Luton Town v OXFORD

[Radley Rambler]

Following that logic, so should the majority of non-ST holders. On the day prices at the Kassam as follows:

East Stand - £20
North Stand - £22
SS Lower - £22
SS Upper - £24

So a very clear average of.........£22!

Before we all have a go at Luton Town (well, at least about this topic!) perhaps those who feel that £22 is 'off the scale' should look closer to home.

Even at your prices using an average is very unfair, OUFC fans at Luton have no choice, if we wish to attend we have to go in the badly converted terrace with poor views, and non-concessions have to pay £22, there's no option for £18 or £20 ticket. It's also worth remembering that we make less money off a ticket than the vast majority of clubs, due to Mr Kassam.

I do think, however, OUFC should try to address away ticket prices as a bigger away following enhances the atmosphere for all fans, perhaps matching the family area prices for away fans would entice a few more in without being unfair to home fans.

Do away fans at our ground have much of a choice? I genuinely don't know if they can buy at the reduced advanced rate of a mere £19 but presumably to do so, they would (at least until this season) have incurred a booking fee so they'd still have been paying £20 and would have to make the effort to order the ticket in advance.

Whilst the view at the Kassam I'll grant you is better than at Luton (albeit some might argue they'd prefer being behind the goal in a bit of a crowd melee (me included) rather than at the end of a windswept soulless stand), the stadium experience is hardly a good one - I refer you to previous arguments on this topic over the past decade on this forum!

The point about Kassam's share is I believe not really relevant - that's down to Mr Merry and his poor negotiations. To turn that on its head - should Chelsea or Man City fans get in for free due to their sugar daddies' extreme wealth?

I'm also not convinced that reducing the ticket prices for away fans by even say a fiver would really make much difference. If you are prepared to spend your time (opportunity cost), travel (££) and eat/drink(££) to watch your team on the road, the differential in the ticket pricing is far less relevant than it is in the home fans' pricing decision point.

[Radley Rambler]

Oxford have scrapped on the day price rises this season: http://www.oufc.co.uk/news/article/oxfo ... 51579.aspx

Correct and I've just looked again at the OWS which still has the 14/15 prices listed hence why it still shows pay on the day price rises - nice one! This also means my £22 average is based on last year's ticket ranges although I suspect it won't change much.

Could someone tell the club that the season is about to start?

[Snake]

Oxford have scrapped on the day price rises this season: http://www.oufc.co.uk/news/article/oxfo ... 51579.aspx

Correct and I've just looked again at the OWS which still has the 14/15 prices listed hence why it still shows pay on the day price rises - nice one! This also means my £22 average is based on last year's ticket ranges although I suspect it won't change much.

Could someone tell the club that the season is about to start?

Anyone else feel like it’s been a long boring summer with something not quite filling it up, like a Euro or World Cup? Be handy if the Ashes had started in mid-May, but such is life.

We need one of these internet thingy apps tailored for football addicts - http://www.xmasclock.com/

[Kernow Yellow]

Oxford have scrapped on the day price rises this season: http://www.oufc.co.uk/news/article/oxfo ... 51579.aspx

Correct and I've just looked again at the OWS which still has the 14/15 prices listed hence why it still shows pay on the day price rises - nice one! This also means my £22 average is based on last year's ticket ranges although I suspect it won't change much.

Could someone tell the club that the season is about to start?

http://www.oufc.co.uk/news/article/oxfo ... 51579.aspx

£18/£20/£22 adult prices. £20 for North stand so that's what away fans would pay I presume.

So all adult tickets a pound more expensive than last season, but no booking fees and no on-the-day surcharge this season so they'll end up the same price or cheaper.

Not sure why the old prices are showing up on the website, nor why I can't seem to get an under-7 ticket when booking online.

By the way, has anyone been in the family area recently? Is it any good? I stopped taking the kids there because the view and atmosphere were so crap, but I noticed that the club were making a bit of an effort with Olly's Den last season and would appreciate any feedback on it...

[OUFC4eva]

I recall reading a tweet from oufcofficial last week
that said the under 7 ticket offer had been "abused"
so had been taken down from the web site.

Sad, if true, that people are effectively trying to defraud their own club.

