What's REALLY Going On Off The Pitch At Sunderland?

0:00Before the season even kicks off, soccer fans are already making predictions. Who wins the league? Who qualifies for Europe? And who's lifting the trophy at seasons end? On Kalshi America's number one prediction market platform, your trading against peers in a live market, meaning there's no house. And as the probability changes, you can buy in and out of your position. For a limited time, download the Kalshi app and use code CUP26 to get $10 when you trade 10. KALSHI Kalshi trade the beautiful game. 18 plus only restrictions and eligibility requirements apply. Event contract trading and ballers risk can may not be suitable for all investors. Price's values and available markets may differ from those mentioned. For more information, see Kalshi.com slash regulatory. Superstition even a marching bandwick up call at 555 and 55 seconds.

1:00Hit it! When you need a team that will do whatever it takes on game day, it matters where you stay. Hilton for this day. This episode is brought to you by PayPal. You know how a mom's bag has everything? Sunscreen, snacks, a stapler, the new PayPal app is like that, but for your money. Shop, pay, manage your account, and earn rewards all in one place. And with purchase protection on eligible items, biometric security, and passkeys, you're protected at every step. Download the new PayPal app to get started. See PayPal.com slash protection terms. Hello everyone and welcome to how you're the podcast with Gavin. You join us today for a special episode. Yes, it is still the international break, so we've got no Sunland football

2:03to react to, unfortunately. But we have got the time to do things that I want to do in a little while. And that brings me on to today's guest because as well as Ian being here with me. Hello Ian, how are you? Hello. Yes, yes. Ian and myself are joined today by Dave Rose from the Red and White. Army, hello mate. How you doing? No, I'm good, thanks. And thanks very much for having me on. Yeah, yeah, it's an interesting time, isn't it? With Sunland and with, obviously, we go into it and create detail every single bloody day on this podcast. But for yourself, Dave, and obviously for people listening as well, who don't know a great deal about Red and White, Army might have heard of it, or don't really know what you guys do. Can you just fill in the blanks? And it's, I don't know, in a short space. You can't do it probably here all day. Talk about this. I have to go. Well, yes, do, do, do chicken and shutters up if I run the world. Yeah, like, Red and White Army is a support, it's trust. And when I look back to when it's long, it was launched. It was under a very different Sunland, DFC.

3:05And we... Any ten years, isn't it? It's not an on for ten years, unbelievably. Yeah. And it was sort of when we were starting to plummet. It was just up with the moys. And it was there, this sort of short out period. And obviously, we launched as a supporters group then to provide a strong voice, a voice that is based around democratic principles and independent principles as an organisation. And also, at the time, I've been thinking a lot that I worked for the Football Supporters Association. So I worked with supporters, trusts and big supporters. And we were entities at all clubs across the whole pyramid. And I always sort of wondered why we were in a position where Sunland didn't have their own supporters. But we were probably one of the biggest clubs, if not the biggest that didn't have one. So we set up an independent support association. And that, after a couple of years, had a lot of success.

4:06And then converted into a full, what's called a community benefit society. It is a legal entity. It's a fair, a fair, a supporters trust, an independent supporters group. And the main reason we exist is a conduit between supporter and club. A lot of what we now call supporter engagement was in its infancy. At that point in time, when we helped create something bespoke at Sunland, we've now since had things like the independent football regulator form, which now mandate clubs to hold engagement quite, and interestingly, quite similar to how we already do at Sunland. That's something that's an expectation across football now. So yeah, it's been a really interesting nine years, very fast nine years. And we'll find ourselves a supporter club. That is now in Europe compared to a club that was plummeting to Lee one at the time. It is interesting, isn't it, that just how much has changed in that nine years,

5:07ten years, that the Red and My Army's been in place. Because as Dave rightly says, busy formed, I wouldn't say the word protest, but sort of at a time when generally fans were like, we need to do something here. We need to fix things at this club because if we don't do it at the fans, we're in danger of going out of business because of the people who are custodians of this institution. And they're not looking after it correctly. And like Dave says, fast forward nine years were in Europe or in Premier League. I know we always bang on about the journey we've been on. But I guess the formation of the Red and My Army coincided with the lowest point in the club's history. And now here we are nine years later. Yeah, a lot of that, isn't it? You know, a supposed time goes by, you have to kind of adapt yourself a bit, kind of like chameleon like to whyber the situation, the climbers' life at the club. There's never more the case of being a club needing its fans when the situation's looking bleak. And obviously, Red and My Army and other supporters groups out there are the club.

