Season Ticket Renewal Thread (Read first post)

[SUIYHA]

Yep - very pricey for a ‘popular’ stand. The only chanting from the sort of crowd that can afford that is a chorus of ‘we’re going to smash the oiks rah rah rah’ (yankspurs - apologies as I expect you won’t get the ‘Young Ones’ reference!)

"You'll never sing that
You'll neeeveeer siiiiing thaaaaaat
Four bedroom house owner
You'll never sing that!"

 

[DiscoD1882]

I do find it a little offensive that some people assume that only people who can afford the cheaper seats are the ones who create the atmosphere. I’m not denying the price increase is harsh for a for few. But diminishing the support of everyone In the stadium because there are a minority who have been going for a long time is out of order. Wembley has proved this year you can create an atmosphere in a soulless bowl. So why can’t we do the same next year. It may take a while to get to know
Your neighbour again. But I for one have actually really enjoyed the Wembley experience. And those around me have created more than enough atmosphere. People are going way over the top with the criticism. As others have said. This isn’t white Hart Lane. And th costs associated with it are going to cause an increase. Maybe they could do what Arsenal
Did and just massively limit spending for a X amount of years. But unfortunately. We haven’t had the success or continued champs league apprearances to suck up the fallow 10 years. Whilst we pay off our debts. This will probably mean the sale of a number of our players and the slide back into mid table
Mediocrity.

We need to give this stadium a chance. If you can afford to go. Don’t start the season like West Ham fans. As this project will end in a similar way.

 

[RickyVilla]

And still no email.

 

[muppetman]

Tweeted by Lineker in response to the trust



Gary Lineker
@GaryLineker

We’re seeing more and more empty seats at grounds. Given the vast sums received from TV rights, ticket prices should be falling not rising. The game needs full stadiums otherwise its appeal will slowly decline, even to rights holders. Avarice will only damage the game and clubs.

 

[N17TJK]

It's no surprise is it really, all of the creative industries are pushing prices up and pricing out the majority of fans.

Look at some of the big events at The O2... Justin Timberlake tickets £100-£150 each, Kevin Hart tickets £145 each, Anthony Joshua's fight at Wembley was £100 minimum. Even if you want to go cinema in London these days you're looking at £20 a ticket.

Tottenham are considered an event on par with those at The O2, like it or not the Premier League is now a global "brand" which includes us and the demand will be there for people to pay these prices.

I'm one of the lucky ones who can afford to do it but that doesn't mean I'm happy about the increases, it's just the way it is across the board, not just football and unfortunately there's very little we can do about it.

The trouble is that there is no one I’ve ever known that goes to a concert at the 02 every other week. I’m seriously worried about the direction the club is going in now, as the trust said this was an opportunity to build on the relationship built up between the club and the fans but increases of up to 50%, not giving us the two cup ties back and putting a line of corporate season tickets through the middle of the south stand is an utter piss take.

 

[King of Otters]

No doubt the stadium is great. And like you, I can afford it. I don't think that's the point, however.

In my naive dreamland I thought the fact ENIC were building a characterful stadium and were therefore aware of the difference between a proper football stadium and a conference centre with a bit of outside space in the middle (Wembley, Emirates), perhaps meant they were aware of what a huge opportunity this stadium was for Tottenham Hotspur. You look at Arsenal and see that the problem there isn't only their generic stadium, but the people inside it. People who buy a season ticket but only go to games now and again for the big games because they have so much disposable income that wasting a few hundred quid doesn't matter. People who also have a debenture at Wimbledon, are members of the MCC, and go to Monaco Grand Prix for the weekend. It may be a cliche, but mostly these aren't the people who are going to get behind the team and drive them on to a difficult 1-0 victory at home to West Brom or whoever. They won't even be in the stadium.

So it was an opportunity to say that while they down the road are a club for rich people, and their stadium was built for only one purpose - to extract as much money from those people as possible - our club, our stadium is for the people, for the real supporters and while we give a large part of the ground over to corporate facilities, the parts where the real fans go, where the atmosphere comes from, are sacrosanct. And we will hoover up a generation of young fans because parents who follow our club can afford to take their children to games. To follow the German model, to say we respect our supporters and given that in reality, tickets sold isn't really that large an income stream for the club anyway compared to TV and sponsorship, we'll take a small hit on what we could rake in from our fans in order to say this is a proper football club.

But no, just 600 tickets at £795 - clearly there only to make headlines at the lowest priced ticket, while it's £2,200 right in the middle of the 'iconic' home end. It is and has obviously always been an exercise in taking our fans for everything they've got. If they can't pay, Premier League football is so big that a rich foreigner with a couple of houses in London will just buy a season ticket and occasionally visit if they happen to be in the country when Spurs are at home and happen to be playing one of the top 6.

Make no mistake, they have made us like Arsenal. "62,000 attendance" -- half that in the stadium. Instead of building a huge bond between the club and it's support base, and making sure the ground is absolutely rocking for a good proportion of the games, what they've done is alienated everyone and made it abundantly clear that they have absolutely no respect for the supporters.

