The Bradford City (Edin Rahic) Approach re Supporters / Prices

[BobBobSuperBob]

An interesting little piece I thought about Edin Rahic & Bradford City

 

As the former finance director of one of the world’s biggest companies, Bradford City’s co-owner Edin Rahic knows a thing or two about economics. So, when he promises that tickets will cost £1 should the League One club reach the Premier League, it is no idle boast.
Rahic arrived in English football last year fired with a missionary zeal. The first German to have taken the plunge into ownership in the English league, he is spreading the gospel of affordable tickets and the economies of scale that accompany it.
In some ways the approach is blindingly obvious: he has targeted 20,000 fans paying the current £149 to watch the Bantams next year and that would bring in the same money as 15,000 paying £199. However, the extra 5,000 people will have money in their pocket to spend on shirts, beer and burgers — and there is a spin-off for the team in terms of creating an intimidating atmosphere.
“Even with season tickets of £149 we can build a good team and compete if we sell more than 18,000 tickets,” Rahic says, sitting in his office in the Valley Parade stadium with a view towards the east of the city. Fans of rival clubs have been in touch, offering their praise for the £6.50 a game tariff.
“More people in the stadium means the atmosphere is better and is more scary for the visiting team,” he said. “The fans have more money to spend on beer and food. We have sold 12,000 shirts. For League One, that’s massive.
“At Bradford we decided to keep one price for adults wherever it is in the stadium. You have to have season tickets which are affordable. You see when you go to other clubs and they have 3,000-4,000 and it’s just not an atmosphere. I also went to a Premier League match in Manchester and it was like a theatre.
“Bradford is a working-class city, we are a working-class club and we want to encourage working-class supporters who give everything for the club. That’s a bit like our image. We are underdogs and we want to fight against the big boys. Therefore we need 18,000 to 20,000 supporters to have the atmosphere.”
The approach appears to be working: Bradford have not lost at home in more than a year and Saturday’s 2-1 win over Swindon Town keeps them in the play-off positions in the League One table. Their away following is impressive, too — sell-outs of their away allocation are regular occurrences and, when 4,300 travelled to Bolton Wanderers, it was the biggest away contingent anywhere in English football that weekend.
Bradford were already committed to affordable tickets before Rahic, 43, and his co-owner, Stefan Rupp, 47, bought the club — indeed it was one of the elements that attracted them last year. Originally, Rahic had targeted Glasgow Rangers and had put together a German consortium but that takeover failed to materialise.
He turned his attention to England and commissioned a detailed analysis of all 72 league clubs outside the top flight. Transport facilities, squad size and average age, manager turnover, history, hooliganism record, potential fan-base and ticket prices were all covered, and Bradford, who were already on the way up after a couple of cup runs, ticked all the boxes.
Rahic had been financial director for Bosch, the German engineering and electronics multi-national, before becoming a private investor. A talented youth player who appeared for Yugoslavia Under-16 before serious injuries ended his hopes of a career, he joined the board of Stuttgarter Kickers as well as gaining coaching and refereeing licences.
Bradford is the perfect place because we don’t care if someone is black or white or any colour — everyone is welcome
Since the takeover, he has moved his family over from Germany to demonstrate his commitment and aims to bring some elements of the German game to Bradford. He adds: “In Germany it is possible to buy really cheap tickets because of safe standing. It is maybe only £110 for a season ticket even at Dortmund or Bayern.
“When you look at ticket prices in the Premier League, when even the bottom of the table gets £100 million in TV money, I think it’s a shame to charge so much. There are a lot of average players in English football who are far too overpaid. You can pay the superstars good money but the rest should not get nearly the same.
“It’s our dream, of course, to be in the Premier League and, if we get there, the tickets will be £1 per game, because you already get at least £100 million from the TV money. The income of the ticketing would be a small percentage compared to TV money.
“So why would you not give something back to the fans? I want to have the best atmosphere in England.”
Rahic’s parents moved to Germany before the civil war in Yugoslavia erupted and the country broke up. Their original home was a Muslim enclave in Serbia but he does not follow a particular religion. “As my father said, just judge between good and bad,” Rahic says.
“Bradford is the perfect place because we don’t care if someone is black or white or any colour — everyone is welcome.”
Rahic has noticed, however, that the make-up of the crowd at Valley Parade does not reflect that of the city itself, which has significant communities of British Asians and more recent arrivals from eastern Europe. “My strategy at first was to understand why we don’t have the citizen mix of the city in the stadium. I asked the question and had 20 answers, or more accurately 20 excuses, from everyone.
“We have to find a way to be more interesting for the Asian and other communities. I was playing football in the park with my boys and started playing with some Asian kids, and scored a goal and said, ‘Yeah come on Bradford City!’
“They were saying, ‘No . . . Bradford Shitty, we support Arsenal, we support Manchester City’. I think they are more focused on the top leagues and the best teams, which is fine but the community loves football. Something like 90 per cent of people on the stadium tours we have are Asians, so we have to win over the young generation — we give out free tickets to community centres and we have the Bangla Bantams fan club.
“In two or three years our aim is to have a sold-out stadium which reflects more the citizen mix that is in the city.”
The Edin Project is well under way at Bradford and the rest of English football may learn a thing or two along the way.