6:10So they're very much the kind of bit in case of emergency option when owners are disinterested or owners are not looking after a club in the way that they should be. But of course, when things are going really well, likely are at the minute, there's a chance for it to kind of, you know, everything kind of duct-tellin' everything, you know, everyone's pushing the same direction. Imagine Dave, you feel that things are very, you know, very different. But I would say though that you should, you know, I suppose you'd feel like you never want to take your eye off the ball around things that need to be scrutinised and things, you know, when a club expands and when a club expands its operations as much as we have at the minute, you have to kind of make sure that you're scrutinising around things like the membership scheme, for example, like ticketing things and stuff like that. It is, you know, is all, you know, make sure that everything still is, you know, as it should be. And I imagine that's a bit of a challenge because I suppose that's the case, you need to be a bit of kind of ahead of the curve. It's a really good point, Ian, that however we're doing off the pitch, it's sort of viewed through

7:12the lens on the pitch as well. So if you're, you know, everything's positive on the pitch, it sometimes takes a little bit more time and effort to scrutinise and to get fans to understand why there's a need to scrutinise other aspects, whether it be the ticketing service or membership schemes and crucially things like pricing of season tickets, I'd say it's a really big one. So we, we're at a point in the club and I guess we have been for the last year or so at a point in the club's history where there is an opportunity for the club ownership and executive team to exploit the loyalty of supporters because the demand is as high as ever. And there's a real obviously positive trajectory on the pitch. And in the day job of the football support association, we do a lot of work with Premier League clubs, particularly those clubs that are being flaked by their owners where pricing continuously goes up, where there's no erosion of discounted

8:16pricing, concessionary pricing. And where there is a failing across the Premier League, that there is a move towards moving away from course support in order to take the big books on a one-to-one match basis from what we're about to phrase sort of tourist fans. Now, I'm not saying there's a massive influx of tourist fans at Sunland, but we do have a ground that we can pretty much sell out regularly. And therefore, even on the localised level, there is an opportunity to exploit the demand for taking. Thankfully, I don't think we're at a point with a club where they've done that. I think it's possible that could have happened, but when you've got supporter groups under fan-based generally, they'll really include into the supporter engagement process at the club. That adds a pressure and it creates a situation where the club do sit back hopefully and think, yeah, just because we can exploit that, like it doesn't mean we should. And I think we're sort of

9:18at that point still with the club. We'll talk about the membership aside because I think that was probably a bit of a cash grab. But no more so then pretty much every other club does in the talk to you as a footballer to the fair, the club on that one. I mean, since you mentioned membership, we might as well chat about it quickly because that's something certainly since we broke for the international break that we've taught a lot about on this podcast because we've had so many questions from people, so many emails. I don't know what it's like from your perspective. I imagine you get the same sort of feedback on memberships and stuff as we're getting. But the general feeling, I'm sensing is that people don't understand the benefit of it. People feel like, in some cases, they've been missled the membership scheme because they don't see the benefits they're supposed to be getting. I mean, we've spoken pretty freely about this on here with that we attended a meeting with the club when there were proposing the membership scheme. I think you were also there,

10:20Dave, but it was presented to us, I think most of us in the room thought, well, this sounds like a decent idea. But it, I mean, where do you, where do you come at it from? Because I think it is, it is safe to see, I think people are asking the right questions about the membership scheme. A hundred percent, and we have had many of those questions and we have represented those questions in the most recent meeting with the club, but also outside of those meetings, we would speak to various execs and decisions and it was at the club and push these points. And I think that meeting that you referred to, Garb, I think that it was a fear to commonly membership was happening, so there wasn't consultation around whether membership would happen or not. They did state the case in terms of they were playing catch up as a club. This is pretty much every Premier League club has some kind of scheme similar to this. And most of if not all of the championship as well. So in that context, you can sort of understand from a club business point of view why they want to bring in such a scheme. The overriding, my overriding tape on this really is

11:25that it has been rushed through without, and one thing I think the club would agree on as well is it hasn't been stress test. It's one I ought to really. They've not went through all the different scenarios, they've not really thought about what the various impacts can be on the ballot and how that would work and what would happen if it, what happens if A happens, where do you go next? And they just haven't really stressed test that. And what they really needed was some sort of focus group to almost like war room, the whole the different scenarios and work out what would happen so that the end user then can make sense of it. Because as much as they might try to think through those things at the club and as loads of good stuff at the club who were fans and would get where the stress points are, they still end up through and furthering that bubble and what the need is, just some end users like you would with any business product really. You get

12:26the end users in and you see right, let's test this to hell and let's see where the problems are. I think none of that has happened and really what you would need is almost like a half a season worth of looking at it before you launch it and that didn't happen and I think that's the real problem that's been a bit rushed. Part of that I think is because of changes behind the scenes at the club as well. At that level it's been quite a few problems in Go and Tasnna. I think it's really interesting actually. Sorry guys, it's really interesting. It's the continuity of the process has been so interrupted partly because we got into Europe and partly because that has meant it's changed for the better. But it's interesting. And at that meeting what they said was basically we're bringing this in and the reason why is because it's a commercial decision, it's a money-making thing. They weren't showing away from that. But the fact that almost every other club in the championship and the Premier League had it was the reason why I'm doing it. And

13:30now I think about that. I realised that they were saying that in a way to say, well, we should just accept it therefore that it's happening because everyone else is doing it and therefore it's given it's understood that we should be doing this. But the point is not that we should be doing it. The point is that we should be doing it right and we should be doing it after a full proper process which means that we can understand the impacts of the decisions around the membership. So for example, the really good one is the fact that many fans of complaints. I have this experience as well that my young girl who's not yet going to games could potentially be locks out and getting into the club because it'd be very difficult to get here to come along when I'm already a season card holder. So they haven't necessarily thought everything through. There might be a fix for that in the future but that doesn't help people right now who want to bring their child to the game for the first time this season or next season. But ultimately when we talk about all these clubs in the Premier League Championship doing it, the question I would ask for them and the question I would ask our club here and I'd also ask

