Sunderland Season Ticket Sales
- Thread starter BeanBeany
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parmoboy
Well-known member
Sheffield Wednesdays' adult ticket pricing is more expensive than ours but even they have cheaper junior tickets.
£100 for U17s and £60 for U11s.
The issue I have with our junior pricing is that we only have the one U18 price. The club should at least consider having an U18 category, and keeping it at £186, and then setting up an U16 category, charging £100.
I feel it's wrong that the club are expecting school kids to pay £186 for their season ticket. It would cost a parent £666 to buy season cards with their kid and sit in the north or the south stand.
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indeedido
Well-known member
I am far from an apologist for Gibson - I have repeatedly criticised the ridiculous premium from Early Bird SC prices per match and match day prices. Concessions for kids for match day tickets are also far too high.
HOWEVER - some fans (especially B-G) need some real perspective and Gibson needs to be cut some slack.
BG says he wants a price for him and his lad outside the GRFZ, as he can't get in.
Last season he would have paid £628 on average on 2 SC's in the North Stand (EB's and New) for him and his lad up to the age of 18. That is £27.30 per match for the pair. I think that was decent value.
The same average SC pairing in West Upper would have paid £796 or £34.64 per match for the pair.
The GRFZ SC prices are too low. The Dad and U11 combo was on average £480 or £20.87 per match. The Dad and U18 combo was on average £566 or £24.60 per match.
I am basing this solely on the data Rob released from the club. Bare in mind the club pass on VAT from these prices and don't realise it all themselves.
The disgrace is the Walk up prices.
We have empty seats because people either don't or can't commit to SC's and because the Walk up prices are insult prices.
I am certain that more creative Match Day pricing or short term bundles, together with reduced Match Day child prices would sell more tickets to more matches. It could be done to avoid the risk of losing long term SC holders.
The Club averaged 26,012 last season despite very low away turnouts.
This despite a really poor start to the season where crowds were lower.
Lower Match Day tickets or clever packaging of matches would perhaps have sold maybe an average of an extra 2k, which actually wouldn't put us much behind capacity inc segregation.
The prices have gone up for the new season, but this has been done to death.
1. The Club lose money every season outside the PL. GO'N cover the loss.
2. The Club have faced massive inflationary pressures.
3. The increase in SC prices will not generate more than half of the money needed to cover the inflationary impact the club has faced.
4. Despite the price increase, the club have sold significantly more tickets than last year.
HOWEVER - some fans (especially B-G) need some real perspective and Gibson needs to be cut some slack.
BG says he wants a price for him and his lad outside the GRFZ, as he can't get in.
Last season he would have paid £628 on average on 2 SC's in the North Stand (EB's and New) for him and his lad up to the age of 18. That is £27.30 per match for the pair. I think that was decent value.
The same average SC pairing in West Upper would have paid £796 or £34.64 per match for the pair.
The GRFZ SC prices are too low. The Dad and U11 combo was on average £480 or £20.87 per match. The Dad and U18 combo was on average £566 or £24.60 per match.
I am basing this solely on the data Rob released from the club. Bare in mind the club pass on VAT from these prices and don't realise it all themselves.
The disgrace is the Walk up prices.
We have empty seats because people either don't or can't commit to SC's and because the Walk up prices are insult prices.
I am certain that more creative Match Day pricing or short term bundles, together with reduced Match Day child prices would sell more tickets to more matches. It could be done to avoid the risk of losing long term SC holders.
The Club averaged 26,012 last season despite very low away turnouts.
This despite a really poor start to the season where crowds were lower.
Lower Match Day tickets or clever packaging of matches would perhaps have sold maybe an average of an extra 2k, which actually wouldn't put us much behind capacity inc segregation.
The prices have gone up for the new season, but this has been done to death.
1. The Club lose money every season outside the PL. GO'N cover the loss.
2. The Club have faced massive inflationary pressures.
3. The increase in SC prices will not generate more than half of the money needed to cover the inflationary impact the club has faced.