 

[Kid in the Riot]

Honestly thought we might do something similar (but not quite as extreme) when the redevelopment was complete but it's clear from ticket pricing for the rugby and football that Mr Lansdown has little interest in filling Ashton Gate. His reign over the past 14 years has demonstrated he has little interest in 'giving back' anything to the fan base in fact. 

Fair play to the Bradford owner, he 'gets it'  and good luck to them. Sure they'll be a force in The Championship when they eventually get back up.

[ChippenhamRed]

Fair play to Bradford and their owner - a fantastic ethos! So refreshing to see an approach that genuinely puts the fans first.

I'd love to see our club do the same, but I do wonder if it would have the same effect on attendances that it has at Bradford. The demographic of Bristol is very different. If we charged £199 for a season ticket, how many would we sell? Without question we would sell a lot more, but our POTD sales would fall through the floor, and STH would be less inclined to attend every game if you hadn't paid so much for it. As a member, I go to about 8 home games a season, which costs me around £200 a season. So a £199 ST would be a no-brainer for me - but I still wouldn't be able to go to many more matches. So attendances may not increase dramatically.

I also question whether price is the number one reason people don't come more often. For our games against Newcastle and Villa, where tickets were full price, the attendances were higher than the game v Blackburn, where there was a £10 ticket offer. That suggests that our fringe support picks matches based more on the prestige of the occasion, rather than the price.

You would also have to say that 15,000 people paying £300-400 means you would have to almost double your season ticket sales to make the same money at £199 - and that's before you factor in the loss of matchday sales. However, it's clear that profitability isn't the only driver at Bradford - and full credit to them for that! But in the age of FFP, the club does need to maximise revenues in order to compete as best we can against our Championship rivals.

So, I see both sides, but I do still love what Bradford have done.

[Kodjias Wrist]

I dont see this method working if your team is struggling for a couple of seasons and the attendances start dropping. Also how would fans react once the price goes back up to faciliate the need to survive in the championship for example ? An annual increase in price?

 

[Guest]

Its a very interesting subject and i really like the bradford scheme of low prices to fill the ground.

Also there is massive scope to tap into ethnic minorities and i actually think our percentage on this subject is poor,though i have no proof of this just my eyes at matches.

[Kid in the Riot]

10 minutes ago, Kodjias Wrist said:

I dont see this method working if your team is struggling for a couple of seasons and the attendances start dropping. Also how would fans react once the price goes back up to faciliate the need to survive in the championship for example ? An annual increase in price?

Read the article. Bradford introduced this pricing when they were struggling (L2 if I remember correctly) and the owner wants to reduce prices as they go up the leagues, not increase them.

[Kid in the Riot]

19 minutes ago, ChippenhamRed said:

Fair play to Bradford and their owner - a fantastic ethos! So refreshing to see an approach that genuinely puts the fans first.

I'd love to see our club do the same, but I do wonder if it would have the same effect on attendances that it has at Bradford. The demographic of Bristol is very different. If we charged £199 for a season ticket, how many would we sell? Without question we would sell a lot more, but our POTD sales would fall through the floor, and STH would be less inclined to attend every game if you hadn't paid so much for it. As a member, I go to about 8 home games a season, which costs me around £200 a season. So a £199 ST would be a no-brainer for me - but I still wouldn't be able to go to many more matches. So attendances may not increase dramatically.

I also question whether price is the number one reason people don't come more often. For our games against Newcastle and Villa, where tickets were full price, the attendances were higher than the game v Blackburn, where there was a £10 ticket offer. That suggests that our fringe support picks matches based more on the prestige of the occasion, rather than the price.

You would also have to say that 15,000 people paying £300-400 means you would have to almost double your season ticket sales to make the same money at £199 - and that's before you factor in the loss of matchday sales. However, it's clear that profitability isn't the only driver at Bradford - and full credit to them for that! But in the age of FFP, the club does need to maximise revenues in order to compete as best we can against our Championship rivals.

So, I see both sides, but I do still love what Bradford have done.

As you say if we charged £199 we'd sell "a lot more" season tickets, and that's really reason enough to do it as far as I'm concerned. We are now bringing in pretty big money on the hospitality side of things and that money could be passed onto the average supporter. 

Not sure there's any evidence to suggest if you'd paid less for an ST you'd attend less. You might attend more to get full value and spend extra money in the ground. How successful the team are would have a bigger influence on attendance I'd suggest.

I think people going from membership to being ST holders would attend more, think that's a safe assumption to make and again would lead to more money being spent in the ground.

