[Albion] Corporate Football

So often see on here about people saying football clubs are now too sterile,too corporate and we are now customers not supporters. Dont understand it. Having attended Goldstone and Withdean going to the Amex is a great pleasure. I was in north stand in Goldstone days but now prefer my comfy seat at Amex now with same crowd round me every game. Hopefully north stand will someday become safe standing. Maybe people think it is wrong that there is now a small % of people coming to watch the game rather then follow the Albion. So what, especially if there willing to pay £70/80 for a meal. I know people that watch Whitehawk and Burgess Hill,They run down corporate Albion and say what they watch is a proper football experience. Having watched football at both grounds this season they couldnt be further from the truth. I have very few gripes about Albion, Am sure he does a good job but Paul Barber can be annoying with his,we know how to run a football club attitude and how they do us a favour by laying on free transport. Sorry but not supporters fault ground is in the sticks and we do pay for this on our STs. I am fortunate to be able to afford it but with money coming in from TV, ticket prices far to high. I know many that cant afford it and effort should be made to sometimes make tickets available to these people. If we stay up can see no justification in the ST price increase or w/d of subsidy to seagull travel. How nice with the £2m plus made from cup run club did something for supporters and withdrew these. In the meantime I will watch Albion in whatever division. Pleased to hear why some think football is now too corporate

Not sure what you are getting at in your one paragraph ramble.

Are you happy with the club or not? We need to know

Yes As I said going to Amex to watch Albion is a pleasure compared to the Goldstone and Withdean

amexer said:

So often see on here about people saying football clubs are now too sterile,too corporate and we are now customers not supporters. Dont understand it. Having attended Goldstone and Withdean going to the Amex is a great pleasure. I was in north stand in Goldstone days but now prefer my comfy seat at Amex now with same crowd round me every game. Hopefully north stand will someday become safe standing. Maybe people think it is wrong that there is now a small % of people coming to watch the game rather then follow the Albion. So what, especially if there willing to pay £70/80 for a meal. I know people that watch Whitehawk and Burgess Hill,They run down corporate Albion and say what they watch is a proper football experience. Having watched football at both grounds this season they couldnt be further from the truth. I have very few gripes about Albion, Am sure he does a good job but Paul Barber can be annoying with his,we know how to run a football club attitude and how they do us a favour by laying on free transport. Sorry but not supporters fault ground is in the sticks and we do pay for this on our STs. I am fortunate to be able to afford it but with money coming in from TV, ticket prices far to high. I know many that cant afford it and effort should be made to sometimes make tickets available to these people. If we stay up can see no justification in the ST price increase or w/d of subsidy to seagull travel. How nice with the £2m plus made from cup run club did something for supporters and withdrew these. In the meantime I will watch Albion in whatever division. Pleased to hear why some think football is now too corporate

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".......especially if there (sic) willing to pay £70/80 for a meal."
".....with money coming in from TV, ticket prices far to high. I know many that cant afford it"

You've just explained it most eloquently. What else do you think you need to understand?

I think there's a difference between being corporate and being professional. I find it refreshing that this club is run VERY professionally these days. It was appallingly run before the Withdean days to be honest. Even in the Mike Bamber era when the team was half decent, it was still a badly run club and it held the club back for decades.

amexer said:

Pleased to hear why some think football is now too corporate

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Just wait and see how you feel about the number of tickets we get for the FA Cup Final, once we've pushed Man City to one side!

For me, it's about the extent to which the game sells itself to pander to TV and Corporates rather than consider the fans that have been there for decades, and will be the ones that remain when/if we hit hard times and slide back a division or two. You just have to look at kick-off times, and how many games are arranged when away fans have no trains left to get back home to see how little consideration is given to fans who actually attend matches.

As long as the games sell-out, we seem to have little consideration given to how convenient it is to get a ticket, transfer a ticket or even get an elderly relative to the upper tiers. Nope, the game has sold out, so everyone is happy, because we've aimed to sell every ticket, and that's what we've done. If people have had to buy a ticket 6 weeks in advance, and "life" has simply happened, making them unable to attend, then tough, no avenue to resale, or returns, and we announce the tickets sold, not how many are actually able to attend, anyway, so it still looks good in our stats.

We'll also ban various items without listening to fans concerns, but it may just make a few extra £££ across the concession stands. We'll charge £££ for people to be a mascot, even though that is small change to a club,in the EPL, but big bucks to the individual.

The moment we became a club who could announce £15m of loss in a year, then a bit of me died, because I realised how far the club was from being saved or influenced greatly by my extra few quid, supporting the club by spending in the ground, or buying a programme. It would take 25 games at 25,000 people spending an extra £25 to recoup £15m, so it's beyond the extra couple of quid they could wring out of us, and yet they still do it!

That's "Corporate Football" for me. Still love the club, still bouncing off the walls when I secure my tickets to Wembley and Stamford Bridge, but I simply don't feel "part of the club" in the way I did, and I don't feel like I matter to them like I used to. Not bitter about it, I'm quite accepting of it, but there is no doubting it is a change from what it used to be.

Simster said:

I think there's a difference between being corporate and being professional. I find it refreshing that this club is run VERY professionally these days. It was appallingly run before the Withdean days to be honest. Even in the Mike Bamber era when the team was half decent, it was still a badly run club and it held the club back for decades.

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This. Reckon we all benefit from the enhanced professionalism e.g. the painless process of buying tickets. As for the enhanced corporateness, well sort of goes with the Amex/PL turf, and easily enough ignored if you're not directly affected. Having said that, and having chipped in on a couple of NSC-sponsored match occasions at Withdean, I for one was mightily impressed at the corporate hospitality the club was able to put on in tbose dog days, despite some obvious financial limitations. You never ever got the feeling you were being short-changed. In fact I'd be surprised if the club didn't actually lose out on the deal. Top top people then. Pretty sure not much has changed on that score, apart from probably the profitability. And who on earth would begrudge the club that?

Looks very nice, no wonder they are late out to their seats, like to experience it once but prefer to jump up and down, scream and shout...

Tom Hark Preston Park said:

This. Reckon we all benefit from the enhanced professionalism e.g. the painless process of buying tickets. As for the enhanced corporateness, well sort of goes with the Amex/PL turf, and easily enough ignored if you're not directly affected. Having said that, and having chipped in on a couple of NSC-sponsored match occasions at Withdean, I for one was mightily impressed at the corporate hospitality the club was able to put on in tbose dog days, despite some obvious financial limitations. You never ever got the feeling you were being short-changed. In fact I'd be surprised if the club didn't actually lose out on the deal. Top top people then. Pretty sure not much has changed on that score, apart from probably the profitability. And who on earth would begrudge the club that?

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Was it early last season that you posted that this was your last season as a regular attendee/ season ticket holder and that you were off to non league next season? I am hoping and assuming you changed your mind once the Italian Stallion took over?

I know where the OP is coming from and he is right in that we shouldn’t begrudge those who want to spend (or be spent on) a bit of corporate entertainment. It’s those that wander round the West Stand Lower , having just exited the Dugout “club”, trying to find the entry points into the bowl with their lanyards tied around their dicks that do it for me.

The only criticism that I would have with the OP’s post is that it has a shocking lack of apostrophes!