4. Despite the price increase, the club have sold significantly more tickets than last year.
Decent value compared to what? Why are we so much more expensive than the other Championship clubs? The ones defending the ticket prices can't answer that question. What do we get at Boro that you don't get at Watford, WBA, Sunderland, Swansea etc. Because they can all price it much more competitively.
For similar tickets I could watch:
WBA - £372
Watford - £472
Coventry - £525
Sunderland- £438
Swansea - £426
Watford and Coventry do have cheaper family stands that would make it much cheaper but I used their standard ticket pricing outside family areas to keep.it comparable.
I didn't say that. I want the ticket pricing rolled out across the stadium so I can sit where I want at a fair(er) price.
Its the club who need the perspective. We aren't in the Premier League or London so dont charge Premier League or London prices.
Anyway it's been done to death. I'll probably end up with an ST because I've been looking forward to my oldest being at an age where I can eventually take him regularly but I do think its a bitter pill to swallow. Its only going to get worse when my younger two lads are old enough to also go at which point I could be totally priced out. Or I might just do what I did last season and go to a handful of Boro games and then have a couple of weekends away watching Premier League Football.
indeedido
Well-known member
What part of this don't you get?
You appear to want to go for under £20 per match, for both you and your child, just because one or two clubs do.
The last ticket receipts published for 2021-22 were £9.46m and covered less than a third of the 28.43m wage bill.
The total revenue for that season was £26.9m and did not cover the wage bill, let alone cover the cost of buying players, running the Academy, running Rockliffe or The Riverside, or the cost of all the goods sold by the club.
People in the GRFZ are getting a crazy deal. People are now locked out of it and want the same pricing for other parts of the stadium. It is barmy.
4,049 total SC holders in the GRFZ generated a total of £930k.
The Adults paid the same as the adults in the North, South and Corners.
894 under 11's paid £9k in total.
A further 1207 under 18's paid £74k in total.
So 2101 under 18's in the GRFZ paid just over £83k in total. £39.50 each. It is effectively giving the Cards away.
27% of last season SC holders were kids, generating 9% of Non Hospitality SC revenue.
5% were 18-21, generating 4% of ticket revenue.
15% were Over 65's and generated 15% of ticket revenue.
3% were Personal Assistants and paid nothing.
Over half of the 19.1k Non Hospitality SC holders were Concessions, and generated just over a quarter of the Non Hospitality SC revenue.
I agree the premium by match is far too high, but the SC prices are good value, especially on EB.
It is adults we have a problem luring and adult Walk up prices once SC's are done.
What part don't you get?
I want a comparative price for a season ticket (actually two, potentially three) to the rest of the league. It's not one or two clubs. I quoted five clubs above and I picked them because they were the first five that came into my mind in the championship that were the most similar in size. If I did more digging, I'm sure the rest of the league would be in the same ball park as them, not ours. I could have included Huddersfield which would cost less than £300 for me and my son or Wigan that would cost £380 but I considered these clubs smaller than ours and less value in the comparison. I've literally checked the price of 7 clubs and we are nowhere near any of them.
No one is getting a crazy deal. The people in GRFZ are getting a better deal than the people elsewhere in the ground but still paying more than the rest of the league.
The problem is you are breaking this down to a match by match basis and comparing to our own ridiculously high matchday prices and trying to use that as a justification instead of comparing it to other clubs. Get your blinkers off.
As for the rest of your post, breaking down the clubs financials and revenue isn't my concern and I really couldn't care-a-less. Exactly the same as I couldn't care about the revenue breakdowns on Cineworld or Showcase Cinema. What I do care about is what am I paying for a ticket? And if I'm paying more, what am I getting extra for my money?
Because from what I can see, I am paying roughly 50% more than our competitors for 23 games of Championship football. The only difference being that I support Boro and that is where my heart is otherwise I wouldn't even consider it.
jam69
Well-known member
One or two clubs ? It's the vast majority that charge a lot less
Yep. 20 of the 22 that have released ticket prices. Their cheapest season ticket is cheaper than our cheapest season ticket. That includes 3 teams just relegated where fans would have been paying that for PL football.
