Extortionate Admission Prices

[IainB]

21 hours ago, topsoil said:

I would bet that the only sports which attract teenagers in any amounts are one which also have alcohol nearby? Football (because it is media wall to wall), T20 cricket, darts nights out (sold as a night out rather than a purely sporting attraction).

So if you want to attract teenagers, maybe you need to turn speedway meetings into a stag party atmosphere?

You can see this by the crowd that Cardiff attracts, as a bit of Speedway purist, I go to watch the event because of its importance (World Championship round), the racing and the atmosphere. The downside (for me) is that there are a lot of people at the event that are p1ssed up on the booze, it's generally ok as I can move to seats away from these annoyances but I've never seen anybody p1ssed up at a league match.

19 hours ago, Pieman72 said:

What gets me is a £20 take it leave it attitude. No attempt to attract a new audience or throwing in additional entertainment just this is our track aren't you lucky to have permission to come in and watch our racing.

This is born out by a "discussion" I'm currently having on the Leicester thread about various issues with Speedway in general and some with Leicester in particular. There are some people that seem to think that because there is Speedway at their track that everything in the garden is rosy and that the sport doesn't really need promoting that much. The if you build it they will come style of promotion. Clubs should never be happy with their attendances unless they're playing to full houses.

18 hours ago, Hawk127 said:

Many aspects of the sport have simply not moved with the times, they have tinkered with the number of heats over the years but it is still four laps clutch start and that is it. Team racing is rare and most ‘teamsters’ race firstly for themselves and the income with the club a secondary factor in the equation which is why I never understand why so many dislike individual meetings apart from the GP. The admission price is seemingly determined by the riders and not the paying punter.

Rarely do tracks actively promote themselves or the sport either individually or collectively (some decent advertising deals are available on a number of commercial radio stations) and most could learn a thing or two from the banger racing promoters and the IOW.

Despite claims from many who run the sport, it is not family friendly night out given the cost and no need to go on about the odd summer promotion re kids admission , how many regular weekly meetings are being held at all top tier tracks this year and covid  is not an excuse for not thinking outside the box and putting on a motor cycle show with various two wheeled disciplines not just the gate and go merchants.

Sadly with few exceptions it is boring, living in the past, over priced and going nowhere in a hurry as no one has any vision and the balls to turn it around and make it an evening spectacular and leave behind the dead wood of 15 heat league racing.

First and foremost give the punter value for money as no clubs needs to chase ratings, the sport is not big enough to think like that so play to a new audience and drag the oldies screaming into the current day but do something different before it is too late for the sport and it ends up as an amateur outing for a few enthusiasts.

I'm not sure that many do dislike them, they probably don't like them when they're at the start or end of the season as fixture fillers but some of the biggest attended meetings I've been to were Individual meetings held in the height of summer on Saturday nights or Sunday afternoons. World Championship Qualifiers, Rick Miller Testimonial, Golden Hammer, Pride of the East etc. etc. These events used to carry some history and prestige... until they were stuck at the end of the season with weakened line-ups and the punters saw through this.

18 hours ago, Sings4Speedway said:

But why does speedway have to operate in stadiums? Internally its viewed as a sideways alternative to superbikes but externally its seen in the same light as stockcars and banger racing. So why don't / can't clubs run successfully on a lower glamourous environment? 

Isn't this basically what Buxton, Somerset & Scunny were/are?

[IainB]

14 hours ago, enotian said:

The irony is cricket had adopted a couple of key aspects common to speedway.  A variety of formats and more recently players who play for numerous teams.  However they've done it somewhat better than speedway does.  On a much larger budget of course.

Would using the 4TT format for the league be the way to answer the current ills?  Fair enough you lose team riding but that's, as stated earlier, rare.  One league 16 teams.  Facing your 15 opponents twice home and away with some kind of end of season play off and grand finals (4 of them, 5 if you add a neutral track).  That's 10 regular home fixtures (similar to this season) and 30 away fixtures.  Just about the equivalent number of fixtures riders have this season doubling up. 16 teams of 4 requires 64 riders (80 if you include a reserve) which is about the same number of active riders this season across the two leagues, so no need for riders to ride for more than one team.  Rank the riders A, B, C, and D and each team would consist of one of each (maybe have a pre-season auction to generate interest).