14:30to you, David, do you think on behalf of the supporters this is value for money that we're getting for whatever it would be? What is your tier you're paying for? Are we getting the requisite my benefits for money that we're paying or not do you think? I think the way that I've priced it and what would be on offer in hyperthetically when they talk this world through with bits of content and things like that. I think once that's all in position you could probably compare it without the knowledge of every single membership scheme across all the clubs. I think comparably you'll probably sit okay. But at the minute no because it's a bit models, the community case doesn't been good around it and there's been already problems exposed with things like the bullet about how you choose your seat and that sort of thing as well and whether it's even necessary for who knows how many home games you would need, you would need to be a member because the membership numbers are not there yet. So and this is why it needs needed half a season of prep really to understand

15:33all of that. Well yeah I think a lot of fans I think feel a little icky about their membership schemes across football, across if you talk about the clubs, I think many would have gripes about their membership scheme and about them paying for the rights to be able to do certain things and we did push that on some things if you remember in that meeting and that was listened to. So I think it was better than necessarily it was originally meant to be put with functionality and the processes haven't been thought through. It's frustrating to say that it's been done in this way because it obviously it's it's unavoidable. You can say that it hasn't been tested through it hasn't been thought through probably. But the real danger as again as we've discussed on the unrecent days, the real danger is we don't qualify for Europe next season so you can't dangle that current in front of people and there's people look at it and go well why do I need a membership

16:35because we've got me another member of a podcast team bummer he's an exile so he's not a season ticket holder. He just said I wasn't bothered about getting one because I kind of forced all the would be issues and I didn't really see why I would need one and then he said well in fairness every game I've wanted to go to the season I've got to take it for it so I can't I can't then say well it wasn't a bad decision not to get one so that people are going to make their own mind on whether the need one enough but the danger the club have got is that take up is a lot lower than it was when they initially promised it because the offerings being so poor my suggestion was in recent days fix it as quickly as you can do you think that's a possibility? Yeah I think it's a possibility I don't know if it's a probability like hopefully hopefully we're about to see a bit of a turnaround on things like the membership and the ticket office because in the last meeting the point was and it's not the first time this has happened by the way over the years but the point was made pretty strong and hard around the need to sort that and there was reasons why

17:42it is the way it is I'm not going all the details on that because minutes have got to be come out of those meetings but I think I was in that meeting but from what I understand the funds in there felt the points it landed and were heard and and there's a hope that through some recruitment and maybe a bit of resource applied so these off-field areas that maybe should have already been applied may start to happen there's a lot of complexities around that there's like budgets have to be agreed and I guess there's a little bit of the exacting pushing up once a little bit this year we need a little bit more help here because obviously no one would argue that the football side of things hasn't been well planned out and well funded which is needed a little bit of percentage of time and resource on these behind the scene stuff so that the funds don't feel that they've been taken for granted and I think there is we see the seeds of

18:43this but we've said it before and sometimes it happens and sometimes it doesn't if you remember it wasn't that long ago I mean one of the meetings that Red and White Army made a statement at the start of the meeting this is a couple years back where we said we were going to walk away from the engagement process and the consultation process because we were sick of seeing the same things things started to give a little bit then and improved but we've just went back a little bit with the sort of changing in staff and stuff I think and the greater demand and then the extra complication of Europe shining a harsher light on the inadequacies of the operation. Yeah and obviously again we've talked about this but David Bruce Leven towards the end of last season was a massive change behind the scenes because David Bruce was somebody who was front and center a massive sundling fan clearly behind a lot of the real fans centric things like the strips and the you know the stuff we're seeing inside the ground and stuff so you can see the difference

19:47between when David Bruce was at the helm when you know Tom Burwell whoever else is in there now at the level is there and that I think that it's probably been bad timing for the club as there because that coincided with a lot of issues I think I think it is it's a bit like I think perfect storms probably too strong a word but like it those things have aligned and it's probably not helped matters to to anyone as well intentioned as the might be and as stillful as the might be as common in as is this is the sort of new way of leadership on the day of the first thing and the improvements that were made it's interesting because I know we'll talk about this at some point but when David Bruce first came into post he gave us a shout out when my army and then we had a meeting where I coffee with him and he showed us an AI produced exact summary of the last survey that we did a few years ago about all the much the experience and he basically did a word clouds and produced this sort of one pager and that was easy to do list he said when he came in and

20:48that was his priorities and it was things like identity around the stadium improvements of there in particular at the time if you remember the the whole merchandise and the club shot itself was awful really and all of those things are in this this document and you can see and obviously I'm not just saying it was all done with the survey of course not but it was just a handy way of encapsulating the issues which comes back to this conduit thing if you can pat yourself up in a in a meaningful way that becomes a to-do list for the club then we're getting somewhere and he did do that and and you can see I mean it's our first season coming in with the with the conco sort of with the murals and obviously we've got the key across and now you get to say feedback from from other fans of other clubs coming in the city seeing the murals what and all of a seeing our identity the well at the sunland and it's become like a special way there and like it's no simply different and it probably I don't know what cost budget wise but

