Open Letter on Season Tickets and Pricing | Club announce price freeze on "general admission season tickets & PL match tickets" for next season (p163)

[Kippax Street 1880]

Pissing into the wind the club don't give a fuck about you. They actively want you replaced with a young foreigner who will buy half the club shop and visit twice a year.

 

[jimharri]

Apples and elephants.

What?

 

[pottsy]

Pissing into the wind the club don't give a fuck about you. They actively want you replaced with a young foreigner who will buy half the club shop and visit twice a year.

They will do when their corporate brand gets damaged and they can’t shake off bad PR.

There’s a million different levels this can escalate to. The letter is just ensuring groups have the full support of the fan base when it does eacalate.

Oh and by the way we don’t give a fuck a out them, we were here before the directors and we’ll be here after they’ve gone.

Appeasement/ Neville Chamberlain tactics get people nowhere.

 

[Mr Grumpy]

What?

Comparing * checks notes
We'd just come up to the 1st div in 1990 and average attendance was 27k in a 60k stadium which was a fucking kip.

Not at all the same thing as watching the elite team in a top class stadium that we have now.

You are comparing apples with oranges, or rather elephants given the absolute difference between the two.

 

[jimharri]

Comparing * checks notes
We'd just come up to the 1st div in 1990 and average attendance was 27k in a 60k stadium which was a fucking kip.

Not at all the same thing as watching the elite team in a top class stadium that we have now.

You are comparing apples with oranges, or rather elephants given the absolute difference between the two.

Okay, thanks for that. Have to be honest, I've never heard of "apples and elephants". Oranges, yeah. Chalk and cheese would be the more common term used for comparing vastly different items.

 

[Mr Grumpy]

Okay, thanks for that. Have to be honest, I've never heard of "apples and elephants". Oranges, yeah. Chalk and cheese would be the more common term used for comparing vastly different items.

Was just a bit o' jesting.

 

[kippax_blueboy]

There won't be a public response. There hasn't been one yet. There might be a meeting with the groups, but the meeting will be NDA'd. The club might ignore the letter completely, bar putting out a carefully worded statement via Khaldoon (and the board), whilst the club pushes on with the agreed season ticket and match day ticket prices for next season.

We need to protest like we did in the 90s.

 

[kippax_blueboy]

Swales didn't care about us but we changed it.

 

[jrb]

I think the club think it's still just a few ungreatful nutters on Blue Moon.

It's more than that now.

 

[Gone for a Burton]

Don’t get me wrong I hope this letter has some impact. I am a season ticket holder and as I’ve said a few times on here I’ve been close to sacking it off since Covid really.

I’m in the fortunate position that the money isn’t an issue but the principle of the club slowly increasing prices while clearly finding us little more than an inconvenience irks me.

Nobody in the executive leadership really gives a toss about or understands the fans. And with some of his weird comments over the years, as brilliant as he is I partially include Pep in that.

I’m repeating myself but any genuine consideration for everyday fans went out of the window with Garry Cook.

Cookie got us.

He wouldn't have allowed this situation to arise.

He'd have found someway of squaring the the circle.

Imo...it now comes down to HH Sheikh Mansour & Khaldoon honouring their statements !!

 

[kippax_blueboy]

Cookie got us.

He wouldn't have allowed this situation to arise.

He'd have found someway of squaring the the circle.

Imo...it now comes down to HH Sheikh Mansour & Khaldoon honouring their statements !!

I am concerned that in 20 years time the demographic of our support will have nothing to do with Manchester or our history.
Partly this is about cost but more to how the club sells and distributes tickets.

 

[Gone for a Burton]

I am concerned that in 20 years time the demographic of our support will have nothing to do with Manchester or our history.
Partly this is about cost but more to how the club sells and distributes tickets.

Think Madrid & Barca !!

 

[Corky]

Cookie got us.

He wouldn't have allowed this situation to arise.

He'd have found someway of squaring the the circle.

Imo...it now comes down to HH Sheikh Mansour & Khaldoon honouring their statements !!

Cook started to drastically increase the prices and dynamic pricing (the club excuse for not adverting PL match prices from 2008/09).

He would give away free tickets to the odd fan at an event to show empathy, but was very black and white about football binge the "product" and improving the quality of the product to allow price increases further across all areas. Cat A was £28 in my area, and I had access cards for mates who I could get tickets at the front, that rose to £48 in 4 years and no one wanted to go.

 

[Gone for a Burton]

Cook started to drastically increase the prices and dynamic pricing (the club excuse for not adverting PL match prices from 2008/09).

He would give away free tickets to the odd fan at an event to show empathy, but was very black and white about football binge the "product" and improving the quality of the product to allow price increases further across all areas. Cat A was £28 in my area, and I had access cards for mates who I could get tickets at the front, that rose to £48 in 4 years and no one wanted to go.

There was no supporter push back then as we were in the early days of our evolution.

The club revenues/profits were of a very different order.

I doubt that Cookie would've overseen an alienation of our fanbase.

 

[East Level 2]

Pissing into the wind the club don't give a fuck about you. They actively want you replaced with a young foreigner who will buy half the club shop and visit twice a year.