At each home meeting you have the potential for three sets of away supporters (or even streamers) as opposed to one.

It won't happen because it's 16 (20 inc reserves) riders to pay for instead of 14 and 20 or 16 heats instead of 15.

 

To compare Speedway to cricket, all the Speedway competitions are the same, just with a different name, the format is always the same 15 heats, 4 riders, 4 laps, 3,2,1,0 point scoring. Yes there is a pairs event and a 4's event but these are one off's. There's no variation... oh excuse me, you can't tac-sub in a KoC match... that's it, really? That's the vision?!?

How about a competition where the matches consist of devil take the hindmost races, 1 lap dashes? Saw a number of these at Stoke, I think, and they were quite entertaining. You get 3 first bends per race, which generally where all the action happens and a match race, which can also be quite entertaining, just thinking out loud but it's something different.

[Pieman72]

But why does speedway have to operate in stadiums? Internally its viewed as a sideways alternative to superbikes but externally its seen in the same light as stockcars and banger racing. So why don't / can't clubs run successfully on a lower glamorous environment? 

Couldn't agree more. Can't beat a cooking your dinner on the side of the track and sitting in your car watching 1000cc sidecars belt round like a bulldozer. Lets get shale racing back to basics.

[Steve Shovlar]

Dont forget the govt get 20% vat out of admissions. 

[Sings4Speedway]

1 hour ago, iainb said:

Isn't this basically what Buxton, Somerset & Scunny were/are?

Precisely and proving the point that getting the track right is the most important element to be successful. Its been argued time and time again which is/was better Scunny or Somerset? The answer is they are/were both great. Buxton also had all right ingredients to be successful barring a little extra capital to renovate the track surface. Frustratingly they had been calling for a lower points limit and wage caps for years and were ignored yet Berwick can get it pushed through at the first attempt. There is still a marketable option for Speedway at Buxton and should the Euromillions come up it would be my first place to call.

[AFCB Wildcat]

It's not just prices that have changed over the years. In researching how much they had changed in other sports, I found a Chesterfield v AFC Bournemouth program from a div 3 away game I attended in 1985 amongst my speedway programmes.

There is a section giving details of their upcoming away trip to Derby County at the old Baseball ground. They say that the cheapest admission on the away terrace is an "extortionate £3",  which is £9 odd in today's Monday. 

In describing the ground it says " The ground is situated in an unsavoury area. Some houses around the ground have been demolished in a slum clearance scheme, the others have been occupied by immigrants and the area has some of the qualities of a ghetto" 

In today's money that would equate to "a vibrant cosmopolitan area rich with cultural diversity" 

[topsoil]

22 hours ago, old bob at herne bay said:

You could start by looking at offering some alternative formats for meetings...... do we have to have every race of 4 laps ?  do we have to have a standing start ? Does every meeting have to have 500cc only bikes?  Would the TV companies be happy to show a speedway meeting of say 45 minutes with 3 laps per race and say 4 man teams 8 heat meetings and get the riders out for the next race as soon as the previous race was finished? Open up the bars and snack bars ... put up a big screen somewhere showing action replays of all the incidents ......

Go ahead topsoil and do some blue sky thinking..... everyone thought the original 40 overs one day Sunday cricket was a joke at first. Until it appeared on the TV every week and filled the grounds.

First 500 tickets sold online at the T20 get a free beer at Canterbury ...... seems to be a popular idea. Stadium owners would be happy to see more punters enjoying their facilities and eating at the tracks food outlets. 

First of all I respect your reply, my pet hate is posters who just flat out moan but don't offer any solutions themselves. That said, this is where I disagree with a lot of your post.

I would be heavily against any reduction in the length of a meeting. I certainly wouldn't be happy with a meeting which finished after 45 minutes. Would riders be happy to turn up for a meeting knowing they would only be getting two rides?