And somehow our season tickets look like good value compared to walk-ups which shows how expensive they are.
As someone who lives outside the area it really puts me off going even when I'm in the area when I know it's going to cost me so much. I feel like I'm being ripped off. I pay it begrudgingly at times but I can afford it and as a one-off it's not going to make a huge difference. The people that live in the area and can't justify a season ticket are the ones being most shafted by the £30+ per game walk-up prices and it's ridiculous prices for an adult taking a child for a one-off game. I go to away games local to me instead and regularly sit in home ends and it's far cheaper.
Late to this. It wasn't the revenue that was the majority, it was relating to the amount of OAP and kids being a high proportion of ticket sales.
Colgates_shaving_foam
Well-known member
Ah right, I'm not sure if that's actually what I meant and I wrote gibberish instead.
indeedido
Well-known member
Nonsense.
If we all paid even less for our SC's (and your lad is another that came for nowt), it is an even bigger loss the club makes. And who covers the extra loss?
You don't "care-a-less" about anything other than what you pay and whether you can get somebody to subsidise you eventually bringing your three kids.
Over half of our SC holders last season were U18, over 65, or Personal Assistants, generating just over a quarter of the SC revenue exc Hospitality.
The crowds are up, there are loads of kids going and paying very little.
I grew up in the 70's in effect and there were Leeds, Liverpool, Man Utd, Spurs, Everton, Arsenal and Chelsea shirts all over our playgounds. Big Jack switched a lot, but you will always get some people looking up at the PL when we are not in it. Adults not just kids.
With rubbish away crowds at The Riverside, we still averaged over 26k.
Flexible deals on more affordable walk up prices including cheap kids will help fill in some more empty seats.
The midweek games are already significantly cheaper.
Maybe, or maybe the increase in sales/merchandise/refreshments would balance it out. If the club need to charge 50-80% more than most other championship clubs to stay afloat then there is something wrong with the way the club is being managed. The fans shouldn't be the ones to foot the bill. The club needs to look at why we need to do that. We are either overspending or we aren't earning enough revenue through other streams.
In terms of the breakdown of the revenue, yes I couldn't care other than what I pay. There's people in well paid jobs within the club to worry about the other things you've mentioned. I'm not asking for anyone to subsidise me bringing my kids and to be fair it's pretty offensive to phrase it like that. I want a fair pricing structure that is in line with the rest of the League. Other clubs can do it. They see the benefit. Not sure why you find this so difficult to comprehend. If the club don't I just won't stump it up. It's as simple as that. I'll go to a few games when I feel like it and probably pop to the Etihad a couple of weekends for an extra tenner and watch some World Class players. On that note, I could get a season ticket for me and my son in the Etihad for £585 and watch some of the best players in the world in the world for less money than MFC want for Championship football.
Rubbish away crowds, another by-product of the MFC pricing structure.
The crowds are up because we've had a good season and we've played some really good football and we were in a promotion race. People had Wembley tickets in the back of their mind towards the end of the season.
They'll be down just as quick when the football isn't as good. Like it always is. Look it over ten years instead of ten months.
This doesn't mean that we have "enough" U18s. It just highlights how few adults we have.
From latest census data demographic data shows that 14% of the population are 6-18, 19% are 65-90, 5% are 18-21, 56% are 22-65 aka working age adults. (I'm excluding Ages 0-5 and 90+ because I presume there are very low numbers in those age groups)
Either our fanbase doesn't reflect the national demographics or something else is wrong. Taking your figures from earlier on ST sales at 19,100 we should have:
5-18 : 2,933
18-21: 952
22-64: 11,567
65-90: 3,649
but we had:
5-18 : 5,157
18-21: 955
22-64: 9,550
65-90: 2,865
We've either got way too many U18s attending than we should have or we've got way too few of everything else. If 5,157 is the correct number it means we are missing 14k fans in other age categories. 18-21 is the closest age category to being the correct representation. If we assume that is correct then we treat the additional 2,200 U18s as a bonus but we are missing 2,063 18-64 and 798 65+.