Newcastle/Villa were higher crowds than Blackburn tho I'm guessing they each brought 2k more fans than Blackburn. They're freak examples really as two massive clubs. 

As for revenue/profitability/FFP I would simply say that if Bradford can afford to do it then City and our billionaire owner sure as hell can. He chooses not to though -  and that is his decision. 

Martin Griffiths talked about Bristol Sport's objective being to fill AG, I can only assume that is no longer a priority. Shame,  because it is looking a bit 'white elephant' at the moment for the football and rugby.

[ChippenhamRed]

11 minutes ago, Kid in the Riot said:

As you say if we charged £199 we'd sell "a lot more" season tickets, and that's really reason enough to do it as far as I'm concerned. We are now bringing in pretty big money on the hospitality side of things and that money could be passed onto the average supporter. 

Not sure there's any evidence to suggest if you'd paid less for an ST you'd attend less. You might attend more to get full value and spend extra money in the ground. How successful the team are would have a bigger influence on attendance I'd suggest.

I think people going from membership to being ST holders would attend more, think that's a safe assumption to make and again would lead to more money being spent in the ground.

Newcastle/Villa were higher crowds than Blackburn tho I'm guessing they each brought 2k more fans than Blackburn. They're freak examples really as two massive clubs. 

As for revenue/profitability/FFP I would simply say that if Bradford can afford to do it then City and our billionaire owner sure as hell can. He chooses not to though -  and that is his decision. 

Martin Griffiths talked about Bristol Sport's objective being to fill AG, I can only assume that is no longer a priority. Shame,  because it is looking a bit 'white elephant' at the moment for the football and rugby.

All fair points Kid. Re: attending less if you've paid less, it's more a case of people who can't attend all the time still buying one because it becomes economically sensible to get one anyway. I agree in most cases if you'd bought a ST you'd be there most of the time, but not all.

Certainly agree that the stated objective to fill Ashton Gate looks like a pretty hollow promise when you're charging £500-plus to sit in the Lansdown.

[BobBobSuperBob]

Interesting to compare Bradfords season tickets (I also see Huddersfield anticipating £199 season tickets) to the Face Value tickets for this years Champs League Final at Cardiff !!

 

Category 1 £390 Centrally positioned
Category 2 £275 Mainly positioned in the corners
Category 3 £140 Behind the goals
Category 4 £60 Behind the goals on the upper and lower levels

 

[Kodjias Wrist]

9 hours ago, Kid in the Riot said:

Read the article. Bradford introduced this pricing when they were struggling (L2 if I remember correctly) and the owner wants to reduce prices as they go up the leagues, not increase them.

I read the article. What im saying is if your team is struggling and you face relegation a couple of times why would you then pay £70 more each time you are relegated? 

[Kid in the Riot]

32 minutes ago, Kodjias Wrist said:

I read the article. What im saying is if your team is struggling and you face relegation a couple of times why would you then pay £70 more each time you are relegated? 

But there is no indication in the article that that's what would happen. His model works on the basis that 'price is everything' and as long as the ticket prices are affordable, they will continue to sell in high numbers; no matter what league they're in.

[Welcome To The Jungle]

This is why I dislike SL. He values success over the fanbase. 

[RumRed]

54 minutes ago, Welcome To The Jungle said:

This is why I dislike SL. He values success over the fanbase. 

And failing both

[Tinmans Love Child]

It's a no brainer for me the Bradford way of doing things, it's simple maths, if you have an amount you need to generate on an annual basis to pay the bills (wages, transfers, ground maintenance, policing etc etc) then subtract what you get in TV money, sponsorship etc etc you will be left with a figure that you need to generate from ticket sales, you can divide this figure between as many or as little numbers of fans as you want, I'm surprised more clubs don't do this 

[Kid in the Riot]

45 minutes ago, Tinmans Love Child said:

It's a no brainer for me the Bradford way of doing things, it's simple maths, if you have an amount you need to generate on an annual basis to pay the bills (wages, transfers, ground maintenance, policing etc etc) then subtract what you get in TV money, sponsorship etc etc you will be left with a figure that you need to generate from ticket sales, you can divide this figure between as many or as little numbers of fans as you want, I'm surprised more clubs don't do this 

I thought the reason we wouldn't consider cheaper priced ST's is due to capacity. Now we have the capacity and a load of empty seats; why not do it?

There are other initiatives the club could do such as subsidise tickets for our own away fans (which Arsenal do; £4 per ticket) or away travel (which Stoke do) or reduced season ticket prices for fans who live over 75 miles away (which Watford do). We do nothing and yet some fans seem to praise the fact ticket prices have gone up for some and there's a fair chance we'll be in L1 next season!

I thought there'd be pressure on C'ship clubs to reduce ticket prices given the £30 cap on away ticket prices in the Premier League. If the clubs can't do it themselves then I hope an agreement is reached on £20 maximum price for next season.