Attendances falling

[Boz]

Only just scraped over 5 thousand for The Cobblers, who brought about 150 of their fans. There were 3 games in L2 at Exeter, Port vale and Rochdale which were better attended and Rovers had one of the lower gates in L1. Although the next game against Oldham usually attracts a decent crowd, even with the category A pricing, thereafter it looks inevitable that we'll get a below 5000 turnout for a League game. While the economy may be part of the reason, other sides don't seem to have slumped as much. Wonder what the problem is?

On a separate matter, there was apparently some deal on a pair of tickets for Northampton and Oldham. What p****d me off greatly as a non season ticket holder going to both games was this wasn't mentioned in the Hartlepool programme, meaning that I'm having to pay the full amount. Such deals should be better publicised by the club.#-o

 

[Ian]

Boz, attendances are falling by the season it seems.

I know we've only had two home games this season but these averaged 5226.
Compare that to last season, the average for our first two home games was 8339, however we did play Leeds first game getting over 11000! lol

Season 06-07: 7304
Season 05-06: 7987 and the pattern continues..

We'll be looking at average gates of 5500-6000 this season whereas last season we averaged around 6500-7000.

 

[SCooperSomersaults]

Boz, the deals were on the official website and various others for the last week or so, apologies if we didn't put it on here to publicise it a bit better too.

As for attendences falling, its understandable. 1. There's a credit crunch. 2. The football last season in particular wasn't the greatest or the most entertaining. 3. Summer transfers were solid but nothing exciting to people who are not die hards.

If we played like we did on Saturday on a regular basis, there's a very good argument that people should come back and crowds should rise, cos that was very entertaining and a quality performance which I'd pay good money to see. Our problem is the big games like Leeds at home etc, when big crowds come, we fail to show up, so the non-die-hards don't come back.

Let the football do the talking, if there's good football, crowds will return. Unfortunately I'm in Barcelona for the England game Saturday for the Oldham game. Season ticket available (voucher) if anybody wants it, let me know and i'll get it in the post.

 

[Tartantranmere64]

I agree crowds will come back when the football improves and Saturday was a good start in that direction. We need entertainment, not just 1-0 victories. I believe the Club does a lot but could do more. The general air of pre-season gloom wasn't helped by Lorraine announcing that we're stuffed and she's throwing in the towel. OK, so Rovers may never get to the Prem, but remember we were playing Hull, Wigan, Bristol City etc. until recently etc. and they have managed to head upwards. Anyway, not wanting to get ahead of ourselves, the original point I made was - entertain and crowds will come back.

 

[Boz]

Boz, the deals were on the official website and various others for the last week or so, apologies if we didn't put it on here to publicise it a bit better too.

No criticism intended of this site. My gripe is with the club not putting such information in the Hartlepool programme. I do feel that the club should look at slashing season ticket prices Bradford or Huddersfield style, which pull in a big gate . I wonder what the economics of such schemes is

 

[roverstillidie]

Attendances are falling because:

Last seasons style of play wasn't exactly great

We always lose when we get a big gate Leeds last season and Forest so people don't come back

The credit crunch

The summer signings weren't exactly great on paper. People like Edds don't get many people going (Rightly or wrongly)

Sky's continued destruction of non premier league football

Weve gone nowhere in 8 years

There is an increasing number of 'fans' going to Liverpool/Everton or watching premier league matches on obscure far eastern websites lol.

Finally there is still a major hangover from the football under Little and to be honest with a few matches exempt it hasn't improved a great deal.

 

[Ian]

Weve gone nowhere in 8 years

I think this is one of the major factors in our dwindling attendances. People want to see success.

What have we done that's been successful since we dropped down to this league? The die-hards will support the club as long as the club exists, but if you don't win anything, you aint gonna pull the crowds in.

For the first season or two when we were relegated, crowds were decent, people still had hope, but we've turned into a decent division one side that's not exactly wowing the crowds. Hardly gonna bring people through the turnstiles and like my figures suggest, the longer this goes on, the worse the attendances will get. We are getting less into Prenton Park every season!

Factors such as credit crunch etc are wider factors affecting lots of clubs, you need to look at the more personal factors to see where it's going wrong.

We always lose when we get a big gate Leeds last season and Forest so people don't come back

This is also completely true and extremely annoying.

 

[Boz]

There were 6802 v Oldham, who brought about 1500. The number of home fans hardly changed from the other league games, despite this being the nearest thing we'll get to a derby and our 'friends' over the water not having a game. £20 to get in didn't help. Baring miracles, Colchester will be sub 5000.