"Open up bars and snack bars". Good idea if you get the proceeds from these. A lot of clubs run at stadiums who keep all this money.

The big screen would be a great idea, to replay incidents, show interviews, give sponsors more exposure. But i) these would be very expensive and ii) would stadium owners allow a club to bring a big screen in? If you had to remove it where would you put it?

I know Berwick had a couple of promotions in 2019 where they gave away a free drink / programme with each entry. There wasn't a noticeable increase in attendance.

I honestly think speedway promoters have a near impossible job . Facilities are sparse, very few actually own their own ground, costs are escalating all the time. This is where Poland has a huge advantage. Facilities are council owned and those authorities are willing to spend to improve these. Any clubs in trouble are often assisted financially by local authorities. Compare that with the attitude towards clubs in this country.

I really wouldn't knock promoters over here.

[IainB]

54 minutes ago, topsoil said:

The big screen would be a great idea, to replay incidents, show interviews, give sponsors more exposure. But i) these would be very expensive and ii) would stadium owners allow a club to bring a big screen in? If you had to remove it where would you put it?

What I would say in response to this is that the majority of us actually bring small screens to meetings, wouldn't it be good if there was some Facebook live coverage of behind the scenes interviews, race summaries etc. instead of us having to endure endless tractor racing. All it needs is somebody with a phone to actually do the transmission.

At the Cricket and Snooker you see quite a few people wearing ear pieces, I assume they're listening to a commentary.

Edited July 27, 2021 by iainb

[steve roberts]

2 hours ago, topsoil said:

First of all I respect your reply, my pet hate is posters who just flat out moan but don't offer any solutions themselves. That said, this is where I disagree with a lot of your post.

I would be heavily against any reduction in the length of a meeting. I certainly wouldn't be happy with a meeting which finished after 45 minutes. Would riders be happy to turn up for a meeting knowing they would only be getting two rides?

"Open up bars and snack bars". Good idea if you get the proceeds from these. A lot of clubs run at stadiums who keep all this money.

The big screen would be a great idea, to replay incidents, show interviews, give sponsors more exposure. But i) these would be very expensive and ii) would stadium owners allow a club to bring a big screen in? If you had to remove it where would you put it?

I know Berwick had a couple of promotions in 2019 where they gave away a free drink / programme with each entry. There wasn't a noticeable increase in attendance.

I honestly think speedway promoters have a near impossible job . Facilities are sparse, very few actually own their own ground, costs are escalating all the time. This is where Poland has a huge advantage. Facilities are council owned and those authorities are willing to spend to improve these. Any clubs in trouble are often assisted financially by local authorities. Compare that with the attitude towards clubs in this country.

I really wouldn't knock promoters over here.

Agree entirely!

[cowboy cookie returns?]

Interesting read this. Surely the time has come for a major overhaul from top to bottom including the rulebook, machinery, league structure race format etc etc.

I'll possibly be better placed to comment further after my visit to Ipswich next week.

The scarry thing is how many times have I read that so & so meeting was a bore fest with crap racing on this forum in all honesty I've lost count! And this is supposed to be a supporters form.....if your own customers think that you ain't got a hope of bringing new ones in & more importantly keeping them!

[topsoil]

5 hours ago, iainb said:

What I would say in response to this is that the majority of us actually bring small screens to meetings, wouldn't it be good if there was some Facebook live coverage of behind the scenes interviews, race summaries etc. instead of us having to endure endless tractor racing. All it needs is somebody with a phone to actually do the transmission.

At the Cricket and Snooker you see quite a few people wearing ear pieces, I assume they're listening to a commentary.

Excellent idea, if you can get somebody to look after the social media side of things. Anything which gives clubs more exposure I'm all for.

Maybe I'm different from a lot of supporters, but the tractor racing doesn't bother me, mainly because I'm too busy talking to friends between races. I never really seem to notice it.

[Diamondboy]

14 hours ago, Steve Shovlar said:

Dont forget the govt get 20% vat out of admissions. 