Get this guy on the Trust.

 

[adamsky]

I have a dilemma, either put the ST on my Amex and get the air miles, as I did this year, which means letting the wife know exactly what I am paying for the ST, or put on my own card and let her think there was only slight increase. Not sure the air miles are worth the grief.

 

[spursfan77]

I respect the work of the trust, but this is a somewhat disappointingly bland statement

http://www.thstofficial.com/thst-news/season-ticket-pricing-at-spurs-thst-comment

They are powerless though really. The club aren't going to listen to them on this. Its been proved in the past they wont on ticketing issues apart from once when they put back the ST deadline a couple of years ago after they complained

 

[vicbob]

Never had a ST and never likely to have one, but do go regularly to games and know a fair few ST holders.
I am saddened by this, really thought we could have made a statement and shown the rest of the PL what a real football club with real supporters can achieve
Feel we have really missed a trick here

 

[fingersinc]

And still no email.

Turn off your phone or computer and switch it off again. That's what I did at 17:15 hrs and the email suddenly appeared timed 16:40hrs

 

[spursfan77]

I was just told the complete opposite. The woman on the ticket renewal line told me there is nothing she can physically do and to call the complaints line. I just called the ticket office direct and the bloke on the phone told me that he would look into it and if we are in the wrong phase we would be moved.

I just spoke to the members office and they said the same thing to me. He didn't guarantee being moved though, just that he'd look into it and it sounded like a mistake that could be rectified as far as he thought, but thats all.

 

[Saoirse]

They are powerless though really. The club aren't going to listen to them on this. Its been proved in the past they wont on ticketing issues apart from once when they put back the ST deadline a couple of years ago after they complained

The club is only going to listen if it becomes abundantly clear that this is having a real impact rather than just annoying the Trust types. If they see a significant drop-off in the renewal rate in the first couple of phases, and a situation where everyone is booking the cheap seats leaving only £1500+ offerings in phases 7 and 8 and therefore several thousand not renewing, they'll have to go back to the drawing board. There is no point in putting the prices up if you then don't actually sell the tickets.

 

[manic041]

I have a dilemma, either put the ST on my Amex and get the air miles, as I did this year, which means letting the wife know exactly what I am paying for the ST, or put on my own card and let her think there was only slight increase. Not sure the air miles are worth the grief.

Exactly the reason i didn't add my missus as a cardholder on my amex card. That and I can spend the points taking the mistress away

 

[hakano]

It is really disappointing and whilst there was no expectation that it would be cheaper, I can't understand how they thought they could price so many people out or cause many to stretch themselves financially to watch their team. By all means the premium seats should come with premium pricing - after all those wanting these will be able to comfortably afford it and perhaps more.

With the money in the game through TV and sponsorship the weight of ticket sales is diminished greatly compared to 5-10 years ago. The famous quote from the B.Munich chief says it all really

'We could charge more than £104. Let's say we charged £300. We'd get £2m more in income but what's £2m to us?

'In a transfer discussion you argue about that sum for five minutes. But the difference between £104 and £300 is huge for the fan.

'We do not think the fans are like cows, who you milk. Football has got to be for everybody.

'That's the biggest difference between us and England.'

 

[spursfan77]

The club is only going to listen if it becomes abundantly clear that this is having a real impact rather than just annoying the Trust types. If they see a significant drop-off in the renewal rate in the first couple of phases, and a situation where everyone is booking the cheap seats leaving only £1500+ offerings in phases 7 and 8 and therefore several thousand not renewing, they'll have to go back to the drawing board. There is no point in putting the prices up if you then don't actually sell the tickets.

I agree with you except if that happens then they wont be able to do anything as it will all be too late. They can't offer the tickets all out again from the beginning.

I maintain the best way to do the migration was how they moved to Wembley, it seemed the best way to me.

 

[yankspurs]

I have a dilemma, either put the ST on my Amex and get the air miles, as I did this year, which means letting the wife know exactly what I am paying for the ST, or put on my own card and let her think there was only slight increase. Not sure the air miles are worth the grief.

Get the wife off your card(which will save money as she can no longer run up a massive bill at the shops) and get the miles for the ST. Problem solved

 

[Mattspur]

It is really disappointing and whilst there was no expectation that it would be cheaper, I can't understand how they thought they could price so many people out or cause many to stretch themselves financially to watch their team. By all means the premium seats should come with premium pricing - after all those wanting these will be able to comfortably afford it and perhaps more.

With the money in the game through TV and sponsorship the weight of ticket sales is diminished greatly compared to 5-10 years ago. The famous quote from the B.Munich chief says it all really

'We could charge more than £104. Let's say we charged £300. We'd get £2m more in income but what's £2m to us?

'In a transfer discussion you argue about that sum for five minutes. But the difference between £104 and £300 is huge for the fan.

'We do not think the fans are like cows, who you milk. Football has got to be for everybody.