21:51I don't think there was sort of changes a massive when you compare it in football terms and friendly league income terms well this is this is the thing about David Brace which which I think is a real shame that he's no longer out the club because what for me what he did was he he he made those small changes and he looked like he identified right how can we make big impacts and noticeable changes for a low cost so things like murals things like no till the end campaign and stuff like that was was kind of really driven onwards by him I was he at the club when when we first when we first sort of used it I can't remember but it was sort of really kind of accelerated and and cleared upon during the the player campaign championship but what David Brace did was he he provided fans with those kind of water cooler moments where we'd say oh did you see this did you see that and and and provided some time we could all kind of get around together things like you know the it's it just bought a joint up think I think to you know not was not necessarily just in turn of the football club but also sort of why than the council and the local authoritative

22:52stuff like that you know things to do the crossing etc and so the fact that he wasn't someone fun you know he lives and breeds the football club from a personal basis and was basically probably doing I I see me probably wouldn't kick back in this but it was doing his dream job he was the perfect fit so when he leaves and then somebody like Tom Boewell comes in he obviously doesn't have that emotional connection to the club but has the industry experience he has that professional experience and again I don't think he would probably mind me saying this but much so more of a sort of corporate head on his shoulders people do realise maybe is what that personal local connection is that he lost it doesn't necessarily mean that the clubs in the worst place now but what it does mean is that it's going to have to sort of work slightly harder to get the trust of fans because with David Braceman's priced in there you know we knew because he loved the club that I wanted the best for it you know he wasn't doing things for other reasons he was doing it because he wanted someone to be you know a global leader in terms of things like the Hummel deal with

23:55in the marketing and stuff like that you know he wanted that to happen and and everybody got behind that so so here's kind of departure is a real shame really but you know his finger prints are all over Sheffa Wednesday right now you can see you can obviously see some of the things which they've they've done there was that thing on the the screen around the points deduction being white tellers and I thought I bet you he did that because it's exactly his sort of thing that kind of thing so yeah it's a real shame but it does mean that the club is going to have to work harder from a corporate level because that's where the distrust kind of comes in and and this is why things like the membership seem have to be right to the fix after you know have to be have to be made the ticketing operation has to be probably sorted out things like a Tori Enzane a couple weeks time when everyone's collecting their tickets at the stadium they've got to blend well make sure that that is running 100 cents smoothly because if there's problems there then people who've spent hundreds if not approaching a grand law will be getting in this book well that hasn't that hasn't hasn't that that that's gone kind of wrong already hasn't it so that that's not happening and

24:56wouldn't there's going to be no tick collections in Portugal is it us I was I was sorry I thought there was I thought there was meant to be it was meant to be but that's been sort of like behind behind behind behind the news on this one I'm afraid so what's the latest thing then so it's digital tickets it's going to be the only Europa League game where it's digital tickets and there will be no collection point in Portugal I read whenever I speak about what we do at my normal was very careful not to take any bullets for the club but on this instance to be fair to them I think it's Tori Enzane that's been the issue I think the challenge I've heard that yeah I've heard that by the way and by the way when I when I've said that two people have said well how come we because you'll have seen it you know people have been buying tickets direct from them and people said well how come I've been able to sort tickets out so quickly with them I think that's probably part of the problem is that they are such a I was looking at their average attendance last season and it was 1200 which comparatively there are teams in the northern

25:57Premier League like FC United Manchester who get more fans than they do yeah so you've got to kind of wear that up and think that they've they weren't expecting to play in the Europa League this season it's a complete freak so you know you wonder how much money they'll make from this this single match itself you know if they're thinking we can make you know stuff which will sustain the club for the next half a season yeah yeah I think they've come a crop up with like being a new club in Europe learning our selves and then all of a sudden you've got a club layer as you first aware game it's probably probably turn the hair out at the club can I just go about the point you were making about the other Bruce and that connection with fans that I think it's an interesting point because not that many clubs will have somebody in that position who is a fan of the club especially in a Premier League and so we were lucky to have that but it's not the norm and I think the legacy of what he instilled in like thinking about identity and and talking

26:57about fans about that I think that legacy is on a little and I think we're hopefully we don't that doesn't dissolve over time and I was really pleased with the the bill look to the l first year old became where I think the nail that and the got the fail of it right and it felt like sunland and it felt like a celebration and it felt like a level that should be at without what's going to all the top I just felt right it was class and obviously winning again all that was just one of the best night teller and I think so what the the other point about that is this is what makes support around engagement and proper support of consultation crucial because whoever the chief exec is whether it's somebody from a very corporate background like Tom Boer or whether it is even somebody more local with a better knowledge if you've got a consistent proper sort of inbuilt process of engagement then hopefully the club listening and acting all of that so it

27:58doesn't matter who's at the helm if they're listening properly and acting then and look we know this does not always happen right engagement and consultation doesn't mean that you get every outcome that you want but at least you've got a chance and at least the fans know that we've got a chance to help shape how we go about things as a club before the season even kicks off soccer fans are already making predictions who wins the league who qualifies for Europe and who's lifting the trophy at seasons end on kowshi america's number one prediction market platform you're trading against peers in a live market meaning there's no house and as the probability changes you can buy in and out of your position for a limited time download the kowshi app and use code cup 26 to get $10 when you trade 10 k a l s h i kowshi trade the beautiful game 18 plus only restrictions and eligibility requirements apply event contract trading and volsarisk and may not be suitable for all investors prices values and available markets may differ from those mentioned for more information see kowshi dot com slash regulatory college football is back so hilton called him me the

