I will be getting a season ticket next year before the deadline .....but surely they going to extend the deadline now we more or less doomed, it wouldn’t make sense not to would it?
If I had a few months to get one at price they are now it would help,no one gonna pay full price with 250 a month utilities to pay
The idea of the "early bird is to push people into renewing. Not giving them the option to put it off and then not get one. It the same sort of sales technique as someone telling you "this offer is only available right now" Given the mess and generally feeling around the club currently I think it might have the opposite impact. In the midst of our relegation being confirmed people may not want to part with such a large sum. Leave at the lower price and who knows, by the end of June people may have mellowed and reconsider their postion.
Renewing to watch what exactly though? There is no structure, no idea who will be managing, who will be left from a weak squad. It will be like starting again, and if the powers that be haven’t learned anything we might drop straight through. This is the worst state of the club for years, totally, frustratingly depressing!
I agree totally ! This early bird crap should be banned in my opinion . It’s no different to the double glazing salesman telling you if you sign up now it will be cheaper . It should be the early bird price throughout !
Anyone know why the only payment option is credit card when you try and renew online? I thought you could pay over 3 or 10 months?
You are not looking at it from a business point of view. They want some money in early to help with planning. Given the opportunity most folk will leave it as late as possible so cutting the deadline risks reducing the amount of early money
Disagree. It’s an incentive for early renewal. It has mutual benefit. Fans pay less and the Club has a locked in amount of money to build into budgets. It happens in pretty much every industry in some shape or form. It’s basic marketing and finance planning. It wouldn’t be a surprise to me, if many who object to early birds really just want to wait until the last minute to decide whether or not to renew, but still want to pay the same as those who renewed early. The reality is if everyone did that, the finance model would be fkd and we’d probably be starting the season with no new signings. I also get the financial thing, but tbf there’s finance options, and people also have all season to save. If that’s still not doable, it’s possible that an ST just isn’t affordable. Which is $hit, but true. The alternative is that it’s a flat rate, but it would unlikely be the early bird rate. In which case we’re back to square one. They need the money early, and if there’s no incentive, why would people renew early?
I'm sure it's been extended in some of the previous years, but it's not something you can count on as being a certainty. Gally mentioned that the supporters groups had fed back that it should be a longer period, and he was surprised that the club hadn't taken this on board when the renewal details were announced. Logic says that they'd have to extend it, particularly if the finance options haven't been available to purchase for much of the available window, but it's something of a risk to assume it will happen.
But from a business point of view doesn't having such a short deadline followed by such a steep increase in prices mean a big loss in revenue after deadline day? Especially in a time where the customer base is struggling financially and are playing a waiting game with their money trying to see what the financial climate is heading towards? Also especially when there are many angry customers who the club needs to spend time trying to win back.
Hopefully the huge reduction in ST renewals will make the owners sit up and think about what they are doing. Somehow, I doubt it. Local non league football is the beneficiary in my particular instance.
I don't see it as an increase, what I see is a ST price that is reduced to encourage early renewal. I believe there would be more early money available with the deadline than there would be without it.
You didn’t expect it to be ready on time despite the early bird being the same time period every year, did you? It’s pretty crap when the early bird is as short as it is and half of that time has already passed and anyone who needs finance still can’t buy one.
The box office told me the 3 and 10 month options are not available yet but will be before the end of April, there will be an announcement.
Have to say that I disagree with those saying that having a 22 day (inc Easter) early bird period after putting the prices up by between 15% and 20% in the midst of the worst cost of living crisis since WW2 is good business sense. It's even worse business sense given they are nearly halfway into the 22 days and there are still none of their so-called 'easy' payment options anywhere in sight! Respect others views on this but I fully and firmly believe personally that by keeping the early bird prices to, say, 31st May at least, it would give them significantly more income (and less costs of finance) than guillotining after 3 measly weeks. It would hardly affect their early planning in the slightest, yet give more to plan with and it's still the same financial year. Moreover, the way they've set it up nobody is going to buy one with the £75 penalty after 29th April and so this whole debate about 11,000 ST holders is pure poppycock from the CEO. And I have to say that this thing about awarding refunds weekly has got my goat almost as much if not more than the £750k. To be giving money back to those who most readily have £300 plus sloshing around on day 1 offends my principles of equity and fairness enough, but to be doing so without even giving an equal chance for those who might have wanted to renew by one of the finance options on day 1 because you didn't have them available at launch, makes me sick. Kind of thing Sunak would do. BFC, supporting the richer getting richer and riding roughshod over equality of opportunity. Shocking. From my experience in business, the unprecedented short and punitive early bird, despite the brutal context of household finances, and the desperate FOMO incentives and gimmicks (all of which are fine initiatives in themselves but imho cynically linked - why not give long-standing/existing customers these anyway?) sadly smack of a financially failing business absolutely desperate for short-term cash. It needs to get some in quick rather than get the maximum it could by keeping the prices down and making the incentives equitable and accessible to all. Apologies for the rant, as I say it's got my goat that the club owners and executives run it so thoughtlessly and needlessly badly. Given that so-called 3 month option which if it ever comes out I fully expect to be a 2 month option is only available to 29th April I only half-jokingly interpret this to mean it will come out on 30th April!