Attendances

[JHRover]

49 minutes ago, Mattyblue said:

When we last got promoted out of this league there were 3 (and we were one of them).

Just shows how crowds have increased substantially across the board in recent years - alas we are one of the few clubs to go the other way.

The reason it has gone that way since our 1999-01 spell at this level is because more of the traditionally well supported clubs have dropped to this level. Leeds, Villa, Forest, Middlesbrough and Sheff Wed, whilst poorer supported clubs like Burnley, Bournemouth, Watford, Huddersfield and Palace have replaced them in the league above. If we were to do what Sky want and replace those 5 or 6 smaller clubs with the bigger city ones our gates would suddenly look more impressive.

Goes to show the declining importance of crowds for me, compared to say 30 years ago.

Still think our average home gate is about 16/24 at this level, admittedly boosted by above average away followings, but nonetheless I don't think it is too shabby given how this club has gone about its business and how it restricts it's own ticket sales by moving decent fixtures to inconvenient times. If we actually played a few games at 3pm on a Saturday we might get a few more on.

Note between now and August - 6 months - we will have at most 1 home 3pm Saturday kick off (v Stoke), the rest all moved, some seemingly at Rovers request. Then they wonder why gates are struggling.

[Mattyblue]

Partly the reason, but also clubs like Norwich, Sheff Utd etc are getting much bigger gates than they did 20 years ago, we are not.

[tomphil]

Some clubs just have the demographics, affluence and maybe location of ground to sustain the gates the likes of Rovers just can't I don't think it's coincidence that bigger towns and cities can hold onto bigger crowds even when times aren't as good as they once were on the pitch.

We still average around ten percent of the towns population in regards to home fans and that'll stack up against most other clubs it only shows up more here when we do ok the crowds don't rise much if at all whereas at some others they shoot up by thousands simply because they have more in the woodwork locally to draw from, todays opponents being a case in point.

Edited February 17, 2019 by tomphil

[Stuart]

2 hours ago, Mattyblue said:

When we last got promoted out of this league there were 3 (and we were one of them).

Just shows how crowds have increased substantially across the board in recent years - alas we are one of the few clubs to go the other way.

And we are doing nothing to arrest that trend.

Playing devil’s advocate though, is it just a sign of the times? Unfashionable clubs from the “deprived north west” with too much local tribalism unable or unwilling to unite to survive? Big city clubs, cheered on by the writers of FFP rules, rising above us?

Do we need some kind of initiative with a “Lancashire United” season ticket? A flat fee and you can attend any game in the region with as much effort to avoid home clashes as possible. Would such an idea work? “Back in the day” fans used to happily go to other grounds in the region. Some still do I expect. I guess logistically there would need to be a cap - similar to my 1875 club 10 games for £100 suggestion. Convert vouchers into match tickets, subject to availability. The L.U. Season Ticket could be 30 games at the following clubs for £300.

Would a floating fan (currently watching Bumley) come to a Rovers game with such a ticket/voucher?

I can even do the marketing for you...

Yes, I am being a little tongue in cheek but these are the kind of ideas than need to be considered. Think outside the box or our East Lancashire (and West Yorkshire) club will go to the wall. Or we trust Venkys (ha!) to play the long game and we “out-breed” our local rivals and hoover up their great-grandchildren as fans.

[tomphil]

Bring your mates for a tenner but don't expect the team to turn up !

[Oldgregg86]

1 hour ago, Stuart said:

And we are doing nothing to arrest that trend.

Playing devil’s advocate though, is it just a sign of the times? Unfashionable clubs from the “deprived north west” with too much local tribalism unable or unwilling to unite to survive? Big city clubs, cheered on by the writers of FFP rules, rising above us?

Do we need some kind of initiative with a “Lancashire United” season ticket? A flat fee and you can attend any game in the region with as much effort to avoid home clashes as possible. Would such an idea work? “Back in the day” fans used to happily go to other grounds in the region. Some still do I expect. I guess logistically there would need to be a cap - similar to my 1875 club 10 games for £100 suggestion. Convert vouchers into match tickets, subject to availability. The L.U. Season Ticket could be 30 games at the following clubs for £300.

Would a floating fan (currently watching Bumley) come to a Rovers game with such a ticket/voucher?

I can even do the marketing for you...

Yes, I am being a little tongue in cheek but these are the kind of ideas than need to be considered. Think outside the box or our East Lancashire (and West Yorkshire) club will go to the wall. Or we trust Venkys (ha!) to play the long game and we “out-breed” our local rivals and hoover up their great-grandchildren as fans.

Whilst it simply would never happen I would buy one

[Hasta]

3 hours ago, Oldgregg86 said:

Whilst it simply would never happen I would buy one

It was a chore going down to Ewood today with the season being over

Why would I want to have to bother driving or travelling to Wigan or Blackpool to watch a group of people play football I have no attachment to?

[perthblue02]

12 minutes ago, Hasta said:

It was a chore going down to Ewood today with the season being over

Why would I want to have to bother driving or travelling to Wigan or Blackpool to watch a group of people play football I have no attachment to?

To support the away team , especially at t'turd moor

Edited February 17, 2019 by perthblue02

[SIMON GARNERS 194]

The sad thing is Rovers probably couldn't give away tickets for free to watch that level of dross on display this afternoon.

[Doogs]

What a poor show today.

[Mattyblue]

‘Bring a friend...’ deals never work, especially not for TV games.