29:01superstition concierge to make your fan rituals a reality need a room to match your lucky number we got you want to make sure our team doesn't wash your lucky jersey oh that smells lucky hilton's unmatched hospitality can keep up with any superstition even a marching bandwink up call it 55 and 55 seconds hit it when you need a team that will do whatever it takes on game day it matters where you stay hilton for this day this episode is brought to you by paypal you know how a mom's bag has everything sunscreen snacks a stapler the new paypal app is like that but for your money shop pay manager account and earn rewards all in one place and with purchase protection on eligible items biometric security and pass keys you're protected at every step download the new paypal app to get started see paypal dot com slash protection terms on on tom bur well then obviously it's been a big change is in kind of outlined before you

30:02you've you've gone from having a sun and fan basically running the show to someone from a very court background and that presented to one challenges but is it almost something we should just accept because of where you know we've we've shot into the Premier League we finished seventh we're in the Europa League the club has had to expand it horizons we've had to bring in more experienced people from you know from from not necessarily just from football like burwell's background is in football it's pretty sure to rugby and speedway and things like that so you know hey he's not even coming at this from the angle of a football institution but clearly has a lot of industry knowledge is trusted by the ownership is it almost a case like we just have to accept because of the the rate at which the football club has grown that people a little bit more corporate are going to be involved in the running of the day to day at sun and because we have to we have to keep up in the Premier League it's not it's not your you know one man who's dug in the local park type of operation it might have been in the you know seven easing eight easter times and it's not even

31:08you know like it's not even like the early days of Carol where it was kind of like you know keeping our cards close our chests and not spending too much like all of a sudden we've got to be big players in this in this industry otherwise we'll get left behind them we'll end up back in the championship we'll have to start again so yeah is it is it is almost just a given that people like Tom Burwell will end up running the show at sun and I think it probably is and ultimately it's down to the owner is not who they who they decide to to employ in the various positions um I think so you know from a technical point of view we've got no choice but to accept it that's that's just the way it is it's that it's Carol's business and he he will run it the way once in it and probably who he wants what I would say is that it doesn't mean we have to accept the club getting away from us and from what what it means and what sunland is to the supporters and I come back sort of the exploit and loyally and I'm not suggesting by the way that Tom Burwell is doing this but that's that's the sort of conversations that we want to continue to have about

32:10you know what what we feel is right for sunland and what isn't and and we should we shouldn't accept losing any of that and I think that's the challenge for like as a fan base as well to be to think about these things because um one thing that I see that quite when you just look at the discourse on social media and stuff around then the finances of the club and around things like ticket pricing and membership fees you'll get a number of people and I understand by the coming from saying well this is we also need to sort of dig in our own pockets here to be able to compete because of um because of restrictions on spending in in all the rest of it SCR and and the club have to be constant of that and they do need a drive income as much as possible for that but when you actually slice it up and you look at what their income is from the fans in terms of ticket season tickets sales for instance that doesn't turn a dial on that argument and I know it's something that other clubs have pushed to their fan bases to see it we've got to keep putting your ticket

33:15prices up because we need to we don't want to fall out of the arms race here it's it's simply that the numbers don't start open that's that's something I would urge all fans to think about is that we don't want it falling into that trap um because you increase your season tickets by 10% we all feel that a family of four will feel that in their wallet share you know the disposable income at the end of after period every month you look at that and it's significant to the club to drop in the yours and it does not turn the dial on the ability to buy a 30 million pound clear I can see it when it's in the form I think those if you think about it the same with the memberships because that we we you know back to the Fag Packet kind of calculations as Chris would say you know you would it's not a massive amount of money necessarily that the club would be making from something like that but it causes such a ripple in the fan base about whether you need it whether you want this the benefits of it all these things that we've been talking about when the reality is it probably wouldn't even pay a couple of the players wages for a month you know

34:20what what I would accept is a is it is a point about that type of income increase is you say right well this is what we'll invest in the things that are the touch points for the supporters so we will be for the ticket office staff count we will employ somebody to look after this area membership specifically you're investing the IT that's required to make it better in planning and I think that would that would fail all right um but yeah it's a part of the bigger picture and progressing and would ensure freezing all that neither he nor there I think I think to be fair to the club as well if you look at things like your upper league pricing for the home tickets you know that is you know really fairly price and actually I thought that was going to be more than it that it ended up being so there is an acknowledgement there from from the club that you know that that you know the amount we pay to get into the games isn't what sustains this football club and actually if you look at you know the commercial revenues in this is why Burwell's obviously been bought in I assume but the commercial revenues of the club obviously has to increase across