Well that depends if the club pays it........

[mikebv]

On 7/26/2021 at 4:11 PM, cityrebel said:

How much does it cost to get into top flight Polish league matches?

Pro rata to earnings not a million miles away from the UK, so it isnt "cheap", which is what is sometimes perceived over here..

However you do obviously get the worlds best for that pro rata amount rather than what we get over here..

The big money comes via the TV deals as the TV companies have to actually tender for the contracts, due to the popularity of the sport, which pushes the price they pay up.. 

This blanket TV and media coverage then attracts the big money sponsors who want to be associated with well known "national sport brands" as well as well known "national sporting celebrities"...

Bottom line is..

If the Polish Leagues ever allowed Tai Woffinden to guest for Bartosz Zmarzlik, and Wroclaw didnt qualify for the play offs on the back of it, all TV and big name sponsors would simply walk away, as would the wider sports fans' interest...

Run the sport Mickey Mouse and you reap what you sow and no amount of free tickets given away will keep an audience, (and expect them to pay),  who can't emotionally buy in to what should be team sport tribalism...

Hence Poland dont make the mistakes the UK have made and continue to make ad Infinitum.. 

Edited July 28, 2021 by mikebv

[mikebv]

16 hours ago, topsoil said:

First of all I respect your reply, my pet hate is posters who just flat out moan but don't offer any solutions themselves. That said, this is where I disagree with a lot of your post.

I would be heavily against any reduction in the length of a meeting. I certainly wouldn't be happy with a meeting which finished after 45 minutes. Would riders be happy to turn up for a meeting knowing they would only be getting two rides?

"Open up bars and snack bars". Good idea if you get the proceeds from these. A lot of clubs run at stadiums who keep all this money.

The big screen would be a great idea, to replay incidents, show interviews, give sponsors more exposure. But i) these would be very expensive and ii) would stadium owners allow a club to bring a big screen in? If you had to remove it where would you put it?

I know Berwick had a couple of promotions in 2019 where they gave away a free drink / programme with each entry. There wasn't a noticeable increase in attendance.

I honestly think speedway promoters have a near impossible job . Facilities are sparse, very few actually own their own ground, costs are escalating all the time. This is where Poland has a huge advantage. Facilities are council owned and those authorities are willing to spend to improve these. Any clubs in trouble are often assisted financially by local authorities. Compare that with the attitude towards clubs in this country.

I really wouldn't knock promoters over here.

I think the term 'promoter' doesn't always help them...

They are in most cases just an owner of a speedway licence to run the sport....

Calling them 'promoters' bring connotations of someone actually going out and actively selling a product within the entertainment industry, or promoting sports built on hype like boxing....

So many of these owners simply have zero skill set in doing something similar. ..

Maybe they should just drop the name..

No other sports teams have "promoters", instead have "owners", "chairpersons" and "CEO's"....

[IainB]

10 hours ago, topsoil said:

Maybe I'm different from a lot of supporters, but the tractor racing doesn't bother me, mainly because I'm too busy talking to friends between races. I never really seem to notice it.

I don't mind a bit of tractor racing if it's actually doing something like bringing the track back into a raceable condition. I've seen too many tractors doing too many laps just trying to move non-existent dirt back onto the racing line and the watering of a track in parts where the riders never ride.

41 minutes ago, mikebv said:

The big money comes via the TV deals as the TV companies have to actually tender for the contracts, due to the popularity of the sport, which pushes the price they pay up.. 

This blanket TV and media coverage then attracts the big money sponsors who want to be associated with well known "national sport brands" as well as well known "national sporting celebrities"...

Didn't the BSPL put the TV contract out to tender and there were multiple offers and they decided to opt for Eurosport to attract sponsors to free to air TV. How's that one worked out? Has that brought a League sponsor? Has it brought in any European sponsorship? Has it brought in any sponsorship? In fact here we are in the height of summer where Sky Sports are having orgasms about "The 100" and our "Broadcast Partner" are showing repeats of Olympic action and there's no Speedway until the 16th of August!