Daft idea.

[blueboy3333]

13,249 (1,052 away)

A thousand below average.  Probably doesn't help that the manager has publicly raised the white flag on our play-off hopes.

[Paul]

8 hours ago, tomphil said:

Some clubs just have the demographics, affluence and maybe location of ground to sustain the gates the likes of Rovers just can't I don't think it's coincidence that bigger towns and cities can hold onto bigger crowds even when times aren't as good as they once were on the pitch.

We still average around ten percent of the towns population in regards to home fans and that'll stack up against most other clubs it only shows up more here when we do ok the crowds don't rise much if at all whereas at some others they shoot up by thousands simply because they have more in the woodwork locally to draw from, todays opponents being a case in point.

While the 10% figure is correct it is only a figure. If 10% of the population was attending and we added the thousands travelling in then gates would be much healthier.

I believe the reality is less than 5% of the BWD population attend games.

[Mattyblue]

I would think you are correct as more and more of our match going support resides outside of the town.

Looking at the demographics of Blackburn that trend will only continue.

[Rover_Shaun]

1 hour ago, Mattyblue said:

‘Bring a friend...’ deals never work, especially not for TV games.

Daft idea.

They wouldn't be much of a friend at the moment I'm afraid

[blueboy3333]

36 minutes ago, Mattyblue said:

I would think you are correct as more and more of our match going support resides outside of the town.

Looking at the demographics of Blackburn that trend will only continue.

With 50% of the children currently living in Blackburn never likely to ever go to Ewood it will be a serious problem going forward. 

[Oldgregg86]

4 hours ago, Hasta said:

It was a chore going down to Ewood today with the season being over

Why would I want to have to bother driving or travelling to Wigan or Blackpool to watch a group of people play football I have no attachment to?

Well the simple answer to that is if it's a chore and you have no interest in any other teams it's not for you and you wouldn't bother.

I drive past the dw, macron and deepdale on my way to ewood. I have a soft spot for Wigan being a wiganer and like all local teams to do well with the exception of Burnley and united providing it doesn't interfere with us.

I watch chorley, ashton, Stockport , Salford, man city, united u23s any football that's about when rovers arnt playing because im married and have kids and hate my life so the suggestion by Stuart would be ideal ?

 

Edited February 17, 2019 by Oldgregg86

[blueboy3333]

38 minutes ago, Oldgregg86 said:

 

I drive past the dw, macron and deepdale on my way to ewood. 

 

There must be a quicker route from Mill Hill?

[tomphil]

2 hours ago, Paul said:

While the 10% figure is correct it is only a figure. If 10% of the population was attending and we added the thousands travelling in then gates would be much healthier.

I believe the reality is less than 5% of the BWD population attend games.

Admittedly it's just a ballpark figure for arguments sake and I usually just use Blackburn rather than BWD it sounds better ?

As with a lot of things regarding Rovers it's totally skewed by the difference in demographics of this town and places similar sized say like Ipswich for example. Here we have one of if not The most multicultural towns in the country for its size as well as high levels of poverty so it would be crazy to thing that doesn't affect our local pulling power.

Most clubs though will pull a lot of their regular hardcore from within a mile or twos radius i'd wager so I do believe we'll still stack up well compared to these it's just we don't have the same amount of people ...or type who'll be interested enough.  Facts whether we like it or not sadly.

[old darwen blue]

4 hours ago, Oldgregg86 said:

Well the simple answer to that is if it's a chore and you have no interest in any other teams it's not for you and you wouldn't bother.

I drive past the dw, macron and deepdale on my way to ewood. I have a soft spot for Wigan being a wiganer and like all local teams to do well with the exception of Burnley and united providing it doesn't interfere with us.

I watch chorley, ashton, Stockport , Salford, man city, united u23s any football that's about when rovers arnt playing because im married and have kids and hate my life so the suggestion by Stuart would be ideal ?

 

Im afraid these things are fundamentally connected. 

[Paul]

Ill health is preventing me from attending at present. Decided to use Now TV to watch last night -£9.

What a crap experience that was. Let's see 23 home games at £9 = £207/season. JWL ST = +/-£345.

I can't think of a single benefit to watching on Sky or NOW TV if one can get to Ewood on a matcgffff76w

[Mattyblue]

Seems obvious to long standing, committeed season ticket holders like us.

But many fans don’t have that same level of commitment so are happy to pay their Sky subs and watch any available game on TV, whilst maybe taking in an odd game at Ewood.

 

[Hasta]

Plenty of empty seats yesterday around me in the Blackburn End which are normally taken up by season ticket holders.

[Paul]

2 hours ago, Hasta said:

Plenty of empty seats yesterday around me in the Blackburn End which are normally taken up by season ticket holders.

The gaps were noticeable on TV. My eldest moved seats so he could take his brother, who usually comes with me.

He said a lot of regulars were missing.

[AshleyClifford]

On 17/02/2019 at 00:18, blueboy3333 said:

https://www.soccerstats.com/attendance.asp?league=england2

At an average of 14,141 we are 2k down on Waggott's target of 16k for home attendances.

Waggott's  target was extremely ambitious I'm not sure it can be used as a stick to beat him with. Attendances are up.

If every season ticket holder brought a friend the Ground would have been full, as it was 1 in 10 might have done, but a good portion of those would have attended anyway and paid full price (Fact) - there were people at the ticket office yesterday. we did not get a bigger attendance yesterday despite a pretty good offer.