35:22every single aspect of the club but if you look at clubs like um leads united we've got clubs like Bristol City the amount that they make from their commercial income and I'm assuming it's like events at the whole that the stadium stuff a lot is massive huge and a far and excess support we have here at the stadium of light so that you know I would like to think that their focuss are on growing the club on that side more than just basically trying to hit the fans in the pocket because I would say that 90% of some of the supporters at Gull regularly support matches will never spend more on a season following their club than this season most likely because you know we're going to Europe the merchandise is brilliant you know so with all this great stuff comes at a cost if there was as you say Dave the you know the increase in ticket prices whatever you'd want to be able to see you know the investments in things like the take like like taking operation you know like making sure that club comms coming out on the social media side of things are actually accurate you know it's the easiest thing to get right but let's have

36:25people you know in present in those positions you're actually doing the job properly you know because it looks a bit amateurish to be perfectly honest with you um so yeah you're like set that um but just paying an extra you know 1015 quid on a match to ticket for what would would probably stick and people throw it a little bit because you know what as a football club what the what the corporate side of this football club needs to remember is it's that passion from the fans it puts buns on seats and it buys shirts and then you'd lose that you see basically what you find in the first series of someone till I die when you're watching the sunlands playing at a half-end you stayed in a light with meth and and Stuart Donald sitting in the corporate seats with a sea of red seats behind them because no one's there because nobody's interested the interest is there at the club at the minute but you've got to find that balance between harnessing the passion of fans and making sure the club contests in a profit and they are they are to be honest doing a decent job at the minute they are but but it comes in it it's a delicate balance isn't it and you don't

37:26have pushed too far one way or the other it absolutely is and and I think they should be congratulated on the price and structure of the KMO for the Europa League games I was delighted I was absolutely delighted to be honest with you I was really happy and I do think that's I do genuinely think that's the direct result of listening to the arguments around not exploiting loyally and that's and not not take not looking like right it's the first time we're in Europe like what a look that would be you know after 53 years just to then certainly say right we're going to fleece you I mean that would have been horrendous people would have feared it or that's a thing right yeah well here's a thing sorry across you Dave but here's a thing that I'm wondering will never know the answer but is this a direct result of the flak that nottingham forest in particular in nassen villa fans gave their clubs as a result of given ticket price and structures that were ridiculous last season in Europe in the club that we know we again and that meeting they talked about they said we've sported a villa we sport the forest so they've listened to what's gone at other clubs which I think is fantastic but I do wonder had that not been the case would we

38:29have been squeeze a little bit we never know but you know yeah I'd like to think we wouldn't have been but you're right and and after many years working in football it's about finding the common ground in order to get the best out of the best day of our fans and by that I mean well you know is it a better overall financial position for the club to get this balance right on the price and because she ended up selling more tickets in more revenue more you know more money through the catering in all of that and what is morally right and just making the moral argument if you can find the business case for it all as well and you laugh and that's you know what but in the day when we pushed the 20s plenty campaign in the Premier League at the FFSA football supporters association that was common ground they weren't selling it out the way it ends at that point it was eroding the atmosphere because of where fans obviously been a disproportionate impact to the atmosphere and the ground that then had a not-one effect on the product that we were

39:32selling from a broadcast point of view so there was in the interests of the Premier League to talk to their club owners their member bones and push the agenda so we had a bit of a principle of fans pissed off and protested and reason for exact the friendly league to push for it and all of a sudden then you ended with a price cap of 30 quid which is still there that is dear so it's finding them little wins and you know that's the sort of thing that you should do at a local level as well because as much as we want to push the community aspect and the moral aspect of how to look after you the fan base the core local fan base that will only carry us so far as you change different people you talk into in the boardroom and and it's exactly so you've got to try it with clever and find what is realistic and where the common ground is. Obviously you mentioned it before as well in previous years the the red-white army survey the fan survey which has been used in the past to create effect by the club you mentioned David

40:33Bruce yeah was a was a particularly strong advocate of that and then what the revelations of it I guess because ultimately the best thing you can do is ask your fans what they think of the experience every time they walk through the doors every time they go to the club shop the buy a ticket what they think of the way that communication is like which you know we've talked about again it's been really poor I recently for before being truthfully honest and it's actually become a bit of a laughing stock more than a you know a serious charge point that people say the comms come out the same mistake and they make a bit of an example of it on social media but it is a little bit embarrassing but all these things they come together within that survey and obviously at the minute the red and white armies support a survey for the 2026ers out and what can you tell us about that and kind of how that will help shape the next year or two at London. Well there's a lot of questions we'll try to keep the same so that you have sort of comparable data is to you know what what people think now to what they thought about whether it is the ticket or whatever it might be

41:34or the identity, her own stadium, the match the experience all those questions are still in there as if you added as well around membership and that sort of thing and we talked to the club about it because again if you remember that win win mentality way find common ground we wanted to make sure that we were asking questions that the club would buy in it when listening to they had no video about what we put in there but we thought it was smart to get their input and have that dialogue so we had a bit of bottom fourth over for a while and and because of that the club really looking forward to seeing the results looking forward might be the wrong race when we are eliminated results but they are really came to get the data and to understand I don't think that will some of it will be a surprise they know that there's been issues around comms and ticket and membership but to have it data driven with them again a sort of a part of

