Clive, counting the cost of going up. | Page 3 | Vital Football

Clive, counting the cost of going up.

Trying to get my head around the extra £1m apparently needed to compete in L1.
Looking at one angle, are we saying for example Akinde or Shackle wouldn't have signed for the good wages we offered if we'd been a L1 club. And they would have signed for lower money potentially into L2?
From another angle, the extra TV/Solidarity payment plus ticket increase is going to be a good portion of £1m, or are we imagining it's another £1m on top
 
From the figures given I would say Teams staying in L2 teams get approx £9000000 EFL money , league 1 cost are said to be 1 million more on cost of L2, but L1 teams receive 1.2 million in EFL payments an extra £300000 that mean in my mind clubs have to fund £700000 from other sources. May be a little simplistic but look logical to me
 
I took it from the Plymouth figures that the additional revenue would be £205,000 in basic award and £215,000 in Solidarity payment, giving a combined increase of £417,000. I think TV money is only available for the showing of live games at the rate of £30,000 per home game and £10,000 per away game, but very few get shown (I think about 20 across L1 & L2), so I don't think that is going to make a huge difference to us. If the average ticket price increase is £5 per ticket then that would be an increase of £1,125,000 (9,000 av. attn x 25 games per season x £5). If the average ticket price is only £2.50 (given concession, child and early bird season ticket discounts) then the increase would be £562,500. I am presuming a fairly neutral stance on average attendances due to the much discussed ground capacity.

There should be corresponding increases in concession and merchandise sales, but it would be a guess as to what those would be and I don't think they will be massive, so I have ignored them. Totalling that up, we could expect an increase in revenue of between £980,000 and £1,542,000. None of this takes into account the tax position, as I believe 20% VAT would be payable on all ticket sales, even if we make a loss and pay no tax on profits. I presume that removes between £93,750 and £187,500 from that income giving a net contribution of between £886,250 and £1,354,500.

From that you would think that there is an automatic uplift in all player and management team wages from bonuses written into contracts. Any extra players would both cost more on average to purchase and cost more to fund their wages. What other additional costs there may be I am not sure and whether the playing side cost increases account for that £1m figure I don't know.

Happy to have this pulled apart if I have got anything wrong from the limited research I have done.
 
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Jal has kindly pointed out that his Season Ticket renewal is at the rate of 6%, which has made me consider some of my rough calculations above.

It is a really difficult thing to judge average ticket price, as Season Tickets are so much cheaper per game than pay on the door and Concessions so much cheaper than full Adult price. We would need to know the breakdown by Season Ticket, Season Ticket Concession, MyImps prices, MyImps child prices, family tickets, pay on the door full price adult and pay on the door concession in order to work it out correctly.

However, if the season ticket increase of 6% is replicated across the board then this would see about a £1.50 increase in the Full Adult price pay on the door price, which is much less than the 20% increase I have suggested. But a 6% increase in the Season Ticket Price equates to only 60p per game.

The other thing my rough calculations did not account for is that if about 65% of the ground is already sold as season tickets, then the increase may only be 6% for that portion, meaning that we wouldn't be able to raise the average ticket price by nearly as much as I have suggested.

For comparison, if these considerations brought down the average ticket price increase to £1.00 that would be £225,000 ex VAT or £187,500 once the VAT is taken out. Giving a total lower end estimate of £604,500.
 
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PlymouthImp said:
Granted that high attendances don't guarantee finishing position (e.g. Bradford avg. 16,070 and a thing I like to mention regularly to Argyle fans because it winds them up - avg.9,704), the emphasis must be on the quality on the field.
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I agree with you, I'm sure we'll be ok, however Bradford may average 16k but at £100 a season ticket its not earning them much if they don't buy a shirt or eat something. We also should be ok because probably half the team minimum is of that level already but on the flip side a few of them are approaching or at the end of there career. One thing the management excel at though is recruitment, in fact to be fair there bloody brilliant and excel at everything!
 
