Chris Heck - President of Business Operations

[tomd2103]

Nothing wrong with tourist and corporate fans.  If they'd built the new North we could have had 10k of them with little impact on the traditional match-going fans.  Obviously a bit of seat shifting in the Trinity but that will happen ultimately anyway.

I just can't see it with the tourist angle unfortunately.  In this country, London is a global city with hundreds of thousands of tourists milling about who want to see a Premier League game.  Liverpool and Manchester United are the tourist attraction in those two cities.

I'm from Birmingham and I love our city, but we haven't got the volume of tourists in the city, let alone large numbers who want to watch a football game. 

HS2 and a city centre ground could change that I suppose, but at what price?

Take a walk round New Street and the surroundings on a Saturday afternoon and see the number of weekenders.

I do have a walk round there from time to time and would guess that most of the people might be there for shopping, a theatre show or a concert at the NIA rather than to watch football Dave.

[Lastfootstamper]

Well, yeah, cos they can't even if they want to.

[tomd2103]

Nothing wrong with tourist and corporate fans.  If they'd built the new North we could have had 10k of them with little impact on the traditional match-going fans.  Obviously a bit of seat shifting in the Trinity but that will happen ultimately anyway.

I just can't see it with the tourist angle unfortunately.  In this country, London is a global city with hundreds of thousands of tourists milling about who want to see a Premier League game.  Liverpool and Manchester United are the tourist attraction in those two cities.

I'm from Birmingham and I love our city, but we haven't got the volume of tourists in the city, let alone large numbers who want to watch a football game. 

HS2 and a city centre ground could change that I suppose, but at what price?

Take a walk round New Street and the surroundings on a Saturday afternoon and see the number of weekenders.

Sorry, but why do you say this?

Loads of people visit Birmingham and the midlands. They don’t carry big signs about proclaiming themselves as tourists.

We are hardly at the arse end of the earth. We’re like just over an hour away on a train, it’s nothing. It’s like saying people won’t bother going to Versaille because it’s not in the centre of Paris.

Edit: was replying to tomd not Dave!

I said it because I don't think there are as many tourists in Birmingham to bridge the gap with places like Barcelona and London! 

I agree with the points made above that a period of success might well change things a bit.

[Dante Lavelli]

I think you’re underselling Birmingham.  It’s a decent base for a day visiting the Cotswolds, a day doing Shakespeare/warwick castle stuff then a day at the match followed by fancy grub in the city.  Throw in a curry/theatre etc and that’s a decent weekend away.  birmingham international being the hub that opens up loads of potential customers.

Joining the dots is the hard bit, but nothing the club couldn’t arrange with a decent partnership with hotels/airlines etc.

[dave.woodhall]

Ten years ago you'd have been laughed at for suggesting Birmingham as a tourist destination. Now we have queues to get into bars on Saturday afternoon and try getting a weekend restaurant table.

[tomd2103]

I think you’re underselling Birmingham.  It’s a decent base for a day visiting the Cotswolds, a day doing Shakespeare/warwick castle stuff then a day at the match followed by fancy grub in the city.  Throw in a curry/theatre etc and that’s a decent weekend away.  birmingham international being the hub that opens up loads of potential customers.

Joining the dots is the hard bit, but nothing the club couldn’t arrange with a decent partnership with hotels/airlines etc.

I'm not underselling the city at all.  As I say, I'm from the city and like spending time in the city centre.  I'm biased, but have always felt that it is a good weekend break, as it's one of the few cities where everything you might go for (shopping, hotels, concert at the NIA, theatres) are all walking distance from the main train station. 

That said, the discussion is regarding people who are potentially going to come to the city to watch Villa.  As others have said, maybe more will come if we have some success, maybe more would come if there were more tickets available, maybe more would come if  we moved to a new ground in the city centre. 

[pauliewalnuts]

I think you’re underselling Birmingham.  It’s a decent base for a day visiting the Cotswolds, a day doing Shakespeare/warwick castle stuff then a day at the match followed by fancy grub in the city.  Throw in a curry/theatre etc and that’s a decent weekend away.  birmingham international being the hub that opens up loads of potential customers.

Joining the dots is the hard bit, but nothing the club couldn’t arrange with a decent partnership with hotels/airlines etc.

I'm not underselling the city at all.  As I say, I'm from the city and like spending time in the city centre.  I'm biased, but have always felt that it is a good weekend break, as it's one of the few cities where everything you might go for (shopping, hotels, concert at the NIA, theatres) are all walking distance from the main train station. 