[ty cobb]

Although I think the club have got a lot right pre season, including season tickets, I do wonder whether these prices represent a missed oppertunity to set a more realistic price for league 2 football. Personally I think £18 is a bit steep. If you look at West Ham next season they will charge £240 for a season ticket because they will have an increased capacity and want to try and fill it. As with Oxford at the moment I'd only need to go to about 13 games a season to justify the purchase, this seems to be an awful lot of free games (10) for season ticket holders to get.

I know those fans who go week in week out, especially in the last few season, deserve a good deal but we're about 2000 fans down on previous averages at the Kassam and I think more needs to be done to wn these fans back, £18 being the cheapest ticket is unlikely to do it I think.

Personally I would go for the £14 mark, this still offers a excellent saving for season ticket holders but is at a level when people are more likely to think, well I've got a free Sat what shall I do...........at £18 I think people would think twice, at £14 more likely to go for it.

[Snake]

Agree. From last season’s figures ST holders (whether they were present or not) made up the majority of the attendance. They of course are the ‘converted’ but the target audience needs to be the ‘casual’, who in turn may become ‘regulars’ and eventually ST holders (so long as the stuff on the pitch is not too shite of course).

At least two ways of doing this. Either make the ST ridiculously cheap (like they used to do at Bradford City) or radically bring down the on the day price (if only in the least popular areas of the ground).

Another idea that is adopted by other clubs is to offer a financial incentive to forgo a game in your ST if you can't make it (it's done online), so the seat can be resold. Usually it's a small amount of refund and can only be used as credit against the purchase of your next season ticket. Impossible to do previously, but the new system should allow this. i.e. if you put a cancelled ST card for a game under the barcode reader it will be rejected.

[Brahma Bull]

Firstly football needs to be affordable, without question. Oxford United have done that, in spades, by their ticket offers this season, let alone scrapping the ridiculous on the day booking increase and online/telephone booking charges. So for home fans, I think the club has done reasonably well.

Buy a season ticket and you are absolutely quids in. Offering 7YR-13YR old kids a £49 season ticket which includes a free shirt, simply marvellous and certainly puts two fingers up to those who wish to criticise and complain about affordability in football.

Away tickets, well that's a slightly different topic. I rarely complain about away prices because OUFC charge OTT for visiting supporters to come and watch at The Kassam. You don't even get a good matchday experience as an away fan. So I won't be complaining that Luton Town (and plenty of others) either recognise the lack of offers we provide or more importantly, they are profiting from supply and demand - 1000 Oxford fans who are fighting for tickets points to little need for them to reduce the pricing. Moreover, that's money in their pocket, for their wage bill and for their aims of promotion. Something which ALL clubs are interested in.

Would we all be in favour of reducing adult away tickets at The Kassam to £10? Thus impacting on our wage bill and ability to compete in L2.

As for WHU and their sensational offers, they are moving next season into a stadium they won't fill and need all the offers they can throw out there to entice the people of East London to watch the Irons at the Olympic Stadium.

[SWA]

good post that ^^^^^

[OUFC4eva]

Away tickets, well that's a slightly different topic. I rarely complain about away prices because OUFC charge OTT for visiting supporters to come and watch at The Kassam. You don't even get a good matchday experience as an away fan. So I won't be complaining that Luton Town (and plenty of others) either recognise the lack of offers we provide or more importantly, they are profiting from supply and demand - 1000 Oxford fans who are fighting for tickets points to little need for them to reduce the pricing. Moreover, that's money in their pocket, for their wage bill and for their aims of promotion. Something which ALL clubs are interested in.

What's wrong with the away fan matchday experience at OUFC?

For the last few years away fans have had a good experience as they tend to
Return home with a point or three!

As for the Premiersh!t - no club needs to charge anything for tickets as they get £150m per year
before ball is even kicked.

[tomoufc]

I support this campaign http://fsf.org.uk/campaigns/away-fans/s ... y-tickets/.

As such, I would be against us charging more than £20 for away fans at the Kasstad. As such it's perfectly legitimate to demand the same if I want to see Oxford somewhere else. Market demand has very little to do with it, since you don't decide whether to follow your team on some kind of marginalist cost/benefit calculation, but for other reasons (passion? love? madness?) that mainstream economists just don't understand.

[slappy]

For me the travel costs are normally more than the ticket costs, particularly for away games. Nonetheless I think £20 is a psychological barrier above which I notice the cost.