This gets trotted out every so often but I'm not sure it's entirely true.
The club wants to alienate a relatively small (but significant) percentage of our supporter base and replace them with tourists who may or may not support City. They know there is zero chance of filling the ground with tourists on a regular basis, and they also know home PL games sell out in the final few days so there is no chance of filling an additional 7,000 seats with tourists other than perhaps 3 times a season.
If 5,000 season ticket holders were priced out, there would be a couple of thousand empty seats for many games unless prices were reduced. Consequently the club only want to piss off a couple of thousand ST holders, relying on the loyalty of the rest to accept price increases.
The lack of information regarding prices in the new NS2 indicates the club is either intending to have silly prices and risk empty seats, or still hasn't made up their minds. The less than convincing on-pitch performances this season could lead to some red faces if they go for the silly price option.

 

[kippax_blueboy]

This gets trotted out every so often but I'm not sure it's entirely true.
The club wants to alienate a relatively small (but significant) percentage of our supporter base and replace them with tourists who may or may not support City. They know there is zero chance of filling the ground with tourists on a regular basis, and they also know home PL games sell out in the final few days so there is no chance of filling an additional 7,000 seats with tourists other than perhaps 3 times a season.
If 5,000 season ticket holders were priced out, there would be a couple of thousand empty seats for many games unless prices were reduced. Consequently the club only want to piss off a couple of thousand ST holders, relying on the loyalty of the rest to accept price increases.
The lack of information regarding prices in the new NS2 indicates the club is either intending to have silly prices and risk empty seats, or still hasn't made up their minds. The less than convincing on-pitch performances this season could lead to some red faces if they go for the silly price option.

The lack of a transplant supporter plan and strategy has led to where we are mistrusting of the clubs intent.

 

[Twisted-wheel]

This is the price we pay for global marketing, tourist fans spend far more money on match day revenue than your local based fan and thus eventually driving them away from watching city. City will always have loyal support but it comes at a cost. Had to give my season ticket up a couple of years back that I’d had since 84, this was due to cost of taking my son and shift patterns of working for the NHS, however I certainly don’t miss it at all due to it feeling less and less like a community club no more and the spirit in the ground also feels like it’s taken a huge hit these days. We now have a new breed of fans that expect more than they give, however it is mainly the cost for me, parking, food and beverages is just too much now and I had to concede defeat.

 

[Cheadle_hulmeBlue]

This gets trotted out every so often but I'm not sure it's entirely true.
The club wants to alienate a relatively small (but significant) percentage of our supporter base and replace them with tourists who may or may not support City. They know there is zero chance of filling the ground with tourists on a regular basis, and they also know home PL games sell out in the final few days so there is no chance of filling an additional 7,000 seats with tourists other than perhaps 3 times a season.
If 5,000 season ticket holders were priced out, there would be a couple of thousand empty seats for many games unless prices were reduced. Consequently the club only want to piss off a couple of thousand ST holders, relying on the loyalty of the rest to accept price increases.
The lack of information regarding prices in the new NS2 indicates the club is either intending to have silly prices and risk empty seats, or still hasn't made up their minds. The less than convincing on-pitch performances this season could lead to some red faces if they go for the silly price option.

We regularly fill the ground with tourists and non city fans for every champions league game. I don’t think it would too difficult to fill those seats. For lesser games they might not always be full, but the club don’t care.

I’m hoping your right and the stands half empty - if the prices are too high.

The club don’t want long standing fans or poorer locals anymore in my opinion. We as fans need to stand up to that.

 

[Zaba's Busted Nose]

Sadly, I’d be gobsmacked if there was no increase to ticket pricing for 2025/26. From a business point of view (bearing in mind, sadly, the Club is a business owned by shareholders, not a community asset owned by its fans) why wouldn’t they put prices up?

The cost of everything is going up - labour, energy, food and drink production, supply chain, construction costs - so they’ll want to protect their margin and recover their increased overhead costs somehow. Especially given prize money revenue will be down in 2024/25 because of our poor on-pitch performance.

That will be the Club’s position I’m sure, to increase revenue wherever possible to bridge the gap in prize money and cover those ever-increasing overheads. The directors whose bonuses hinge on achieving certain revenue and profit targets will be banging the drum accordingly.

I don’t agree with any of this by the way - I wish none of the above was true. But sadly (again!) that’s the world we live in I think.

 

[jrb]

Sadly, I’d be gobsmacked if there was no increase to ticket pricing for 2025/26. From a business point of view (bearing in mind, sadly, the Club is a business owned by shareholders, not a community asset owned by its fans) why wouldn’t they put prices up?

The cost of everything is going up - labour, energy, food and drink production, supply chain, construction costs - so they’ll want to protect their margin and recover their increased overhead costs somehow. Especially given prize money revenue will be down in 2024/25 because of our poor on-pitch performance.

That will be the Club’s position I’m sure, to increase revenue wherever possible to bridge the gap in prize money and cover those ever-increasing overheads. The directors whose bonuses hinge on achieving certain revenue and profit targets will be banging the drum accordingly.

I don’t agree with any of this by the way - I wish none of the above was true. But sadly (again!) that’s the world we live in I think.

In that case, stop paying agents £60mill, get the players on the pitch on time and stop wasting £2mill in fines, and stop wasting over £100mill on players who won't ever play for City again, or are sat on the bench. That aside, there are costs to be saved all over the club. 10-15 stewards from 2 security firms are employed at the entrances to blocks 116 and 115 to check season tickets on mobile phones. The vast majority of them just stand around talking, laughing, and joking with each other, whilst the odd one checks the season tickets on fans mobile phones. The club is awash with money, but there is little or no accountability to where that money goes, or where it is wasted.