I know it's been discussed to death, but the ticketing prices at Oakwell are downright ridiculous. There were what, 8500 est Barnsley fans at the match last night? How many years has it been since we've had attendances that low - the worrying thing is, we aren't playing bad football at all! After the games, I like to have a rummage through the oppositions message boards to see their views and thoughts on the game and I've noticed a worrying trend appearing throughout, that being 'Boycott' messages about Barnsley FC and the absurd ticketing prices. At the end of the day, it's meant to be a source of entertainment, and something wholly accessible to all. How can the average family man even comprehend taking a family to watch his local side on a Tuesday night/Saturday afternoon when the ticket prices are out of this world. It's lunacy. Surely the board/whomever have to see the blatant, smack-dab-between-the-eyes obviousness error in their ways on this. Hold their hands up and make the correct adjustments to the prices. Pretty soon, it won't matter how good we're playing or where we are in the table. If the ticket prices keep escalating to obscene levels, then there won't be any fans going through the turnstiles, and there won't be a football club (ok, ok, extreme I know, but you get the gist). Come on BFC - sort it out. Make the club more accessible to the local fan base and get some people through the doors. The atmosphere will improve and hopefully, that will then leak out onto the pitch.
Maybe WE should boycott the club as well? Personally I think no match at Barnsley should cost more than £20. Get it sorted BFC.
Re: Maybe WE should boycott the club as well? Been done to death. We've had £16 games but the stay aways couldn't be arses at that price.
Whilst I agree with your points entirely, I'm not sure they could really get away with changing it now, having set the prices and categories at the start of the season. There'd be uproar from the clubs that have visited already. I think the argument has been done to death and the club will be well aware of both our and opposing fans views on this. The best we can hope for is a few sensible one-off reductions (they really should have come to an agreement with Donny like last year) and a sustained campaign to make changes from next year onwards. No doubt we'll have lost a lot of floating fans in the meantime, so it'll take something spectacular, but the 100 year anniversary of the cup win gives them the perfect opportunity to test it out. I wish the clubs visiting Oakwell would address their 'boycotts' formally to BFC. Perhaps if they received 100's of letters and e-mails every week from people saying they would have come to the game had it not been priced at £30, that might make more of a difference than moaning on their message boards.
Re: Maybe WE should boycott the club as well? Because odd games aeren't going to do it. People get into the habit of not coming, they'll then stop looking at prices for upcoming games thinking they are all £30. Should be approx £20 a game....varying pricing between stands.
Re: Maybe WE should boycott the club as well? I agree. Nobody can say that the price of the Watford game wasn't widely publicised yet what difference did it make? None whatsoever. I have a lot of sympathy with the marketing team because trying to tempt back some of our stay away fans must be like trying to plait fog. ***Disclaimer*** When I say stay away fans I am of course not referring to those fans who genuinely can't afford to go. I just wanted to spell this out to avoid offending anybody who incorrectly interprets this post as an attack on all fans who don’t go.
Re: Maybe WE should boycott the club as well? Nothings going to change with matchday prices this season and l'll bet "The Don" will come out at the end of the season saying its a success, takings are up etc etc... The best we can hope for is some good 125 years centenary season ticket deal next season to try and get the missing couple of thousand back or improve our fan base. If they aren't going to drop matchday prices for the remainder of this season at least they could get the details of the half season ticket out early and give some price options (2 payments? 30th November & end of December?) or will this be announced a few weeks before the tickets start?
Re: Other fans message boards Dunno but it might be worth doing. I spoke to a few Hull fans yesterday who would have gone to the game but decided against the £30 and asked them to do just that. Might be a new way of exerting some pressure on BFC
There were 9186 Barnsley fans at the Watford game There were 8430 Barnsley fans at last night's game. So it did make some difference. Was it enough to make the same amount of money from Barnsley fans? I don't know, but I bet it was close. I know one thing though, we can't afford to be losing 700 fans.
Re: Maybe WE should boycott the club as well? Because a one off game against one of the worst teams in the league isn't going to work. If they back the Twenty Is Plenty campaign and make every single game no matter if we are playing Leeds United or Peterborough United 20 quid for an adult ticket the crowds would soon go up. No need for the 1912 membership or for catergories. Everyone knows that whenever they go to Oakwell the price will always be twenty for an adult.
Re: Maybe WE should boycott the club as well? Soon changed your tune. It wasn't that long ago you were saying people should make cut backs...
Re: Maybe WE should boycott the club as well? maybe they should up the price to £70 a game....keep the poor and the riff raff out...... maybe these 'fans' could be hand picked by Mr Hill?