Interestingly Virgin trains are piloting a scheme for fans of Newcastle and Sunderland to get cheaper advance East Coast tickets and group discounts, and refunds if matches are rearranged.

[Snake]

What was used in the Prem a lot in the last year or two were ‘reciprocal agreements’ whereby say, when West Brom visited Hull the tickets would be £18, and when Hull visited West Brom they would be charged the same (that’s just an example btw). Yes, the home club suffers financially but the away fans of both teams benefit. On top of that there were perks like free replica shirts, beer, food, scarves, progs, coach travel etc. This year it’s just an extension of what was a voluntary scheme. The real bonus is that it attracts more away fans, so in theory a better matchday atmosphere all round for everyone. And if say, the away ticket price was halved, it would be partially offset by the increased number of tickets sold.

However, as OUFC4eva has pointed out, at that level a much smaller percentage of a club’s income is generated from bums on seats so it’s not so much of a gamble. Having said that, there is nothing stopping OUFC in experimenting with it for one or two clubs and seeing how the ticket sales went. Obviously no good in having a reciprocal arrangement with clubs like Luton where the away end is likely to be sold out, but when visiting other League II clubs with massive away ends it might be worth a go. There are no rules about making it cheaper for away supporters.

On top of that, for a 20 year old working on a minimum wage of £5.13 an hour it means over half a day’s pay (or a full day for an apprentice) just to watch a game of football, so it’s not helping to bring in the younger generation who have yet to commit to buying a season ticket.

[Kernow Yellow]

Firstly football needs to be affordable, without question. Oxford United have done that, in spades, by their ticket offers this season, let alone scrapping the ridiculous on the day booking increase and online/telephone booking charges. So for home fans, I think the club has done reasonably well.

Buy a season ticket and you are absolutely quids in. Offering 7YR-13YR old kids a £49 season ticket which includes a free shirt, simply marvellous and certainly puts two fingers up to those who wish to criticise and complain about affordability in football.

Away tickets, well that's a slightly different topic. I rarely complain about away prices because OUFC charge OTT for visiting supporters to come and watch at The Kassam. You don't even get a good matchday experience as an away fan. So I won't be complaining that Luton Town (and plenty of others) either recognise the lack of offers we provide or more importantly, they are profiting from supply and demand - 1000 Oxford fans who are fighting for tickets points to little need for them to reduce the pricing. Moreover, that's money in their pocket, for their wage bill and for their aims of promotion. Something which ALL clubs are interested in.

Would we all be in favour of reducing adult away tickets at The Kassam to £10? Thus impacting on our wage bill and ability to compete in L2.

As for WHU and their sensational offers, they are moving next season into a stadium they won't fill and need all the offers they can throw out there to entice the people of East London to watch the Irons at the Olympic Stadium.

Hang on a minute. OUFC charge home and away fans basically the same (£20 for away fans, £18-22 for home fans). How can one be 'OTT' and the other be 'offering affordability in spades'?!

Yes the booking fees have been removed but the prices have gone up a quid across the board. So they've basically stayed the same. At a time of zero inflation and chronic under-performance on the pitch.

I'm not having a dig at the club here - as others have pointed out they're basically charging the going rate. But let's not blow smoke up their arses about it. That rate is still too high for League 2 football. But that has more to do with the massive imbalance of wealth across the pyramid compared to regular support, and is a much wider debate altogether...

[ty cobb]

We also have a stadium which is barely a third full most games. Many people seem to think twice about going to see us away at Luton because it's £20, well that's essentially the dilemma casual fans face every week when deciding to come and watch Oxford.

If you've got 1000 fans who pay on the day at £18, you would only need an extra 300 fans to come along to make more money if charging £14 a ticket. Given the up tick in crowds when an offer is running (such as the groupon one) I actually think we'd see rather more on the gate that 300 if tickets were £14.

We could at least try it for a game couldn't we? If you lower the price to £10 a ticket, you'd need 800 extra people coming along on the day to break even. At £10 I think it becomes an option for people who don't really support Oxford and you'd see a significant uplift beyond that.

We don't seem to attract many casual fans anymore, the crowds are mostly made up of season ticket holders so I really don't see any benefit at all in charging so much.