'That's the biggest difference between us and England.'

It's easy to say that when They're by far the richest and most successful club in their league. In fact they're so far ahead of anyone else that it's actually pointless for anyone to try to compete with them.

 

[thebenjamin]

It's easy to say that when They're by far the richest and most successful club in their league. In fact they're so far ahead of anyone else that it's actually pointless for anyone to try to compete with them.

That is how most (all?) German clubs operate. Ticket prices are reasonable and they don't see their supporters as emotional imbeciles ripe for exploitation.

 

[fridgemagnet]

The league when negotiating these TV rights should say okay we accept your offer of £200 million per season (or whatever figure) but X % must be used on match day tickets so the match day costs are lowered so fans still attend rather than stay at home watch it on TV and that way the clubs don't lose match day income.

This is something that should have been nipped in the bud TBH (not just with Spurs)

The pricing seems ridiculously over complicated and heavily based on those surveys that went out where everyone was frothing into oblivion at wanting to sit in various stands for example that supply/demand/intent to actually follow through on a purchase has all been blurred and skewed. Plus the obvious inevitable price rise then a cash grab on top.

It was always going to be complicated 1st move back in, surely it's not beyond the wit of man to trade seating positions over the year and pricing to be simplified and adjusted.
(from THFC's point of view they could drop prices if they're unpopular and it shows but it wouldn't have gone down well if they started them at 15% up on the current price and then put them up 30-50% in year 2)

If the cost of the expensive seating was spread around the entire stadium so it was mostly a flat fee you'd still get complaints so they can't really win.

DL's obviously got a number that needs to pay for the thing and we don't know which European comp we'll be in yet either.

Sorry for the long post.

 

[THFCSPURS19]

No doubt the stadium is great. And like you, I can afford it. I don't think that's the point, however.

In my naive dreamland I thought the fact ENIC were building a characterful stadium and were therefore aware of the difference between a proper football stadium and a conference centre with a bit of outside space in the middle (Wembley, Emirates), perhaps meant they were aware of what a huge opportunity this stadium was for Tottenham Hotspur. You look at Arsenal and see that the problem there isn't only their generic stadium, but the people inside it. People who buy a season ticket but only go to games now and again for the big games because they have so much disposable income that wasting a few hundred quid doesn't matter. People who also have a debenture at Wimbledon, are members of the MCC, and go to Monaco Grand Prix for the weekend. It may be a cliche, but mostly these aren't the people who are going to get behind the team and drive them on to a difficult 1-0 victory at home to West Brom or whoever. They won't even be in the stadium.

So it was an opportunity to say that while they down the road are a club for rich people, and their stadium was built for only one purpose - to extract as much money from those people as possible - our club, our stadium is for the people, for the real supporters and while we give a large part of the ground over to corporate facilities, the parts where the real fans go, where the atmosphere comes from, are sacrosanct. And we will hoover up a generation of young fans because parents who follow our club can afford to take their children to games. To follow the German model, to say we respect our supporters and given that in reality, tickets sold isn't really that large an income stream for the club anyway compared to TV and sponsorship, we'll take a small hit on what we could rake in from our fans in order to say this is a proper football club.

But no, just 600 tickets at £795 - clearly there only to make headlines at the lowest priced ticket, while it's £2,200 right in the middle of the 'iconic' home end. It is and has obviously always been an exercise in taking our fans for everything they've got. If they can't pay, Premier League football is so big that a rich foreigner with a couple of houses in London will just buy a season ticket and occasionally visit if they happen to be in the country when Spurs are at home and happen to be playing one of the top 6.

Make no mistake, they have made us like Arsenal. "62,000 attendance" -- half that in the stadium. Instead of building a huge bond between the club and it's support base, and making sure the ground is absolutely rocking for a good proportion of the games, what they've done is alienated everyone and made it abundantly clear that they have absolutely no respect for the supporters.

Great post but to suggest we should follow the German model is absurd. No other club in the Top 6 does that and they're our competition, and at the end of the day, the new stadium's main purposes are to improve the area and to allow us to compete financially with the other clubs, through an increasing wage and transfer budget, so that we win titles on a regular basis. What on earth would be the point of spending a billion quid on the stadium, and then offering kids tickets for £1 and £300 season tickets? I'm not condoning the club pricing fans out of the new stadium, and having looked at the pricing more, they have probably gone over the top, but I understand their reasoning (London, Top 6 club in PL, best stadium in Europe) as to why they were never going to be cheap.

On a personal note, as the Trust said, I think the club should be getting more praise for the Young Adult pricing. I'm not sure I've seen that at other clubs, and it's a huge deal for me. I'm nearly 20, and a student, and I want to have a season ticket for years to come. I'm delighted the club has recognised that those aged 18-21 do not have the financial means of working adults, and have reduced their pricing accordingly - which I was actually surprised by. At the end of the day, those aged 18-21 are the most immediate 'next generation' (sounds dumb) of ST holders and I'm glad they haven't priced us out.