A question about improving support

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Originally Posted by Whisperer

Away membership needs looking at - I’m all for having a photo ID and a membership card but £30 every season maybe good value if you go on the busses every week but I would do maybe 6/7 aways a season and I stopped going.

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I can tolerate the need for some ID/membership but it simply shouldn’t cost that much.

As an exile, I’d attend a handful to a dozen away games a season but since Covid I’ve not been to one. Unnecessary costs like this definitely a factor. My general football watching has also plummeted since to be fair but there’s something now about what feels like additional planning and faff with what seems an unnecessary cost attached that just puts me off.

I have a few friends that support lower league clubs and we’ll go to London away games in a group a few times a season. Minimal fuss involved: travel to the ground, turn up at the away end, pay your money, go through the turnstile. I appreciate the context is different for the city or a championship club perhaps, but the more the whole process moves away from this now the less I’m interested.

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Originally Posted by Armitage Shanks

Yet Lee Waters thinks we have a marvellous transport system that doesn't require any more roads to be built

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We have a 5 pager on poor public transport to the ground and you think another road is the answer?

A few things Corks!

Price of Children's kits! I took my 7 year old child to get the full kit with his name on the back £93 !!!! £93 f**king quid?? what????? Kids kit (under 15) should be no-more than £20 , we need to encourage kids to wear their home town colours!!! I certainly won't be buying it again! sad really!

Prices too! I would go more if the kids were a lot cheaper !!! everyone's feeling the pinch, at the moment, putting food on the table and paying bills are more important that football.

I feel the club is no longer our club or there for us. the club shop is hardly open, nothing attracts you to the ground.

Prices inside are madness!!

Bring back the grange end next to the away fans! - will never happen... but it's all pretty rubbish now. going down is just a force of habit these days, go there, sit and watch football and go home, it's not a day out anymore.

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Originally Posted by stevebrickman

Crystal Palace are about as close as it gets in this country to the German fan culture , with their ‘ultra’ section behind the goal (Holmsdale end??)

They seem to have nailed the home atmosphere… I think I would be looking to try and replicate what they have… ringfence area behind the goal… the club could actively ‘recruit’ supporters into it initially (and if it took off people would naturally gravitate towards it).

Not for everyone, probably more so for the youngsters… but it’s the atmosphere and experience we need to be working on.

I’d also be working with primary /high schools in south east wales… free tickets, discounted bundles etc. The hundreds of clubs that play Saturday mornings… these kids love footy already, it’s just a case of trying to draw them in.

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They do give tickets away to schools quite frequently but I’m not sure how many….my kids school have had some (20) but only once a season. They should give away far more, fill the reds seats with kids who are the future, make this a designated family stand. Kids can’t see anything when the play is towards the canton so will get a far better view. Best of all no longer stuck next to the away fans who can then be shunted along into the grange end towards the grandstand. Allowing standing and singing in the Ninian then would make a far better atmosphere but it’s debatable whether the club actually want this? My jack mate tells me if it wasn’t for the allowed singers next to the away fans at the Liberty there would be no atmosphere at all, aliken to the CCS now.
It always amazes me the club tend to target the valleys for new support when we have a city of almost half a million people (if you throw in Barry and penarth) and how many go? 2%? Must be the worst support per pop anywhere in the uk and mainly due to tickets being way to expensive last minute and the fact most don’t even know we are playing……do we even have any fans from the suburbs close to the stadium bar Canton? Grangetown, riverside, butetown? Very poor area’s?
Almost 50,000 students in and around the city too…..

One thing that's always baffled me, Arsenal Man city on the weekend, fans were separated by ONE! single glass barrier, you could probably lean over and touch the away fans! All other teams in the prem too~!!! With us, we have sections after sections closed off. it's looks pathetic and loses all match atmosphere!!! Love it or like it, fans like a bit of banter!! it's apart of football!

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Originally Posted by fingers

I’d echo the travel issue. Took the train from Bridgend on Saturday with my 10 yr old boy. The walk up from central station not great so after the match thought we’d catch a train back to Central from Ninian station - jam packed and couldn’t get on it. Had to walk back in the dark which didn’t bother me but my boy wasn’t happy. Got to Central station, got on train and there was a problem with the doors - stuck on there for 25 minutes, boiling hot, no air conditioning, toe to toe. Got into Bridgend and missed our last bus (yes, last bus 6:30pm!). Got a £10 taxi and got home 3 hours after final whistle, just 20 miles down the road from CCS.

