottom for all games be it Man U or Bolton visiting.
I would rather see a seat occupied with an enthusiastic kid for a fiver even at the expense of getting 3/4 times as much from an adult. They may then follow us for a lifetime rather than risk them being lost to the SKY favourites and watching all their football on TV.

In fact, I will go further. £4 for every single game and £50 season tickets for under 16s, make live football accessible at Villa Park to virtually every football mad kid in the West Midlands.   

That would look dreadful on Messrs Russell and Faulker's spreadsheet.

Plus, Deloittes would downgrade us, God forbid !

[lordmcgrath5]

A lot of good points on here - no wonder people are fed up when you get a situation like this.

It is completely bleeding obvious, but seems to have escaped football clubs in this country - unless you give people a chance to take their kids along with them (yes, also sit next to them wherever they are in the ground), you're going to lose the next generation because they won't have grown up with going to football.

Football crowds have been getting older for years now in this country because of ludicrous prices. Something that always strikes me when I'm over in Germany is how many kids go to football compared to here. And they're able to start going on their own from a fairly young age (say 14, 15 or so) because they can afford the cost of terrace tickets and clubs make it as cheap as they can for them. Bingo - next generation on board.

Many of us have argued for years that the PL would end up destroying itself - this season I think it may finally be coming true.

[Lee]

The Club gave me a call yesterday asking if I fancied the game at the weekend for a discounted cost of £30. As I may have free corporate tickets, I said at this moment in time I wasn't interested.

He then tried to sell me the 3 "big ones" in Arsenal, Manure and Chelsea for a discounted price, before the "31st October Deadline" at a competitive price (about £90+).

They must be really desperate

[Blackcountry Villa]

If i'd have been a nipper these days i wouldn't have gone to the football every week, whereas when i was younger me and my old man had season tickets for years. He doesn't go these days because it's too expensive and not value for money, so i wouldn't have grown up going to the football and many kids will grow up not doing the same. Our crowds could be very low in future decades because there simply aren't enough youngsters and new fans going to games.

[MarkM]

The Club gave me a call yesterday asking if I fancied the game at the weekend for a discounted cost of £30. As I may have free corporate tickets, I said at this moment in time I wasn't interested.

He then tried to sell me the 3 "big ones" in Arsenal, Manure and Chelsea for a discounted price, before the "31st October Deadline" at a competitive price (about £90+).

They must be really desperate

Filling potentially empty seats [or attempting to] with cheaper offers is an ok strategy as with the airlines its better to have a body in a seat paying something rather than it being empty.

The problem here is that many have paid a higher price in advance [Season Ticket Holders] which the clubs desperately need to keep. But as I have said with all the offers around it makes having a ST almost pointless

[MarkM]

If i'd have been a nipper these days i wouldn't have gone to the football every week, whereas when i was younger me and my old man had season tickets for years. He doesn't go these days because it's too expensive and not value for money, so i wouldn't have grown up going to the football and many kids will grow up not doing the same. Our crowds could be very low in future decades because there simply aren't enough youngsters and new fans going to games.

When I started going regulary it was £1.25 to stand on the Holte. With the £3 for the supporters coach from Telford it made going to the football affordable

[pauliewalnuts]

Footballl is all about short term profit, sadly.

It's hard enough to get kids interested in football these days with the various other ways they have to enjoy theirselves, so god only knows where the next wave of supporters will come from.

Sadly, clubs are too busy salivating over the likes of overseas television rights, Asian markets and how much the next Sky deal will be worth to do something about it.

[Lee]

The Club gave me a call yesterday asking if I fancied the game at the weekend for a discounted cost of £30. As I may have free corporate tickets, I said at this moment in time I wasn't interested.

He then tried to sell me the 3 "big ones" in Arsenal, Manure and Chelsea for a discounted price, before the "31st October Deadline" at a competitive price (about £90+).

They must be really desperate

Filling potentially empty seats [or attempting to] with cheaper offers is an ok strategy as with the airlines its better to have a body in a seat paying something rather than it being empty.

The problem here is that many have paid a higher price in advance [Season Ticket Holders] which the clubs desperately need to keep. But as I have said with all the offers around it makes having a ST almost pointless

I got one for my lad for his 16th in the Upper Holte at a cost of £355, which I think is ridiculous considering the fayre on offer at the moment. However, I agreed because he wants to sit with a friend of mine that has been going since the 70s and his lad who is one of his best mates.

On calling to book the ticket, I asked for a combined amount. I'd have had little change from a grand. I decided against it and only missed one home game this season on a vastly reduced amount compared to buying a Season Ticket and also managed to take my daughter to her first ever game along with a German friend of mine and his lad who live in Birmingham in the process.

If you are willing to move around you can get some cheap tickets. I do feel sorry for ST holders. A lot (like myself) a few years ago worried about giving up their long standing seats. In the end I bit the bullet and let two go. Only regretted it for the League Cup Final. Cost me a fortune to go that day (x2)

[Lee]

Can I just add at this point to about the pricing structure for youngsters. A few years ago, child tickets I believe were up to 18 and then there were concessions for Students and OAPS.

This 16-18 band seems a little unfair to me, especially when most kids are still not earning at that age and going to college/sixth form (especially in this day and age)

[lordmcgrath5]

Can I just add at this point to about the pricing structure for youngsters. A few years ago, child tickets I believe were up to 18 and then there were concessions for Students and OAPS.

This 16-18 band seems a little unfair to me, especially when most kids are still not earning at that age and going to college/sixth form (especially in this day and age)

 
A good point and well worth making. But following up on that would require clubs to cast a glance beyond whatever world it is they inhabit.

[TheSandman]

Damned if they do, damned if they dont.

This is the problem with offering cheaper tickets to try and fill the ground, people expect it all the time.

Of course we should fucking expect it. The tickets are ridiculously expensive so therefore they should be cheaper.

I'd also love someone to explain why, as the quality of the team has got worse the ticket prices have increased.

[SoccerHQ]

Problem is Phil, if the club do endless cheap ticket matches it will end up pissing off the ST holders.

They are already.

All the games I've paid for this season have been either 15 or 20 quid, they're already advertising that the Swansea game on Jan 2nd is 20 quid in quite a few parts of the ground.

As I've been saying for the last 18 months, the club have raised ticket prices for matchday games too quickly, two seasons ago you could watch this game in the north stand upper for 21 quid, on Saturday it's 30 quid!

Now our season ticket holders numbers are reducing more people are realizing this...

This is the sort of thing you can partly get away with the team are doing well on the pitch and challenging the top 4 but not when you're in mid table.

[remy]

A lot of circumstances have come together this season for our home game support to have dipped to circa 30k.

Firstly we have lost our best players year after year.

Then Man city have proved the level of investment needed to win the league in the most "competitive" league in the world. 16 or 17 other clubs cant do the same.

So now our real purpose is to either get local bragging rights or win a cup / secure a Europa place. Personally I think just STAYING in the league is our remit for the near future.

Our football at the moment is pretty bland and the cost of living has rocketed.

All reasons why its easy to turn off.

We can all "escape" for 90 mins from our everyday lives down VP for the enjoyment and atmoshphere and the win, then we see the players uninterested and get bored watching them, so we go home and cant beleive we've paid £70 for a 1-1 while they roll into their supercars, drive to their mansions and collect the years salary for the time it takes me to take the train to work.

Were not putting up with it anymore so season after season get used to the empty seats.