42:37information that they can take to Carol and and keep themselves as a document that to be used in future meetings when they're working out how to address some of these issues is really useful and then there's always a new bit of stuff in there as well and we've got a few over text boxes which again with the eye now is a lot easier to sort of make sense of in the past talk and text boxes were really difficult to deal with and if you have thousands filling in a survey but now we can we can use tools to condense and pull out themes and things like that so we'll be doing all of that and we will publish here and actually present a sort of summary of all of the the main points that pick we think people are interested in and we'll send the whole results to the club as well of course and and the club have promised us that there there will be acting upon it and look looking at it and helping them understand and help them shape the way forward so it's a very direct way of fans being able to voice what they might talk about on socials and and in the pub

43:40and direct that into something that that could actually be really useful and in public yeah we'll include the link to that in the show notes for this pod so if anyone wants to go and fill it out I would advise you do takes what five ten minutes yeah I did it with the DF I want it really useful help me actually compartmentalize what I was going to chat to you about as well which was which was good but yeah you know I presume you agree these things can only be a good thing when it comes to correcting issues I guess you know we speak we speak a lot about the money out of people go on social media vice opinions might email the club email read my army or whatever but this is a way you can genuinely get your voice heard if you've got a problem with the way things are or if you've got like something good to say it's not just negatives you know there's a lot of stuff in there about the really good match the experience stuff that's going on particularly in conjunction with this as we aside where you know you can tell them what you like what you don't like what you'd like to say more of so let's say these things can only be a good thing in common yeah absolutely I mean you know I did the survey just before came on this call actually because I'd

44:42had the email I thought god I forgot about that so yeah and I filled it in and it is a it's just a good opportunity to say what you think you know you have all these thoughts floating around your head but you never kind of necessarily verbalize them or write them down and communicate them and it's an important time to be able to do so because you know at the minute everything is going well and as I say Dave you know you probably find the challenges are to keep ahead of the curve around things but it's always trying to work out what the next issue come down the tracks is going to be you know it's very easy to sit there and say hey everything's great everyone sort of slap each other and ask in the back and this massive echo chamber but you know as a you know as a you know as a you know a Greek wishes there to scrutinize and to hold to account as much as sort of congratulate you know that's a challenge for you and so these these these surveys are really important because actually you know in your head you I imagine you can think of a thousand and one different scenarios around things like the nameships teams or the teeth or whatever might be but you might get a response a single response from somebody who raises specific specific issue which is actually really important

45:46to go to rate is but you can't necessarily know what that is until you see it so that's why everybody should I would suggest fill out those fill out the form and give your feet back yeah absolutely you know you get the point where you think you sort of have a feeling for all of the different issues but there's always something new comes up and there's also like just proctoring new ideas what we haven't thought of as well and lots of lots of sort of individually good ideas and I look I'm pleased that by coming on here I've already gotten two people to to come to complete a survey in addition what we had so it's been worthwhile anyway but for nor like seriously we've had a really good response already and to be honest you only really need like between 50000 and a thousand you sort of statistically and sort of merriable and significant so I don't think we'll see like when you look at the overarching results massive differences by more and more filling that in but it will be great if if people could take the time it's and especially look at those those comments boxes as well and think think a little

46:50about your own individual experiences and add some feedback there but it's probably the best chance for a while to to have that impact when the club have actually pushed the survey themselves that's really telling that hasn't brought always happened to the degree it has this time around and that shows that there's I think a lot of credence in what they've been seeing it was and I think they will follow through on absorbing their results of the survey and and using it to help shape how they do things going forward I think so how do you sort of see the next couple of years going at the club when it comes to a fan engagement perspective and just the club in general I mean I'm not just talking about on the pitch because obviously we'd all like to say something continue playing in Europe and doing really well in the Premier League but I mean in terms of structure and ownership and things like that because obviously this is kind of going to weigh at the degree but the word talks about potential ownership changes you know Tom Burwell was brought in

47:51originally as an interim CEO very quietly has been ushered into a more permanent position it seems there have been other changes that exact level which I couldn't sit here and list out yourself if I was on it I don't know all of the names you might but I mean it is quite an interesting time because we talked about the amount of change on the pitch it's been loads off the pitch and I know yeah we mentioned David Bruce but there's been so much like how do you say that sort of next year the 18 months playing out when it comes to that sort of thing well I think first and foremost what we'd all want is a bit of stability there because it's only stability that's going to you would think fix some of the issues that we've talked about earlier so that's one thing we did ask a direct question in one of the meetings about the ownership and asked is the club for sale because there was a lot of talk around that at the time and that's what we do we take the common themes and direct them into the into the meetings and the answer I can't remember exactly what the answer was but it wasn't to know that it wasn't for sale and I think that played out in

48:52the ego and stuff as well where it was not like a denial which you fail tells you something but you never know unless you're in amongst it that you would think that's what's happening on the pitch and even some investment offered it doesn't fail like a club that's for sale but then again our experiences as a fan base of a club for sailors have been under duress and so we've not really seen it when it's a potential and a positive transition but I have no idea and well we're out on that I would I think we'd all be worried keeping well we're active Carol was to sell because it feels like there's been a real on the pitch if it has been a real solid plan and that's been successful we must be worth the highest amount without being worth now in terms of our squad and where our status is a club and the and sort of one full full potential I suppose but I think we would all be good if there was a certain change now if that happened then obviously there's

