Renewing or not…

viv_andersons_nana said:
I think they could be growing the business more tbh. As we’ve said on here over the past few weeks, the retail operation in particular feels very small-time. There’s never really been an attempt to grow and develop the supporter-base, to engage with and try to entice the town in general since the chairman initially took sole control and he was gearing up for the Riverside Revolution. It feels like quite a stagnant football club at times.
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It might seem that way but commercial take of £6.5m is at record levels. Whatever we may think or say about the shop - sales of replica shirts are at a record high. Even beer sales are now topping Premier League pints.
Most of us want to see a competitive team at the top end of the Championship - the club have looked at other competitors wage levels and assessed you need to be paying over £20 million a year to stand a realistic chance of a play off finish. Luton bucked that trend and it looks like Ipswich are doing so presently but you take my point. Realistically none of us want to support a team scrabbling around at the bottom end of this League. What was it Lennie Lawrence once said - "you can't stand still in football you either spring forward or fall back."
 
viv_andersons_nana said:
But this is the stupid thing about football. Any business that loses £21m a year just isn’t a viable business, unless you have someone prepared to cover those losses. In terms of Boro, our supporters are paying some of the highest ticket prices in the country and are doing their bit. The crowds are high this season and were for much of last. This is without things like food, drinks, merch, hospitality, all the rest of it. Also without factoring in cup revenue, TV broadcast money, etc.

Maybe you just have to say the Boro can’t really compete at the moment. If you’re losing £21m and are in a position where you’re passing £1.50 charges onto a supporter-base that already pays over the odds then you probably just need to accept that you’re not very good at running a football club. Or have unrealistic expectations on what you can do with it.

If the owner is no longer happy to cover the losses then surely he should just sell up. I’m not saying I want him to, but he makes the choice to pay out the money.

It’s just stuff like this, an extra £
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fmttmadmin said:
It might seem that way but commercial take of £6.5m is at record levels. Whatever we may think or say about the shop - sales of replica shirts are at a record high. Even beer sales are now topping Premier League pints.
Most of us want to see a competitive team at the top end of the Championship - the club have looked at other competitors wage levels and assessed you need to be paying over £20 million a year to stand a realistic chance of a play off finish. Luton bucked that trend and it looks like Ipswich are doing so presently but you take my point. Realistically none of us want to support a team scrabbling around at the bottom end of this League. What was it Lennie Lawrence once said - "you can't stand still in football you either spring forward or fall back."
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If they sold decent larger instead of that revolting stuff they could double their sales easily.
 
MolteniArcore said:
That’s some figure Rob! Like I said, I’d love cheaper tickets but I can see why prices go up and admin fees are added. We are very lucky to have an owner who keeps us solvent when we are losing that much a season.
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Very lucky to have a chairman who has got us into that very situation in the first place? And is now fleecing the fans at every opportunity. I'm not one of these who wants Gibbo to sell up but his running of the club, especially in recent times, is amateur at best.
 
18MFC76 said:
Very lucky to have a chairman who has got us into that very situation in the first place? And is now fleecing the fans at every opportunity. I'm not one of these who wants Gibbo to sell up but his running of the club, especially in recent times, is amateur at best.
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If every other Championship club was in profit and in the play-offs every season I’d agree, but they aren’t.
 
MolteniArcore said:
If every other Championship club was in profit and in the play-offs every season I’d agree, but they aren’t.
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Other clubs aren't charging £20.50 (including booking fee) for a young child to attend a football match. It's £23.50 if you sit in the West Upper. Those prices are indefensible.
 
fmttmadmin said:
It might seem that way but commercial take of £6.5m is at record levels. Whatever we may think or say about the shop - sales of replica shirts are at a record high. Even beer sales are now topping Premier League pints.
Most of us want to see a competitive team at the top end of the Championship - the club have looked at other competitors wage levels and assessed you need to be paying over £20 million a year to stand a realistic chance of a play off finish. Luton bucked that trend and it looks like Ipswich are doing so presently but you take my point. Realistically none of us want to support a team scrabbling around at the bottom end of this League. What was it Lennie Lawrence once said - "you can't stand still in football you either spring forward or fall back."
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It is more than understandable that Boro fans benchmark our prices with all other Championship clubs, including interest charges, admin fees etc.
Regarding sales of pints etc, I would expect an increase when compared with PL seasons, as we now have the large external Fan Zone, which can be rammed pre-match and I wonder if the summer concert(s) drink sales are included for the comparator?
30,000 folk are at the event for 6/7 hours and the revenue will be relatively significant.
 
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I get the gratitude towards Gibson and I'll be eternally grateful that he saved the club. Lots of my long term friendships and relationships have come through following the club over the last 35 (ish) years.

However I am not going to be overly sympathetic towards how he's ran the club or towards him generally. They run Boro as part of the Gibson O' Neill company that was in profit to the tune of £58 million or so in the last reported financial year, including Boro and Rockcliffe. It's clearly a side project for him as it's not managed properly but that's up/down to him.

From a purely personal point of view, the title of this thread is irrelevant to me. I have nothing to renew; I've stopped going as have a lot of people in a similar position to me. He's doing nothing to get us back.
 
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