Now there’s a whole separate thread needed for the abysmal state of our public transport, but if that’s my experience (and more importantly my 10 yr old’s experience), how are we going to make ‘the day’ more attractive if you have to spend almost 4 hours travelling 20 miles each way? There used to be a Zeelo coach service from Bridgend direct to CCS before Covid, not sure what happened to that.

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Just to stress the point, I asked my 10 year old this morning if he fancied coming with me to the Bristol game on the 28th and he replied, "not really, the trains were a nightmare". That's the future fans we're trying to attract!

[QUOTE=Dave Blue;5460602]We have a 5 pager on poor public transport to the ground and you think another road is the answer?[/QUO

the man lives in a dream world where it comes to public transport.

The M4 relief road would help though. Nothing grates people more than it taking the same amount of time to get from London to caerleon than it does from caerleon to Cardiff.
More people may attend if the roads were better

The disappointing thing is that this thread has been done countless times and many of the excellent suggestions on here have been raised many times before.

I acknowledge that some things such as better transport connections and switching the family and Canton are expensive and logistically difficult, but simple things like seating under the concourse, more decor, free tickets for schools, etc should be something the club can sort out in a few days.

Even something as simple as getting Hey Jude back on the tannoy took years of asking. Why on earth the club thought playing Fatboy Slim and Motörhead would get the fans singing is beyond me.

Getting to and from the ground is clearly an issue for some of us. Maybe we need a couple of park and ride bus services. The Cardiff East P&R site used to run buses to Queen Street but only seems to go to the hospital now. A shuttle to the ground from there could be good for the East of the city/Newport/those of us living in England.

We should never have expanded the stadium, 28k would be fine now and would've been fine in the Premier League

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Originally Posted by TheBirchgrovePub

We should never have expanded the stadium, 28k would be fine now and would've been fine in the Premier League

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Absolutely

Our fans sometimes talk us up it's daft

Build a new stadium and the fans will come !

28 k would have been perfect

When Coventry got their new ground I would look at the stands from the way end when we were up there and it looked terrible , totally desolate

Ours looks just as bad these days

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Originally Posted by Canton Kev

The disappointing thing is that this thread has been done countless times and many of the excellent suggestions on here have been raised many times before.

I acknowledge that some things such as better transport connections and switching the family and Canton are expensive and logistically difficult, but simple things like seating under the concourse, more decor, free tickets for schools, etc should be something the club can sort out in a few days.

Even something as simple as getting Hey Jude back on the tannoy took years of asking. Why on earth the club thought playing Fatboy Slim and Motörhead would get the fans singing is beyond me.

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Just shows how disconnected the club is, not just from the city in it’s in, but it’s own fan base. You don’t have to switch the ends either, just move the families up to the red and let singing/standing happen in the Ninian…as for transport don’t worry about about it, the Metro is coming, whatever that means….the WAG will have it nicely sorted.:hehe:

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Originally Posted by TheBirchgrovePub

We should never have expanded the stadium, 28k would be fine now and would've been fine in the Premier League

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We had crowds of over 30k for almost all of our home games the last time we were in the Premier League. About half of them were over 32k, which is pretty much a sell-out for the CCS.

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Originally Posted by LeningradCowboy

We had crowds of over 30k for almost all of our home games the last time we were in the Premier League. About half of them were over 32k, which is pretty much a sell-out for the CCS.

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We have been in the top flight for 2 seasons since its formation in 1993

If we were a club with a history of big support a 33 k capacity stadium would have made sense

It's a white elephant as it is

28 k would have been fine and generated a good atmosphere with 20 k crowds in it

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Originally Posted by TheBirchgrovePub

We should never have expanded the stadium, 28k would be fine now and would've been fine in the Premier League

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We averaged over 31,000 in the Premier League

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Originally Posted by City123

We averaged over 31,000 in the Premier League

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Is having 3000 extra in during the PL season worth having an extra 4,000 seats empty for every season outside of the PL? Not for me !

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Originally Posted by TheBirchgrovePub

Is having 3000 extra in during the PL season worth having an extra 4,000 seats empty for every season outside of the PL? Not for me !

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Yes, far better for the club to turn away 3,000 fans a week during a season when they can charge the most.

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Originally Posted by TheBirchgrovePub

Is having 3000 extra in during the PL season worth having an extra 4,000 seats empty for every season outside of the PL? Not for me !

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Yes.

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Originally Posted by City123

We averaged over 31,000 in the Premier League

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Once or twice in a blue moon we get there ff sake

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Originally Posted by Eric the Half a Bee

Yes, far better for the club to turn away 3,000 fans a week during a season when they can charge the most.

