Are You Lansdown In Diguise?

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Ok here i go the coffee and sandwhiches are ready!

1/ Ok

2/ It is my opinion that given the costs it is still beneficial to the club to open the East End to Bristol City supporters. Will 75k as I state send City into oblivion? The cost of policing could be funded by monies which were already budgeted for policing the Williams if the new build had taken place so in that respect I am already subsidizing policing which in effect does not exist. I will always wonder how vigorously the club contested the policing costs particularly given that the Police did not always use their resources efficiently e.g. police in the supporters club v Hartlepool and Plymouth. I feel our cow shed with it’s poor view is an asset because it helps improve the dire atmosphere in the ground, improves the experience of hundreds of the clubs supporters [not a bad thing is it?], can attract support who miss the old skool feeling, would help, ensure those who still go but want to be elsewhere keep going and might actually make the club money. Everything I have read including the clubs fanzine points to City fans wanting City fans in the East End.

3/The club most certainly have done forms of have research haven’t they? If they have not there could be thousands wasted in the corporate seats in the Williams soon. I have certainly received questionnaires from City which I hope were being used to identify trends in the Way City’s consumers are purchasing merchandise. A census of fans opinion in this day in age is not that hard. Any responsible business must know what it customers wants, feels, expects and thinks. Lord Justice Taylor wanted clubs to stop treating supporters with contempt well City should get out there tomorrow and find out what we the fans are really thinking, you, me, Malone fm the lot

Maybe a price reduction could attract those OAPS, kids; people on income support who do not go now but do support City but find the cost too much to bear. I know people who look upon the admission to the Dolman as a luxury.

4/ Simply another reason why City fans should be consulted at every step.Yes We have differing backgrounds and want different experiences from our day at the gate. All points to having that census quickly. Ignore the differences of what the supporter wants at the Gate and City could end up with an albatross of a ground. Of course I want a front two of Rooney & Ronaldinho up front but ………! I do not feel it so much to ask for choice of standing, sitting ,in a stand I want to be in, unreserved seating along with a few cha cha cha every couple of months.

5/ Seating for someone with bad knees and is well over six foot does not equal comfort anywhere I have yet to find except stood by the side of then red and white bar in Ashton Gate! How about reducing prices only slightly or looking to us the fans for answers?

Representative games I presume is a reference to England games which have been lost any way due to changes in EUFA rules. There could well be thousands who would prefer to stand which again gets back to that census. The football supporters federation support safe standing areas, there is a very good and seemingly representative poll of fans across the country which shows overwhelming support for safe standing areas and even my Monthly 4-4-2 magazine supports this and they are never wrong! As you say the club should be offering the best facilities possible to all fans and seating for some is not it.

6/ I completely and utterly disagree with you here. We have investments in the club, we are the stake holders in Bristol City, we have already “earned” this by those sales of season tickets, years of support and City fans should have representation on the board which can affect the club. It cannot be right for those who are the most important to Bristol City to have no say. City fans are not the enemy of the club and can be trusted with its future as long after Dawe and Lansdown have gone we will still be here.It is not right that this will have to come down to the supporters trust to raise ££££?

Found that link http://www.otib.co.uk/index.php?showtopic=50643&st=90

The club has to attract revenue by other means and i fully accept that but City must also look after the fans it has now. We could have a ground with fans sitting , standing and also in those debenture thingys Colin is always going on about. Put somebody in the boardroom voted for by the fans who has clout and hey presto there's your modern club

1/ Er...ok.

2/ Sorry, I'm not going to get into a long diatribe on this point as I believe any reasonable fan will believe there is a much better use for £75k of money we don't have than allowing a few hundred fans to sit in a different part of the ground, and perhaps attract a handful more. It leaves me speechless that anyone could suggest it is a sensible use of that sort of money and still keep a straight face.

3/ My argument was not that the club have or haven't done market research in general. I'm sure they have. My argument was that the case of the EastEnd Stand is a simple ase of cost/benefit analysis. Why waste more money on a survey if you know you can't afford to open it? I too know people who look upon entry to the Dolman as a luxury, incidentally. Me for starters. It seemed the height of snobbery when we moved from the Enclosure on the basis I couldn't see a bloody thing down there because I was (and still am) so short. But I'd rather spend my money on a seat with a better view than on an extra beer or two.

4/ As I said, I think fans are consulted in many different ways, from research to the CFF to open forums to the old fashioned thing of SteveL etc chatting to fans, as I've seen them do. But that doesn't mean the club can afford to implement something just because you want it! I sense from your comment about Ronaldo and Rooney up fron that you agree with my wider point, though, that the club's interests and the fans' immediate interests are not always identical.

5/ Are you suggesting a standing area just for people with dodgy knees? Try the front of the Dolman, where there are plenty of folk with dodgy knees who stand for 10 minutes at the start and end of each game. I simply don't believe that there are thousands who would prefer to stand particularly when, as I pointed out, in order to maintain the same income and therefore the same money available for players etc, they would either have to pay the same as to sit or effectively be subsidised by prices rises elsewhere in the ground. If you think otherwise, it's up to you to produce evidence to show the club, not for the club to spend money standing up your hunch. Perhaps this is a matter you could raise with the Supporters' Trust?

6/ Ok, we disagree on that one then. I still think anyone claiming to represent 'the fanz', either an individual or an organisation, must earn a place on the board. We've already seen from the huge controversy caused by changing over the forum to ST control that there is no such thing as an opinion for 'the fanz'. And this is only a bloody website! The ST must show that they truly represent a reasonable opinion of the fans, that they can be trusted, are well run and are accountable before they should be considered worthy of a board place. If you disagree with that, fine. But you've not convinced me otherwise, I'm afraid.

Is that okay for you, Dorset Red? I feel flattered you care. I didn't think anyone actually bothered to read what I wrote.