[Archived] Fans Forum Minutes

[rebelmswar]

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=206...id=aKchnHh8FqII

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=206...id=aIoGAgCJNyMQ

I think this may also have something to do with it.

[Glenn]

One of Paul's last acts as BRISA chairman was to get the FF back up and running after it had seemingly died and to some extent there presently is little need for both.

The problem with BRISA was that after the initial enthusiasm, it boiled down to the same handful of people being responsible for it.

For quite a while I did consider offering to take over once Paul stepped down and whilst takeover talks were a hot topic I even had a few other people interested in helping too. But once again that interest dwindled. So I decided to put my effort into keeping one fans organisation running (i.e. BRFCS) without trying to keep a second one afloat with very few people to help.

If somebody wants to pick up BRISA where Paul left off, then it's all there and I'll be delighted to offer what support I can.

As for Blakey's comments about BRISA being all secret squirrel, I think he's got it wrong. The FF *was* all secret squirel but as handful of us pushed for it to be opened up, the publish minutes are the result of that. The whole point of BRISA was to be as opened as possible, all meetings were public and all contact with the club was documented (all be it badly at times). We couldn't have been much more open about BRISA if we'd have tried.

[only2garners]

For Sparky Marky, and anyone else who is interested, there is an agenda setting meeting on Monday 6 August ahead of the Fans Forum meeting the following week. If you have any particular issues you would like the Fans Forum to raise with the club, you can contact the chairman or any of the members before that date.

(Contact details were on the rovers official website, but I haven't checked if they are still on the new look site)

As the current secretary of the Fans' Forum, I'm happy to take any ideas for agenda items to the meeting on 6th August - you can either make it public on here or PM me.

[Ben-2000]

The FF *was* all secret squirel but as handful of us pushed for it to be opened up, the publish minutes are the result of that

Quite right too. Well done.

[Paul]

Yep fair enough, but surely these topics should be on the agenda at meeting like this. Not whether you can buy a pie in 10 minutes or not....every club has these problems and mostly fans will expect them like they always have.

I was merely pointing out that there must be more pressing issues to discuss at meetings than pie availability.

Does that make me an idiot?

There seem to be a few misconceptions about the Fans Forum and BRISA. Having had involvement with both, and in no way claimining to represent either, I hope this will help.

The FF is, if you like a focus group or sounding board for the club. Any fan is welcome to attend any meeting, as far as I'm aware, but this should be done through Martin the chairman. Martin will want to know the issue you wish to raise and will hope you'll be able to attend one of the FF planning meetings which take place one week before the meeting with the club. The purpose of the planning meeting is to make sure everyone is clear on the issues to be raised.

As for the pies topic. From memory the spend per fan per game on refreshments is around £1.50. Personally I feel the catering and service is poor and I stopped buying anything at a match years ago. The club have appointed a new catering manager, whose name I forget at the moment, who gave up her evening to give a comprehensive presentation on the changes she will be introducing next season. These are all focused around giving the fans a better service. Now this may not be important to some but it is very important to Rovers. Increased spend per head is presumably a target, as is ensuring the whole match day experience is a success for any fan. People may not like the words, I'm not sure I do, but this is the reality of modern football. If the casual fan finds the catering is poor this might be the decider in whether or not he returns. If Dad gets fed up with queuing to buy junior a hot dog, he may stop taking junior to the game. As another example, kids find it really difficult to get served as they don't know much more than standing in line waiting for some attention - while the adults make eye contact with the staff and ensure they do get served. I hope the club will introduce kiosks dedicated to serving coke and hot dogs so the kids get a fair chance. The game has changed enormously in 10 years, Rovers are dedicated to ensuring the experience is good for every fan, hence the importance of the pies.

As for BRISA it was never a secret. At present it seems to be doing little, I told the "committee" in February I would stand down in May. Glenn hoped to take on the chair role but has discovered what I knew - lots of issues need addressing but too few people are able to commit the time to dealing with them. As JW commented sometime back, fans groups are only needed when there is a crisis. I responded that if a fans group was to be taken seriously it had to have a track record during the quiet times. If for example the club had new owners it would be no good if a fans group suddenly emerged from the wood work with a list of questions for the new owner(s)! Just wish I had that one on tape.

The last issue I woked on for BRISA was the Fans Forum. Basically we talked with the FF and the club about getting the FF running again after a year of no meetings. I'm pleased to say the end result was positive and the FF is functioning very well.

On the club shop I think people need to understand the position. The club is not happy. SWI have recently floated, Mike Ashley has just bought the barcodes. The situation is difficult and both parties are committed to a contract which has some time to run. It is utterly unrealistic to expect Blackburn Rovers to make any public statement about the discussions the club is having with SWI under these circumstances. Fans may feel they have a "right" to know, problem is football is a business and as such much of interest to the support needs to be kept private.

[Paul]

We seem to have entered a strange new environment in which fans almost demand bigger and more expensive signings - TV money can pay for that - yet are not prepared / able to accept the very changes in the game which make these millions available require a very different attitude from the clubs. Commerce rules football these days, no one seems to question the rationale behind the PL clubs pouring millions into players pockets yet when Rovers make a commercial decision to "lease" the shop to SWI - a groundbreaking deal at the time - for the very same reasons, the club ends up with all sorts of flak. The decision was presumably driven by finance, in the same way as 11.30 Sunday KOs are.

[Cocker]

On the club shop I think people need to understand the position. The club is not happy. SWI have recently floated, Mike Ashley has just bought the barcodes. The situation is difficult and both parties are committed to a contract which has some time to run. It is utterly unrealistic to expect Blackburn Rovers to make any public statement about the discussions the club is having with SWI under these circumstances. Fans may feel they have a "right" to know, problem is football is a business and as such much of interest to the support needs to be kept private.

The thing that puzzles me the most about this is that surly SWI would make some cash by actually selling Blackburn gear in the Blackburn shop? I don't know the ins and outs of the money side but I am assuming the money they have paid means that they can use the Rovers branding. I really don't mind them selling lonsdale stuff in there (because I have bought some of it) it would just be nice to sell the Blackburn gear too. I think it was mentioned about the catalog that used to go out (before online shop was really there) I used to remember that coming through the door and saying "Right, I will have that and that and that.....etc. (it also had baby grows in there which would have been excellent for my new born and to stamp the brand on him but I will have to wait till he can fit into the older stuff which I just hope isn't too late )

Given what I have said, I wonder if its the other way round then that every time they use the Rovers brand that Rovers get a bit of money on the merchandise? And this is the reason they stock bugger all?

I guess these are questions that we will never know the answers too so will just have to keep the fingers crossed for the future

(Apologies for ranting about the shop again when there is already a thread about it but its a subject I feel very strongly about as I have cash to spend but Rovers/SWI don't want it)

[stuwilky]

I went in the other day, there was a marginal improvement in the amount of Rovers stuff in there.

[SAS]

i think the idea of a golden mile is a brilliant idea, maybe it could run from the train station to the ground? with past players faces on banners hanging from lamposts and famous events that have happened