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Well you must be so happy to sit in a half empty stadium every weekend knowing that IF we are good enough to get promoted .......twice in the 30 years of the Premier leagues existence ......it will all be worth it because we can sell a few tickets to fans that will vanish if we get relegated

You are a typical dreamland Cardiff City fan

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Originally Posted by TheBirchgrovePub

Is having 3000 extra in during the PL season worth having an extra 4,000 seats empty for every season outside of the PL? Not for me !

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Absolutely not

We are a laughing stock

I disagree it was worth it, not a price worth paying for the occasional PL campaign to fit an extra 3000 fans in - which most weeks there wasn't - average boosted by games against the top 6 and sell out away ends

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Originally Posted by SLUDGE FACTORY

Absolutely not

We are a laughing stock

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Agreed !

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Originally Posted by SLUDGE FACTORY

We are a laughing stock

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You reckon clubs around the UK are laughing at our stadium? Really? What have you been smoking today?

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Originally Posted by Eric the Half a Bee

You reckon clubs around the UK are laughing at our stadium? Really? What have you been smoking today?

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You look at the forums of other clubs and the away days photos and Cardiff City get the piss taken out of them for poor home and away support and the empty seats in our ground, it looks terrible

And they are right

If Cardiff City and the supporters groups were NOT concerned about the level of attendance both home and away why do you think it's been brought up at meetings held between CCFC and the fans ?

You are in complete denial and always have been on this matter

If we didn’t have the extra seats, we may have lost the Wales games being held here

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Originally Posted by goats

Just shows how disconnected the club is, not just from the city in it’s in, but it’s own fan base. You don’t have to switch the ends either, just move the families up to the red and let singing/standing happen in the Ninian…as for transport don’t worry about about it, the Metro is coming, whatever that means….the WAG will have it nicely sorted.:hehe:

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Move us over to the canton by all means but don’t put us up in the red area. You can’t say get the kids are the future of the club then put us up in the shittest part

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Originally Posted by superfeathers

Move us over to the canton by all means but don’t put us up in the red area. You can’t say get the kids are the future of the club then put us up in the shittest part

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The views are good.
Also it would hide the red!

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Originally Posted by SLUDGE FACTORY

You look at the forums of other clubs and the away days photos and Cardiff City get the piss taken out of them for poor home and away support and the empty seats in our ground, it looks terrible

And they are right

If Cardiff City and the supporters groups were NOT concerned about the level of attendance both home and away why do you think it's been brought up at meetings held between CCFC and the fans ?

You are in complete denial and always have been on this matter

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Who cares what fans of other clubs supposedly think? I doubt fans of other clubs are particularly bothered about our attendances, it's hardly as if we're the only Championship club that doesn't fill their ground either.

Every club wants more fans and what was a good thread discussing potential ways to improve the support has been turned into your regular crap about attendance numbers, how small we are as a club, how we're a laughing stock etc etc. It's boring.

The extra capacity is good for internationals and would be used regularly if we strung some wins together. If Tan had not built to anticipate success he would have been pilloried for that.

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Originally Posted by City123

Who cares what fans of other clubs supposedly think? I doubt fans of other clubs are particularly bothered about our attendances, it's hardly as if we're the only Championship club that doesn't fill their ground either.

Every club wants more fans and what was a good thread discussing potential ways to improve the support has been turned into your regular crap about attendance numbers, how small we are as a club, how we're a laughing stock etc etc. It's boring.

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Same to you

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Originally Posted by City123

Who cares what fans of other clubs supposedly think? I doubt fans of other clubs are particularly bothered about our attendances, it's hardly as if we're the only Championship club that doesn't fill their ground either.

Every club wants more fans and what was a good thread discussing potential ways to improve the support has been turned into your regular crap about attendance numbers, how small we are as a club, how we're a laughing stock etc etc. It's boring.

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I regularly go through other teams attendances and laugh at them to myself, or share the news with like minded people. You should try it,

I've been slowly reading through the posts on this thread, and trying to get some thoughts together on the subject.
If the club wants to improve attendance, then there aren't really that many ways to go about it. The most obvious way is to have or build an attractive footballing side, that scores goals, and wins games. (I told you it was obvious). That would in theory move us up the table, and hopefully we would achieve promotion. More people would come to watch the good football, the team winning games, and then you'd also have the 'extra' people coming along to watch the big Premier sides. If we could stay in the Premier, then that swell would be sustained, and our average gates would rise. All good so far, and all pretty obvious to most people.
If they want to increase crowds without the success, then that's a different thing. Some suggestions might be cheap tickets for the Grange End family stand, or handing out tickets to schools or local football clubs. Another suggestion might be cut ticket prices, but how do you do that without upsetting all the season ticket holders? Well, you could do it once - perhaps charge £5 a ticket for a single game, once a season. Next time Rotherham are in town, perhaps.
You can tempt people in once or twice, with cheap tickets and the like. But if the football is poor, then they won't come back.