[IainB]

16 minutes ago, mikebv said:

I think the term 'promoter' doesn't always help them...

They are in most cases just an owner of a speedway licence to run the sport....

Calling them 'promoters' bring connotations of someone actually going out and actively selling a product within the entertainment industry, or promoting sports built on hype like boxing....

So many of these owners simply have zero skill set in doing something similar. ..

Maybe they should just drop the name..

No other sports teams have "promoters", instead have "owners", "chairpersons" and "CEO's"....

To be fair they do call themselves promoters lol

Boxing still have promoters and what a murky world that is!

But to your general point, I've been having a "discussion" on the Leicester thread about "promotion" and somebody pointed out to me that the Bates family are successful business people that run a number of successful businesses and are basically just Speedway fans. They run Sheffield and Leicester as fans and put management teams in place to run the club. Don't get me wrong I'm glad they are running Speedway but it doesn't seem to be the way to be getting Speedway out of the fine mess that it's gotten itself into.

Edited July 28, 2021 by iainb

[steve roberts]

10 hours ago, topsoil said:

Excellent idea, if you can get somebody to look after the social media side of things. Anything which gives clubs more exposure I'm all for.

Maybe I'm different from a lot of supporters, but the tractor racing doesn't bother me, mainly because I'm too busy talking to friends between races. I never really seem to notice it.

Agree entirely!

[mikebv]

2 minutes ago, iainb said:

To be fair they do call themselves promoters lol

Boxing still have promoters

But to your general point, I've been having a "discussion" on the Leicester thread about "promotion" and somebody pointed out to me that the Bates family are successful business people that run a number of successful businesses and are basically just Speedway fans. They run Sheffield and Leicester as fans and put management teams in place to run the club. Don't get me wrong I'm glad they are running Speedway but it doesn't seem to be the way to be getting Speedway out of the fine mess that it's gotten itself into.

Exactly Ian...

Hype can go a long way in getting an audience, even when it's 'economical with the truth'...

I have always thought that each meeting should be regarded as "stand alone" and sold separately using various "high impact" promotional tools...

Twenty or so meetings a year, using twenty or so definitive "pushes"...

Let's be honest just an extra 500 at most tracks would be "game changing" and it doesn't need the same 500 each week, it could be 500 completely different people (although hopefully you would want to get some regulars)...

Eg 2.5 million people live within the Gtr Manchester conurbation, all within 45 mins of a superbly appointed (and shaped) city centre track and modern stadium, with excellent motorway linkage..

Surely a high impact promotional strategy should get 500 a week extra to attend, even if just through curiosity based on the promotional activity? 

[Pieman72]

The best analogy is our supermarkets. For years we experienced 'price wars' when they were running cartels and costing less when in fact they increased prices and reduced the range in tired buildings. Along came Aldi, Lidl and Netto. Netto went into a failed enterprise with Sainsbury's but as for the Teutonic predators they have taken over and the rest is history. I think the promoters are worried this may happen in speedway why have such draconian penalties for potential new alternative tracks.

[IainB]

20 minutes ago, Pieman72 said:

The best analogy is our supermarkets. For years we experienced 'price wars' when they were running cartels and costing less when in fact they increased prices and reduced the range in tired buildings. Along came Aldi, Lidl and Netto. Netto went into a failed enterprise with Sainsbury's but as for the Teutonic predators they have taken over and the rest is history. I think the promoters are worried this may happen in speedway why have such draconian penalties for potential new alternative tracks.

Going off topic for a while... A cartel still operates with the traditional big 4 supermarkets you can see this when they "take turns" offering the same products at "discounted" prices. It's a real bug bear of mine. 1 supermarket will for example sell a bottle of Jack Daniels for £16 for a week or 2 while the others price it at £25, then after a couple of weeks the next one will sell it for £16 and that original supermarket will hike its price to £25. This happens with many product lines, it means you either pay it, travel to 4 different supermarkets to do your shop, or what I do is just bulk buy when the product is "on offer" (the price it should be being sold at).

Rant over!