Bradford sold 13k season tickets @ £150 a time.
They are now charging £225.
Sadly it's going to be for fourth division.
Suppose it's good idea when you have a ground that holds over 25k to have an idea like this to try and fill it.
 
Davidimp said:
Bradford sold 13k season tickets @ £150 a time.
They are now charging £225.
Sadly it's going to be for fourth division.
Suppose it's good idea when you have a ground that holds over 25k to have an idea like this to try and fill it.
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MK were giving away free tickets for our game there and still didn't fill their ground!
 
Davidimp said:
Bradford sold 13k season tickets @ £150 a time.
They are now charging £225.
Sadly it's going to be for fourth division.
Suppose it's good idea when you have a ground that holds over 25k to have an idea like this to try and fill it.
Click to expand...

I know they've been doing it for years but do you not think its a false economy? I mean even £225 is cheap and it represents a 50% increase for a lower level of football. Its simple I guess, success brings the fans back, thing is the answer isn't so easy to manage.
 
The one thing we must also take into account is that the solidarity and basic award payments go to every club. Therefore that money does no more than create a level playing field at the outset. The amount referred to by Bob Dorrian is an additional sum that is required in order to create a financial advantage over our fellow League One clubs ('to be competitive'), assuming they do not find extra funding themselves.

And that extra funding is the crux. We will clearly have an advantage over the majority due to our high average attendance, but we fall down on non-football income compared with those having better facilities and those with wealthy owners. Remember that we had the second lowest commercial income in League Two last season, and that will be exacerbated at a higher level.
 
clanford said:
Well the. EFL website shows nothing, but I found a report from Plymouth Vitals in 2017 that indicated nothing at all as all clubs received an equal payment across the board.

https://plymouth.vitalfootball.co.uk/how-much-prize-money-for-winning-l2/
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So from reading the article the difference is between L1 and L2 is £410k extra.

So far I have estimated c£1.081m received from the very early ST renewal option if the 60% take up figure is correct.

Total estimate for next season is £1.491m in the war chest, plus any new investment, remainder of ST renewals, new ST sales and match day income from spare seats and visiting supporters and finally any increase in commercial income (sponsorship etc.)
 
Jamesimp said:
I know they've been doing it for years but do you not think its a false economy? I mean even £225 is cheap and it represents a 50% increase for a lower level of football. Its simple I guess, success brings the fans back, thing is the answer isn't so easy to manage.
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Maybe they are banking on winning more games in the league below?
 
Merthyr Imp said:
I may have got this completely round my neck, but isn't it - or wasn't it - the practice for clubs to take out insurance to cover paying bonuses if promotion was won?

I seem to vaguely remember the club receiving criticism at one time years ago for NOT having this insurance during a particular season. Perhaps the 1982/83 season, or perhaps not.
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Yes on all counts.

Another epic miscalculation by Mr. Blades
 
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We have a high percentage of season ticket holders. All paying a reduced game by game rate. 3-4,000 (30% of total capacity for the whole season) have already signed up at way less than an increase of 5 pounds per game...
 
Merthyr Imp said:
I may have got this completely round my neck, but isn't it - or wasn't it - the practice for clubs to take out insurance to cover paying bonuses if promotion was won?

I seem to vaguely remember the club receiving criticism at one time years ago for NOT having this insurance during a particular season. Perhaps the 1982/83 season, or perhaps not.
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Lessons will have been learned from the past and insurances taken out. Thought there might have been a comment by now.
 
Think the board would have done all their sums way before now including being promoted and also not. Sponsorship will increase i guess and also shop sales shirts etc . Accrington while not setting the league on fire have stayed up so far and at a much lower spend. Now players are more interested to come to Lincoln to sign and on loan it may not come at such a high cost as once before as they would look at it as a good stepping stone . Recruitment for players to sell on is also a major source of income if they keep bringing in players to develop it may not be what fans want but to be sustainable onsell of players may be the price of success
 
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