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Originally Posted by Tuerto

I regularly go through other teams attendances and laugh at them to myself, or share the news with like minded people. You should try it,

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What would you say is the reason for these low attendance in these bigger grounds ? ? IMHO it might be because locals support other teams, Liverpool & Man City are a very popular teams I hear

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Originally Posted by Dave Blue

The extra capacity is good for internationals and would be used regularly if we strung some wins together. If Tan had not built to anticipate success he would have been pilloried for that.

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Foolish Foolish man, build it and they will come ( occasionally ) in what world are we when people are moaning about a stand being closed ( its not eating or drinking anything as my old mum used to say ) when not needed but being ready to go when the demand requires, its mental

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Originally Posted by Wash DC Blue

The views are good.
Also it would hide the red!

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Last time I was up there Swansea battered us 0-4
I don’t ever want to go back. We’d look even more sparse up there too. Imagine a night game we’d look like an anti social leper colony.

We will be the talk of other clubs

The stadium expansion was part of the deal to bring the Champions League Final and Super Cup to Cardiff.
Without it there'd have been 5k fewer fans attending Wales matches for the past few years.
I'd rather have 5000 extra seats at the stadium, than have to move Wales games to the Principality to accommodate the fans who want to go.

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Originally Posted by blue matt

What would you say is the reason for these low attendance in these bigger grounds ? ? IMHO it might be because locals support other teams, Liverpool & Man City are a very popular teams I hear

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Yup. Thing is, the majority of people who like football enjoy watching a game on TV, and plenty of them shout for one of the big clubs, that's probably as far as their football supporting life goes. To criticise them for not following their local club is just bonkers, they've probably never been interested. It's not like they've jumped ship, they were never on the ship to start with. They might come along if City are in the premier league, So what, who gives a flying **** :thumbup:

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Originally Posted by Tuerto

Yup. Thing is, the majority of people who like football enjoy watching a game on TV, and plenty of them shout for one of the big clubs, that's probably as far as their football supporting life goes. To criticise them for not following their local club is just bonkers, they've probably never been interested. It's not like they've jumped ship, they were never on the ship to start with. They might come along if City are in the premier league, So what, who gives a flying **** :thumbup:

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Well clearly the clubs accountant is worried

Cardiff City's problem for as long as its been a club is the inability to attract big crowds on a regular basis

If people don't care or want to deny it then go ahead but we have spent money we didn't have through gate income on wages under hammam and that nearly buried us

It most certainly matters that our crowds are in need of improvement

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Originally Posted by SLUDGE FACTORY

You look at the forums of other clubs and the away days photos and Cardiff City get the piss taken out of them for poor home and away support and the empty seats in our ground, it looks terrible

And they are right

If Cardiff City and the supporters groups were NOT concerned about the level of attendance both home and away why do you think it's been brought up at meetings held between CCFC and the fans ?

You are in complete denial and always have been on this matter

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So what do you want? A 20,000 seater stadium that is then limited in what it can earn for the club when we can have big crowds? A 20,000 seater stadium that the FAW wouldn't be interested in using, again, bringing in more money for the club?

This season our home crowds have increased for the second successive season, even if you take out the Swansea attendance. Given how crap we've been for a few seasons, it's a genuine suprise to see bigger crowds. It's been very rare in our history for a Cardiff side that has struggled at the foot of the table to gain support. It might be worth pointing out that we're getting bigger crowds this season than when we were promoted under Warnock. I don't see a CONCERN about levels of attendance, more questions on how to BUILD it. The two things are very different.

The club, and Vincent Tan's aim, is to get to the Premier League and, one day, hopefully be a side that plays there year in, year out. We know our crowd would continue to grow if we could stay there for a few seasons. It makes sense to have a stadium that can support good crowds in the top division. I couldn't give a rat's arse what others think if our crowds are low in the Championship. It shows we've been shit. When we've been pushing for promotion, our crowds have always been bigger.

Of course, you don't like the sound of that - the lure of the Premier League bringing people into the ground, spending money etc, even though you happily watch Match of the Day and moan like feck about it on a weekly basis. You'd be happy with plucky old little Cardiff City. So glad you're not in charge of the club. We'd get nowhere.