Re: Maybe WE should boycott the club as well? Just about to post the same. 'If you walk to the game, don't go to the boozer with your mates, have a large carbohydrate & protein breakfast around 11am that'll last you until tea time and take a bottle of tap water then your day out will only cost £30'
Re: Maybe WE should boycott the club as well? "'If you walk to the game, don't go to the boozer with your mates, have a large carbohydrate & protein breakfast around 11am that'll last you until tea time and take a bottle of tap water then your day out will only cost £30'" The problem is it ISN'T a DAY out. It is one and a half hours of 'entertainment' (inconsistent at that) and for that, given the current economic climate, £30 is way way too much regardless of people circumstances. People blame stay away fans instead of looking at the true culprits. greedy agents, out of touch FA and League officials, FIFA UEFA, club chairmen and owners who seem oblivious and immune to the difficulties experienced by their fans. Whilst I still have an interest in BFC and wish them well, I have for some time found myself apathetic about football in general to the extent that I no longer go to liove matches and indeed watch far less football on television. I suspect in that there are many tens of thousands of 'missing' fans - missing for the same reason. wwe are no longer prepared to give up hard earned cash to support lavish lifestyles for people who kick a football around for a living, most of whom, frankly, couldnt give a toss about the average man and would struggle to make a decent living if they had to rely on brainpower and qualifications. Simply put, until football 're-adjusts' like the rest of the world is having to, many more people will desert the game (in spite of all the hype). This will involve a multilateral agreement at wage capping and on that I don't think the legislation of turnover/wage bill relationship goes far enough and will simply polarise the discrepancy between big and small clubs further. I am not holding my breath though as while ever fans pay the ever increasing prices the clubsa dn leagues will get away with it. Only by boycotting matches will the message get through. It doesn't matter how good the football is on the field it is the crowd and the atmosphere generated that makes a football match the spectacle and 'event' that it is both live and on TV. Sky et al would soon lose sponsorship and advertising revenue once interest waned and the wheels would come off the gravy train forcing clubs to drastically cut players wages. Like I said though I ain't holding my breath.
Re: Maybe WE should boycott the club as well? Ive had a season ticket for years and dont miss many at home, but if I had to pay £30 to watch us then that would be me finished, I cant afford it. The club are killing themselves with ticket pricing, I know about 20 lads in this very situation, they would love to go but cant afford £30. I cant see how the club make that much revenue from the tickets sales as im sure most of the income is TV money, so why not make the walk up fan pay a standard £20 every home game. Still on the pricey side but at least going to the match wont be like sitting in a church.
Re: Maybe WE should boycott the club as well? Yerbut the problem is, and here I sympathise with Barnsley FC and clubs in a similar position, they are effectively hog tied with pricing. To compete on the field they have , to some extent, got to pay the 'going rate' for players. It is that 'going rate' that is killing the game. I feel that football will suffer the same fate as the investment banks unless they get their house in order only the impact on the rest of us will be far less. The other possibility is the game may take off in the emerging economies of China etc and the decline of European and South American football will result as all the wages and agents move to where the money is. To mea that would be a good thing and we would get back to sanity and real football. Anyone who remembers the 60s and 70s where kids could go to every home game using pocket money from paper rounds etc would not deny the excitement was still there even if the football quality wasn't. I remember walking from Monk Bretton for most home games to watch Winstanley, Bob Earnshaw, Eric Brookes, etc in the old 3rd and 4th divisions in front of 11-12k crowds with occasional 20K+ for FA cup games against the likes of Leicester, Cardiff etc. and, although the football may not have been as technically good as it is now the coomitment and passion of both players and crowd more than compensated. Too much money for journeymen footballers has ruined the game.
Re: Maybe WE should boycott the club as well? It still comes back to the point that the clubs fanbase is reducing by a rate of thousands every season, and they address this by increasing ticket prices, its bizzare how they see it makes sense?? Unless the club make drastic changes to ticket prices we wont have the fanbase to support any kind of level. I agree its not just a barnsley problem but a football one, Although for clubs like ours there are ways round it. A club somewhere did a scheme where if they sold 10,000 season tickets everyone got £50 off there season tickets. If they sold 15000 tickets, they saved £100 and so on.
Re: Maybe WE should boycott the club as well? Try thinking out of the box. All talk is about maximising revenue. As I said the problem is NOT revenue in football. There are vast sums sloshing around. The problem is getting COSTS down and, I say again, the overwhelming thing crippling clubs is the wages bill. Cap that multilaterally and problem solved - you could sell tickets at a tenner and half that for kidsa and concessions and even with the same crowd base you have now clubs would still be better off. At a tenner with players paid sensible wages you would have many more people going to football matches. Football should be not much dearer than going to the cinema.