49:57a whole new range of the Redmite Army having to then build relationships with a whole new team and ownership and all of that but to try to keep that consistency of what the fans would like to say to club that they but I would hope for stability and to keep progress as we are I mean it's sort of just my jibalata at the minute I think I've never I'm 52 so this is obviously the peter radius or class and but this is like in terms of the quality of what we're seeing on the pitch so we've never been anywhere near this so I'm loving that at the minute and you know the whole that change and I think Ian we'll probably get into this because we've got a couple of weeks till the next game we'll probably get into this in a more in more depth on the part I think the whole ownership situation because it's not really something we've had time and explore but you hear murmurings you hear things about well the club could be potentially up for sale and then it was up for sale and then it's not up for sale but like thinking broadly it's as Dave just said the club's never been more valuable so if you know if you put your business head on and take the

50:59emotion out of it has there ever been a better time to sell Sunland when we've just qualified for Europe we're maxing it in the Premier League we've got a really young exciting and valuable squad to the clubs in good shape off the pitch that will addage about you know doing a house up before you sell it kind of sticks and you head a little bit so I don't know I think I don't say this going away I think it'll always murmur in the background while we're doing well. Yeah it absolutely well there's there's never been a better time to sell the football club at this point in time I don't think and I would also think that for it to take the next step up to a level above where it currently is at that might require a certain extra level of investment so is that one that currently drapers and you know and the owners are willing to take I don't know that bus just me speculating I have no idea as funds what we get nervous about around ownership changes are certainly in this case would be is this therefore the end of the good times and we don't want any

52:01any sort of massive changes to come in to upset the delicate delicate balance out the football club we can only answer that question if if we knew the identity of any potential new owners coming in I suspect any new ones would probably be American just like just like most the other the other ownership well not most but it's less more the fish percent of primarily because it is owned by Americans now so but look that's all specmissive I don't know what's going on ahead of in ahead of the owners but I could see why there's a there's a clear sort of logical reasons to why they might want to to sell or is it is it do they want to sell the club or do they want to sell a partner club if they offer's right you know is it is it that they're trying to attract extra investment for a stake in you know 25% stake or whatever whatever it might be it could potentially be that has lived up in other cities what else is going on exactly so so we just we just don't know I mean the only thing I would say is that whatever decision is taken whether it's the sale or not to sell

53:04whatever it might be it has to be you know the club I want to say the club in five years time ten years time to be in the hands of responsible owners because when we think back to ownership changes from from you know back in the 80s and all that but when Bob Murray came in to go when that was a very sort of rocky period of time which he details in it's in in depth in his in his also biography then the drone will consortium come in and obviously that happens you know a great fanfare with Nadquin but things then so the interest then sort of weighing a little bit now the short comes in and that wasn't really agreement for from what Bob Murray was saying and to reference his book again was was saying that the agreement wasn't for Adyshoffs coming by the whole the club like it did and we all know where that went and then we so we went into Madrox and then we find ourselves here today ownership changes generally don't have a good outcome is what I'm probably trying to say so so it would have to be really careful and really careful sort of process the reason why we're

54:06sitting in this position today is because is sorry to go on sorry I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm putting the pressure obviously so the reason why we're sitting this position today with the with the model that we had in place was because they had a very clear plan at the start around how they wanted to get to where they want to be and we've got there so so we just need people who have vision and and you have you know the desire to be here and I hope that's currently for a person and and and the owners I really hope it is but if it isn't for whatever reason that might be I hope at the handle of two people who have that same drive and determination that same sort of understanding of what this talks about yeah I hope so too and I say it's good times at the minute so you want that you want that to continue and it will be a step into the unknown with if there was to be new ownership at some point what I was yeah going to mention was that the landscape that we're in now football generally takes away some of the anxiety of one exchange because of the independent football regulator that exists now after after fans lobbied for a that to be the case so it's not a magic bullet and it isn't going to fix all the footballs'

55:08hills but their licensing system kicks in next year so if there if there was to be you know at some point there will be a change of course in whether it's hopefully years to come at some landing we will have independent scrutiny on changes of ownership as stronger fit and proper persons test them what exists now legally that doesn't fix all the things you might worry about including the sort of the quasi state ownership and that sort of thing but and it is better than where we were much better than where we were so hopefully work would be mitigated against any disasters well Dave we've taken up an awful lot your time mate so we'll not go on too much longer but thank you very much for all the insight I urge people to go and do the survey because it is really important that all fans have the have the say on what the future of the club looks like essentially and from a from a supporter perspective and just to give a quick plug again for red my army if people want to get involved become a member where do they had to do that?

56:14Yeah there's a link on the website join for free or you can become a full support as trust member with a small subscription per year as well anywhere between a fighter and fit in quit I think brilliant well head over to the website and sign up thank you very much Ian as always mate being being an absolute pleasure and worries about you too long before we're catching back up again and cheers again Dave thank you to our listeners for joining us today thank you very much for subscribing to how we are the podcast we are now on YouTube so you can watch as well as listen along to every one of our episodes we will be back tomorrow with another episode plenty to come as we navigate through this awful international break without sun and playing games of football but we will be going absolutely you know I had a wrote-a-report.espanation.com for your written content and at wrote-a-report and all of your social media it's bye from us and we'll see you tomorrow you

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