That said, the discussion is regarding people who are potentially going to come to the city to watch Villa.  As others have said, maybe more will come if we have some success, maybe more would come if there were more tickets available, maybe more would come if  we moved to a new ground in the city centre. 

Surely the salient point is that, even if there were a few thousand 'outsiders' wanting to go to a match these days, they wouldn't be able to, because they wouldn't be able to get tickets.

[Des Little]

…unless of course they love the idea of all you can eat pick & mix, warm pissy lager and some cardboard nachos with rubber cheese.

[tomd2103]

I think you’re underselling Birmingham.  It’s a decent base for a day visiting the Cotswolds, a day doing Shakespeare/warwick castle stuff then a day at the match followed by fancy grub in the city.  Throw in a curry/theatre etc and that’s a decent weekend away.  birmingham international being the hub that opens up loads of potential customers.

Joining the dots is the hard bit, but nothing the club couldn’t arrange with a decent partnership with hotels/airlines etc.

I'm not underselling the city at all.  As I say, I'm from the city and like spending time in the city centre.  I'm biased, but have always felt that it is a good weekend break, as it's one of the few cities where everything you might go for (shopping, hotels, concert at the NIA, theatres) are all walking distance from the main train station. 

That said, the discussion is regarding people who are potentially going to come to the city to watch Villa.  As others have said, maybe more will come if we have some success, maybe more would come if there were more tickets available, maybe more would come if  we moved to a new ground in the city centre. 

Surely the salient point is that, even if there were a few thousand 'outsiders' wanting to go to a match these days, they wouldn't be able to, because they wouldn't be able to get tickets.

True.  Think the discussion was more about how do we attract more tourist type fans who will shell out mote on matchdays (presuming that is something we want to do!).

Obviously having available tickets is probably the first step.  I guess the ideal scenario would be an increased capacity where ticket prices for existing fans can be kept relatively low, yet there would also be more 'experience' type tickets for day trippers.

[pauliewalnuts]

…unless of course they love the idea of all you can eat pick & mix, warm pissy lager and some cardboard nachos with rubber cheese.

Special guest appearance from club 'legends' - this week, David Norton, Paul Kerr and Dean Glover.

[Des Little]

The more I think about it, the more I believe that our Chris has properly shit the bed with this North Stand farce. I hope that in the fullness of time we’ll see that he was right, but I’m not so sure.

[VillaTim]

…unless of course they love the idea of all you can eat pick & mix, warm pissy lager and some cardboard nachos with rubber cheese.

Special guest appearance from club 'legends' - this week, David Norton, Paul Kerr and Dean Glover.

All whilst sat in rows in a school canteen .

[Villan82]

The more I think about it, the more I believe that our Chris has properly shit the bed with this North Stand farce. I hope that in the fullness of time we’ll see that he was right, but I’m not so sure.

If he has shit the bed he is quite clearly wrong and needs to receive his P45 asap.

[chrisw1]

…unless of course they love the idea of all you can eat pick & mix, warm pissy lager and some cardboard nachos with rubber cheese.

Tourists / Day trippers may well think £120-£140 is ok for a guaranteed ticket including food and drink as a one-off experience to see a historic club play a PL game.  I guess the club needs to up it's marketing to attract them.  Part of this will probably need to be improved transport links etc.   

[algy]

I think you’re underselling Birmingham.  It’s a decent base for a day visiting the Cotswolds, a day doing Shakespeare/warwick castle stuff then a day at the match followed by fancy grub in the city.  Throw in a curry/theatre etc and that’s a decent weekend away.  birmingham international being the hub that opens up loads of potential customers.

Joining the dots is the hard bit, but nothing the club couldn’t arrange with a decent partnership with hotels/airlines etc.

I'm not underselling the city at all.  As I say, I'm from the city and like spending time in the city centre.  I'm biased, but have always felt that it is a good weekend break, as it's one of the few cities where everything you might go for (shopping, hotels, concert at the NIA, theatres) are all walking distance from the main train station. 

That said, the discussion is regarding people who are potentially going to come to the city to watch Villa.  As others have said, maybe more will come if we have some success, maybe more would come if there were more tickets available, maybe more would come if  we moved to a new ground in the city centre.

Yeah, my wife's from Wrexham and absolutely loves Birmingham for pretty much what you were saying.

For a long weekend it's great - loads of options of stuff to do, pretty easy to navigate around, the city centre is more pleasant than Manchester etc. Plus it's an excellent base - relatively cheap, easy day trips to loads of places, loads of options for food & night entertainment.