Reconnecting with the people of Barnsley.

What should the club do? How do they get the armchair supporters back into Oakwell?

The scale of our town, for me, means that the football club as to be the heartbeat of it. The relationship between Barnsley FC and the people of the town needs to be strong, and people of all walks need to be able to reach out and take a piece of the action if they want to, not if they can.

Let's use this thread to generate some ideas to try and make our proud little club, proud once more.

> > Build from the ground up. Freebies to schools in the form of tickets for upcoming matches. Visits from Toby Tyke (who can be more useful than the actual players in this regard). Freebies in the shape of scarves, footballs, keyrings, pencil cases, pens, rulers, erasers etc...get the name of Barnsley football club circulating throughout the town (even if it is only on a ruler). Talks with schools regarding the history and upcoming events etc. Get the kids nagging their parents to take them to matches. Free tours of Oakwell for kids under 8 etc. Free magazines/flyers for schools with recent match reports and the adventures of Toby Tyke with player cards and albums. Kids need something or someone to look up to. They look up to Batman, Spiderman, Messi etc, get them looking up to Toby Tyke and/or other player/ambassadors for the club. How about primary school text books? Offering help with English/Maths etc...themed obviously with Barnsley related sentences/questions and pictures of players.

> > More promotions. More advertising. Tickets for a fiver for the Brighton, Wolves etc... match. Free programme with a valid ticket. Free shirt with 'lucky numbered' tickets. Promotions with town centre businesses. Flyers in Greggs. Adverts on local busses and local papers. Discounts on match tickets when purchasing XXXX amount of goods from Timpson etc. More offers on merchandise e.g. Weekly, Monthly, Seven Days of... with Friday offering the club away shirt with £10 off for one day only. Surely the club have a database of all the supporters? How about semi-automated text messages offering fans 'last chance' 15% off matchday tickets two days before the match. Family tickets for XXX amount/X% off and free programme with each bundle. Free coach travel to Sheffield Wednesday. More days like the Blackpool match for the 125 year celebrations.

The fans that have disconnected with the club, want to feel wanted. They want to be able to reconnect and want something back. The fans are the cornerstone of any football club, and are vitally important, especially with a club the size of ours.

Post your ideas and lets see if we can get something going here.

 

There are some pretty good ideas there.

 

Win our remaining fixtures and secure a place in the Premiership. That should do it.

 

First and foremost we have to start winning games again because when you have our win record in any calendar year you will struggle to tempt casual fans back regardless of the initiatives you have in place.

 

Granted - a winning team would probably bring back the armchair supporters, but I'm talking about a club that has slowly (over the last 10 years) become more and more disassociated with the surrounding community. A club that has lost its focal point. A club that needs to become the heartbeat of the town once again.

 

We need a marketing team and general manager who know what they're doing.

 

Not having Billy Bullsh1tter spouting on about how great he is while the team lose every week might help.

 

To be honest it might annoy a minority of fans but the manager has got nack all to do with it. The disengagement with fans is partly to do with the wider malaise in football and partly to do with the day to day running of the club. Those running the club simply use the manager who has the lowest budget in the league as a scape goat when we unsuprisingly find it difficult to stay up.

The board should pick a manager they believe is best to fit in to a long term strategy that is realistic within the financial constraints they set. They should then have the conviction to stick to that vision. A managerial appointment shouldn't be based on reconnecting with the fans. That is the responsibility of those running the club through a whole array of initiatives which we seem incapable of inventing or successfully implementing.

 

Free tickets to schools

Sounds like a brilliant idea doesn't it. Everyone always mentions it and can't believe the club doesn't do it.

Who takes all the kids to the game and is responsible for them while they're there? Who organizes and pays for all the transport?

I know who is expected to do it.

 

So do I. Mine's daft enough to do it, though....

 

Offer schoolkids a fiver a ticket and parent gets in free and sorts own transport.

 

How about

creating a proper Board of Directors with local people represented?

 

Does 'matchday experience' matter?

Or is it just a load of **** that modern football has brought in? Man City pride themselves on their matchday experience, fan parks etc. But do clubs like us need to bother?

Generally, the majority of folk come to the ground between 2 & 3. Always have, always will. The only thing that will bring people back is a successful side so should Don et al bother with the TVs, scoreboards etc?

 

Sorry but that's wrong, i know for a fact the last manager stopped fans coming,.

 

Expected silence from mark stokes when I pushed him last week about polish tapping. Pushed it at two meetings now and still nothing. Could be the 1500 on gate we need to make it £20.

Some good ideas but way too many freebies

 

The Chron could quite easily sponsor a Tomas Cywka column - a significant part of the borough's population might not be able to understand it but it could generate new interest.

 

Get a free matchday ticket with all replica shirts sold?
That way the club gets some revenue, the fan gets a shirt and get to see a game.

 

Like I mentioned above, the Sheffield Wednesday away match. It could be one of the most important matches of the second half of the season. Fans will have enough to fork out paying for the actual match ticket. The club could put free buses on (like they did for the Southend FA Cup match) and pack the away end at Hillsborough, creating a great away following to cheer the lads on!

 

Randomly picking out say 5 seats and awarding the lucky spectator a free Barnsley shirt/scarf/t-shirt etc... promoting this each week with coupons for money off in the club shop.