I think it's safe to assume that we have more U18s than we should because of the prices so maybe if we had more appropriate prices for other age groups we would have a more representative spread of the age categories which would bring in more money because it is the full price paying segment that is missing.
I do agree with @B_G though. It doesn't matter whether we earned £9.46m and that means that's what we should have to earn this season. As a Boro fan I care about what I pay. If the club can't compete with other teams that have cheaper tickets it's probably because we are overpaying on other things (like massive wages for **** players). Fans shouldn't be punished for the incompetence of the people handing out contracts. How much happier would every Middlesbrough fan be if instead of spending whatever we spent on James Lea Siliki and Aaron Connolly we reduced ticket prices? Saying we have to waste this money on poor players so we can't reduce ticket prices is no different than a government saying they can't pay nurses wages because they have to prioritise billionaires' portfolios.
18MFC76
Well-known member
Redwurzel
Well-known member
If we are the most expensive ticket prices in the Championship - how come I am looking at my Swansea away ticket and it says £32.50 and my Bristol City away ticket says £33!
These tickets were in a cheap area of the stadium i.e behind the goal.
Away fans paid a ticket face value of £31 for an upper tier East Stand seat at the Riverside for a weekend game and £28 for midweek league game.
Please don't say "smoke and mirrors" it sounds like Donald Trump after the US elections.
The prices I quoted are real ones.
We are not cheap and more expensive than the average, but overall not miles higher than other clubs and possibly not higher than at all, against some clubs.
Preston fans in their review of the Riverside said our food and drink was above average value of money compared with other Championship clubs and parking close by was very cheap - most Boro fans I suspect park for free away from the stadium. I often have to pay £5 at away games, I think I paid £7 one season at Reading (2015/16). So as a package it was judged the best away stadiums to visit in the Championship by Preston fans, including best value see link.
To me what you pay at Boro is directly linked to our spend on players - so we could charge £20 adults and £10 kids and a season tickets for around £320 (EB) as some on here want and run a squad on around 70% of the current budget. Play more kids less senior players or sell Akpom and bring in the Teesside lad from Notts County as a replacement.
Having wrote what I have, I do appreciate a minority of fans are priced out, certainly from regular attendance. I read an article today about the new Sky TV deal for 2024/5 onwards and if in the Championship our revenue from Sky could rise about 50%, but live games on Sky will rise too by around 50%. It will be great if MFC could use some of this increased revenue to reduce ticket prices, say by 20% (£1.6m cost). This would be an opportunity to reduce prices without reducing the quality of the squad. (I sure Rob Nichols & co has taken this on board when they sit down with the Club Officials).
Ref "only selling 20k season tickets" (2023/4 early bird) - do posters realise when we were in the Premier League under SMac we only had around 21k season ticket holders in total, with players like Southgate and Boksic on our books!
These tickets were in a cheap area of the stadium i.e behind the goal.
Away fans paid a ticket face value of £31 for an upper tier East Stand seat at the Riverside for a weekend game and £28 for midweek league game.
Please don't say "smoke and mirrors" it sounds like Donald Trump after the US elections.
The prices I quoted are real ones.
We are not cheap and more expensive than the average, but overall not miles higher than other clubs and possibly not higher than at all, against some clubs.
Preston fans in their review of the Riverside said our food and drink was above average value of money compared with other Championship clubs and parking close by was very cheap - most Boro fans I suspect park for free away from the stadium. I often have to pay £5 at away games, I think I paid £7 one season at Reading (2015/16). So as a package it was judged the best away stadiums to visit in the Championship by Preston fans, including best value see link.
