How do YOU see Barnsley Football Club?

I’ve just posted this on another thread responding to a post portraying the club as ‘little old Barnsley, fighting above our weight’ etc etc.
I’m just wondering how many more has those views ???

How do I see Barnsley?
I look at:
The town and it’s locality to other conurbations.
The catchment area of c300,000 people.
The high level of football interest within this part of Yorkshire.
The relatively poor success history of the club.
The glass ceiling mentality that exists throughout the club.
How the football support within the catchment area has been squeezed by clubs in neighbouring cities.
The incredibly poor marketing strategy of the club.

And I’m sure the new owners and CEO will have looked at all these.

I see us to be similar to how Watford is now.
Unfortunately many of our fans can’t see this.

 

I would imagine that Watford is a more affluent Town than Barnsley.

 

Just out of interest, and this is a genuine question Nudger, how would you market the club differently?

 

It is remarkably similar in many ways, both population & demographics. It has a larger asian & non white population.
Quite a working class place & a bit run down TBH.

A lot of the old industries, printing, engineering, furniture manufacture have closed down. It's close to London though, which has to help with
player recruitment & sponsorship.

 

You think the glass ceiling mentality exists at the club now ?

As regards marketing, I never cease to be amazed at people who think marketing is just a 'flick of the switch' thing - you 'do some marketing' and that's it - it needs to be a long term constant regular message. The new owners have been in post 9 months or so, and have had to deal with the (what could be argued as inevitable) result of a season and a half of transfer dealings by the previous regime. As a club we are bound by whatever the financial rules are for league 1, but basically they cannot just throw money at it as some would want, but have to be a bit smarter through this magical thing called marketing, sponsorship etc. Patrick Cryne was quite right when he tried to move the club to some form of self sufficiency should he not be around without a new owner to take over - it looks to me as if the new owners are trying to make the business grow as well as ensure on field success - there are costs associated with not selling Kieffer Moore, Pinnock, Lindsay - all of whom we had substantial bids for in the summer - and so I know it irks a few on here, but credit has to be given for not selling players, as would have happened previously imho. Tom Bradshaw wanted a move for family reasons, and I think it's also to their credit that they facilitated that, and brought a replacement in.

So the building of BFC isn't just headline grabbing 'marketing' it's soft networking - see the letter to the reds fan having issues , it's left of field stuff (New York Billboard) and it's funding the daily operations (not selling best players). There's a long way to go with the nuts & bolts of the matchday experience in terms of catering if nothing else, but to me we appear to be a happier, more open club than we ever were before. Ganaye doesn't have to be on Radio Sheffield every 5 minutes spewing hot air like Mansford, the activities of the club are doing that to a much wider audience, and the excellent start to the season has helped. But it hasn't ended, there'll be more initiatives, more events etc that will come out to promote the long term ethos of the club as it is now. Again, it's only been 9 months into a very long term project.

 

I see the town as parochial. I didn't realise it when I lived there. But when you look at other towns and cities, even really close by, it has a really insular mindset and the town doesn't seem to have leadership, an aspiration or plan to move forward. It lacks in big businesses, so doesn't have anything much to drag it up through employment, and the educational environment offers less than other towns and cities so the ambitious commonly have to move away, near or far.

Despite that, it has an abundance of nature and countryside, though nothing of outstanding beauty, agriculture and decent connectivity on its doorstep.

It's history is harsh, and it's people echo that, though I speak of the latter generations, I cant comment on the current.

As a football club, being less than an hour to the big cities of Sheffield, Leeds, Manchester and just about Nottingham too, we've been in the shadows traditionally. The town being so unfashionable doesn't help, but nowadays, football success bears little correlation to historical success, size or locality.

We have very very wealthy owners and if we get back to the Championship I'll be extremely interested to see what they do, what their ambitions are and what strategies they adopt.

In the few months they've been in charge, I've been pleased with the smaller changes that've been made (though some stem from before their tenure). It would've been very easy after relegation to shelve everything.

