...He doesn't mention that he is taking a cut for this year. He is effectively a dictator in all matters Gills related.
Then in usual times he spends a portion of the year in a millionaires playground - Dubai - on the dubious pretence of "seeking investment", which has produced exactly zilch in a decade.
Those are my only criticisms and they have nothing to do with speculation and are not things he can deny.
You’re speculating that he hasn’t taken a pay cut because he hasn’t mentioned it. You’re also forgetting Michael Anderson who was discovered in Dubai. Ignoring the circumstances in which he left the club he still invested heavily in us, enabling the restructuring.
I’m interested in hearing about the benefits of the supporters groups. In the old days, as Billy Bleach says, membership clubs were primarily another way of helping the club, while in return feeling a bit closer to it using inexpensive added value benefits. A small discount on coach travel. Vouchers for the club shop. A birthday card. Perhaps a membership day where you can meet the players.
Then we started dabbing with a points system based on purchased tickets, merchandise and beer.
Many supporters clubs now are primarily based as a method of prioritising ticket sales when demand frequently outweighs supply. Arsenal has a similar system - everyone pays for the basic ‘red’ tier, then silver gold etc are based on other aspects like being a shareholder, how many season tickets you’ve bought in the past, yearly points accumulations. Hence Arsenal selling 1,000 tickets away to small Eastern European sides in European qualifiers only for 100 to turn up!
Whenever tickets go on sale they go to higher tier members first, then down the tiers with red members fighting over the last remaining ones. Other than that each year there’s a little goodie box of stuff along with your new cards.
Is it needed at Gills? We don’t really need a priority system other than once or twice a season, but a points system will once again encourage people to spend money at the store(s) and Factory. All you need to do is think up some sensible rewards and it’s a winner. It’s not hard, but it’s also easy to mess up if you don’t bother.
Like others say, we know there are ***** on social media who proclaim to be Gills fans but forever put a downer on everything with anti-comments to everything. A wishy washy ‘look out, we’ve made a list of such people’ is more damaging than good.
We’ve recently received a telling off by the Ombudsman for ‘banning’ a fan who was a bit of a penis, forcing a climb-down from both sides. We don’t want supporters to feel any criticism will be punished, which is easier done than saying ‘we’ll ban people if they directly damage our club by saying I used season ticket monies to build a duck house in my garden’.
I obviously agree with much of the rest of the letter. Football does need a reset to take us away from relying on sugar daddies and debt. Loose ticket and shirt price caps too, pressure a loosening of the Taylor report to allow terracing back under safe conditions too. Not his words but mine.