To me what you pay at Boro is directly linked to our spend on players - so we could charge £20 adults and £10 kids and a season tickets for around £320 (EB) as some on here want and run a squad on around 70% of the current budget. Play more kids less senior players or sell Akpom and bring in the Teesside lad from Notts County as a replacement.
Having wrote what I have, I do appreciate a minority of fans are priced out, certainly from regular attendance. I read an article today about the new Sky TV deal for 2024/5 onwards and if in the Championship our revenue from Sky could rise about 50%, but live games on Sky will rise too by around 50%. It will be great if MFC could use some of this increased revenue to reduce ticket prices, say by 20% (£1.6m cost). This would be an opportunity to reduce prices without reducing the quality of the squad. (I sure Rob Nichols & co has taken this on board when they sit down with the Club Officials).
Ref "only selling 20k season tickets" (2023/4 early bird) - do posters realise when we were in the Premier League under SMac we only had around 21k season ticket holders in total, with players like Southgate and Boksic on our books!
Borokian1876
Well-known member
What season was that? There was a good few seasons you couldn’t get a ST
indeedido
Well-known member
The fans DON’T foot the bill. The Club loses a fortune every season.
Tickets covered less than a third of the wage bill.
"I'm not asking for anyone to subsidise me bringing my kids and to be fair it's pretty offensive to phrase it like that. I want a fair pricing structure that is in line with the rest of the League. If the club don't I just won't stump it up. It's as simple as that. I'll go to a few games when I feel like it and probably pop to the Etihad a couple of weekends for an extra tenner and watch some World Class players. On that note, I could get a season ticket for me and my son in the Etihad for £585 and watch some of the best players in the world in the world for less money than MFC want for Championship football".
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Redwurzel
Well-known member
Nano - some good research om tne age categories. I believe Teesside has lower life expectancy than 90% of the UK which could explain the lower figures for over 65s. BBC Panorama reported male life expectancy was only 62 in Central Stockton. Central Middesbrough maybe slighly higher, but still in the 60s.
I don't have figures, but my gut feeling is that quite a few young people leave Teesside after getting A levels or joining the Armed Forces and don't return back on a premanent basis. There are too few well paying job opportunities or better lifestyle away for them.
I am really proud of the 5,000 plus kids that have STs with so much pressure on them to support a Plastic manufactured Premier Team.
I think there were some poor and expensive decisions in 2017/18 on players and the club paid the price right up to 2021, but in recent years there have been some successful decisions such as Spence, Akpom, McGree, Ramsay, Archer, Crooks, Forss. Fees from Spence and Tavernier have probably financed the whole Club's transfer business since 2019. Forest's wage bill in 2020 was £30m, £25m for Boro is not evidence of incompetence, for a team finishing 10th, 7th and 4th. So I have to diasgree the club is incompetent with money in the last 4 years.
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Redwurzel
Well-known member
2002/3
We had a crowd of 22k against Wigan that season
During some of the Robbo era you needed a ST - I was comparing Mclaren era when novelty of the Riverside wore off and there were no Juninho signings. We still spent over £8m on Maccarone in 2002.
Well if our wage bill is 50-100% more expensive than the teams like Sunderland/West Brom/Watford and we have been promoted once in 15 years, then it just further demonstrates the mismanagement of the club.
Or are all these clubs running at a bigger loss than Boro? Why is it only boro that needs to cover these costs through inflated ticket pricing?
Like I said in previous post. Not interested in financial breakdowns. Just want to pay a fair price for my season ticket that other Championship fans pay. If the club is at a loss after charging 50-100% more than the majority of other Championship clubs then its being mis-managed. Fans shouldn't be expected to pay inflated prices to cover a high wage bill or other outgoings in my opinion.
It would be different if we had been relegated after a period of time in the Premier League and we had Premier League wages to cover for a couple of years and tickets had to remain high for a couple of seasons, I would be able to understand it. We've been a Championship team for 15 years, our ticket prices should reflect it. Like West Brom, like Sunderland, like Watford.