So how do I see the club? For what it is at this moment. A league 1 club with very wealthy owners who haven't placed the club in significant debt and seem to be making slightly better commercial decisions than what went before.

But to assume we'll reach the top flight is but hope and optimism. It may happen, it may not. But if it does, it will be because of good choices, good decisions and wise investment.

 

Success of course has to start on the field.
Marketing then has to be maintained on the back of that success.
This couldn’t be done effectively during the Patrick era because we knew every success would be followed by a dip in form - basically because Patrick unfortunately didn’t have the funds available to maintain those successes.

I think under the Chien ownership we will see the club being recognised on the field more and more.
The club has then the task of appealing to football supporters within the Barnsley District - and the bigger task of appealing to football supporters beyond the district boundary.
I think the key to attracting supporters from beyond the district boundary would be to have something that those supporters can relate to.

How do you get football supporters from Denby Dale, Thorpe Hesley, Mexborough and South Elmsall to support Barnsley?

 

Its a very good question. The only thing that would entice fans from that area to come to games is as you say, success on the field.

The only other thing I could think of is doing a similar season ticket offer to what Bradford and Huddersfield do.

 

Im from the Denby Dale area but the majority of Barnsley fans I know from there like me have family originating from Barnsley. I grew up being one of very very few at school who was a reds fan.

 

There are a lot of satellite towns and villages beyond the district boundary that see Barnsley as the place they traditionally went to for things like the market or a night out.
They have an affiliation with the town.

 

There are, especially likes of Fitz and South Elmsall etc but you'll always be struggling with HD8 given that they already have a premier league team in situ. Kids growing up with no affiliation to Barnsley are highly unlikely to choose them over town. Not unless they want the levels of abuse i got as a kid!

 

Agree with every word of that.

 

A lot of points worthy of debate Nudger, but why do you have to spoil it with the last sentence. Do you really see yourself as the special one?

 

As I said in another post, I see us as "inbetweeners" flitting between championship and league one. One of the last of the top 50% or so clubs to get real investment and something to rally behind.

As someone that doesn't come from Barnsley I have mixed feelings about other reds fans. All the ones I know personally, some of them post on here, are knowledgeable and whilst not all agreeing with every point, fair minded and mainly positive.

Some of the fans that post on social media, and sometimes I'm unlucky enough to be near at games, are like monkeys on the club's back. Waiting for any excuse to put the knife in.

I don't know if that's exclusive to Barnsley fans or Barnsley people, but I always sense a mixture of love and distrust for the club from top to bottom.

 

The ...... love and distrust .... is probably a result of countless false starts.
We have been lucky enough to have witnessed some great teams and players at the club - only to find that it’s all trickling away.

 

Please explain , what is trickling away please ?

 

We're in danger of trickling away with the league this season.

Those great players and teams you speak of weren't the norm at Oakwell. The Clarke and Hunter years were almost 40 years ago, 20 years ago the prem season, with sprinklings of success in between by means of cup runs and local derby wins.

There have been many times you could have said it's trickling away when we were towing our bags out after the miners strike, but just over a decade later we were in the prem.

After the premier league, relegation we came back and were a game away from going back.

Dark days of administration followed by promotion in 2006.

Last season's relegation is currently being followed by resurgence.

Plenty to look forward to and be positive about in my opinion.

 

I see us at potential Checkatrade Trophy winners! COYR!

 

Barnsley, is like a lot of post industrial towns, in that it doesn't have an identity in terms of industries people work in.

It is why there are loads of arguments about Labour too. Old Labour or (Tory lite) New Labour?

I think the football team is pretty much all the town has, other than the amazing & iconic town hall. I left the town nearly 30 years ago, but I'm drawn like a moth to a light to watch my team. The team I loved as a kid. The team I'll always love.

 

Well GG obviously doesn't. He aint going to tell him anything. According to his last interview he is gonna keep his cards close to his chest until the game is won.