 

[Tartantranmere64]

The Friday Night Factor might just save us from a sub-5000 crowd but it's a poor state of affairs. We've gone from being one of the best supported teams in the division to being almost down with Crewe, Orient and Cheltenham. Mind you, win a few games and many glory hunters will come back - 1500 Oldham fans FFS! It was pretty amazing that despite such a pitiful home crowd and being behind for an hour the Rovers fans still managed to get behind the team and create some atmosphere.

 

[Boz]

Returning to this theme, we were nearly 3000 down on the gate for the Leeds game last season, despite them selling all their tickets again. A hefty slump, doesn't look like there will be a 5 figure crowd unless we reach the play-offs. After we've lost out on possible Cup revenue, in front of another disappointing crowd, I'm very concerned about the club's finances.

 

[Tartantranmere64]

I think alarm bells are ringing all over English football. The recession hasn't really bitten yet, and when it does football, and Rovers won't be immune. Look at the news that our neighbours Cammell Laird FC are going amateur, with immediate effect. If you don't think this is relevant to us, think again. Let's see how many clubs are still in business and not in administration in two years time. It could make for very interesting league tables, with 30% of clubs starting seasons with negative points like Luton, Bournemouth, etc.

Back to Rovers, I cannot see how the club can pay its way on crowds of around 5000. With the sponsorship revenue falling too, major cutbacks will be inevitable. To be fair, this will happen everywhere, and may level out. As long as Rovers can be reasonably run financially and not be extravagant, I don't see that we'll suffer any more than any other club our size. So no bid for Kaka in the January window then.

L1 seems the worst hit. If it wasn't for Leeds and their 2000+ travelling army a lot of clubs would be suffering even more.

I am afraid we'll just have to get used to a 2/3 empty ground for the time being.

 

[Ian]

The days of five figure attendances are well behind us. Hopefully not forever, but whilst your fighting it out in division one, you cannot expect the crowd to stay behind you. It would be nice, but in reality it doesn't happen.

Take Leeds for example. The longer they stay in division one, the smaller their attendances will be year after year.

I don't particularly buy into this credit crunch theory. Gates have been dwindling for years.

 

[TheBunnyBellEnd]

I agree with Ian attendances have been falling steadily for a number of years. The simple fact of the matter is this MOST football fans are fickle and will not watch a mediocre team in any lower league. The reason for this being most of the time they are playing for mid table mediocrity and the standard of football is appauling. As for us we have to understand that in by gone years we have had a number of supporters who supported both Tranmere plus a team from the premiership. Many of these people would come to watch Tranmere when there BIG club was not playing or were not at home, as a smaller club Tranmere were always able to offer these supporters very competitive prices and a good standard of football, often with us challenging for something. We also had a number of well known players at the club who previously had ties with one or both of the clubs across the water. This is no longer the case, however, if we were to beat Scunthorpe in the JPT and get through to the Northern Final I can guarantee there will be a bumper crowd probably topping 10000. If we were to get prommotion then the crowds would also rise due to travelling support and also the fact we would be playing better teams. In short success will breed bigger crowds.

 

[Ian]

Resurrecting a slightly old thread here, but I noticed Lorraine making a comment about falling attendances in the latest programme. It's obviously something of a worry.

Attendances have almost halved in the last five years from an average of 9044 in 2004-2005 to 5686 in 2008-2009.

Alarming really.
Here's a little of what Lorraine said in the programme:

It isn't just the number of supporters that matters, it is income, so our low prices and special offers combined with falling gates means we are being hit. Sadly, we are having to watch every penny at the moment.

 

[Boz]

Another poor crowd v Swindon. There was an article in yesterday's Independent showing that Rovers had the lowest % crowd to capacity in L1. On an average gate of 6,257 we were only 37.7% full. Of the home fixtures left, can't see Yeovil or Bristol Rovers bringing many, while we won't pull in a big home crowd for a midweek game at top whack v Leicester. Only Huddersfield & Hereford have the prospect of beating the current average gate imo. The side in an equivalent position in L2, Darlington have just gone into administration. Granted they've a white elephant stadium with more capacity than many Championship sides, but worrying nonetheless.

 

[Ian]

I remember looking around the ground at around 2.50pm yesterday and it was scarily empty. Seats filled up a bit just before kick off, but the crowds are dwindling at an alarming rate and if the team can't get out of this league, we'll see even lower gates next season.