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Hi all,

I'm creating this thread with the hope that it will be pinned to the top of the Boro Forum any time anyone wants to discuss or make suggestions regarding our place at the table in the Middlesbrough Supporters Forum. I'm not entirely sure of how this will work yet as I'm not yet in contact with anyone their side but I figured I'd at least start setting out the way I envisage this going from our point-of-view.

Quick intro for those who aren't aware, Middlesbrough Supporters Forum is a group that meets to discuss all kind of supporter concerns. The group is currently chaired by Mark Motley, the representative from Middlesbrough Supporters South, who has previously posted on here as @Mark_MSF. As per the website bio, it was setup in February 2017 with the aim of 'strengthening fans’ links with the club and ensuring that we can properly debate the issues which affect us all.’ Some other examples of attendees at these meetings from the supporters side that you may be aware of are Middlesbrough Disabled Supporters Association, Rainbow Reds, Red Faction, Twelfth Man and FMTTM.

But this is a group that brings the club and supporters together to discuss matters that affect us all so it wouldn't be complete without regular attendance from one or two people in official MFC capacity. For example, going back through the last few meetings' minutes of the group, we can see attendance by Yvonne Ferguson, the Head of Supporter Services, Paul Dews, Head of Communications and Lee Fryett, Head of Commercial & Ticketing. It was also attended on the 12th October last year by none other than the current manager, Neil Warnock, who had some choice words for us might I add:

I think oneBoro is the forum that I sometimes read, and when I read it, I sometimes think I wish I could ring him up. I read the other night, somebody saying its time for Warnock to go. I thought come and see me to my face.

So whilst some of you now drift off into a game of 'Guess Who Neil Warnock's talking about?'👀 I'll just go through a couple of other things.

1. If you have any suggestions, please keep them to this thread or direct them to me via direct message. As I said before, I'll be reading them all no matter who you are so long as we stick to that format. It's just for everyone's benefit that things like that don't get lost in the Transfer Thread, for example.

2. If you'd prefer to message the Forum directly, you can do that via the website here.

3. I will try to feed back things ASAP from meetings that I think people will find interesting but I'll also be trying to summarise the minutes of each meeting when they get released for easier reading. I intend to be doing that for the last meeting's minutes and maybe the one before, but all future ones too.

4. I don't know the process of making suggestions to be put onto the agenda yet but just as a warning to those not aware, we know from previous discussions with @Mark_MSF that this forum isn't for discussing the team, recruitment, players etc. You'll get a better idea of what is on the table as I summarise more of the meetings.

I think that's it for now. Any questions, let me know and I'll do my best to answer them and if needs be, I'll update this post.

UTB

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  • Brunners changed the title to Middlesbrough Supporters Forum - Discussions and Suggestions
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I see Mark is stepping down as chair citing that he's had abuse online and on the street about the ticket prices. Any Boro fan who is involved in that should be well and truly ashamed of yourself. If

Hello All Just to provide a bit of context, the Supporters Forum has received an influx of emails and messages over the last few weeks from Boro fans that are concerned about the behaviour of some

Totals from the Foodbank collection pre-Ipswich. Luckily the rain stayed away, so we didn't get wet!   £1587.49 cash donations,  529.45kg Food

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So we have our first suggestion... I'll mark this down as 'return of alternate savoury snacks'.

1 minute ago, Will said:

First order of business @wilsoncgp, what the f*ck happened to the Yorkshire pudding wraps that they used to do at the ground? I feel like I've been patient enough on this and it's about bloody time they made a return!

 

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37 minutes ago, wilsoncgp said:

So we have our first suggestion... I'll mark this down as 'return of alternate savoury snacks'.

 

Oh good, please don't let them wriggle out of this one mate, I'm counting on you!

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Cheaper ticket prices.  If the club are serious about this sort of thing then that should be the first order of business.  If I remember rightly we were the second highest in the Championship in a recent survey?  There are multiple Premier League clubs with cheaper ticket prices than us, and I don't believe that should be the case.  We certainly haven't been the second best team in the league recently, our expenditure isn't the second highest, and we aren't in the second most affluent area of the country.  

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On that note @Changing Times, I'll share a quick summary of what was spoken about in relation to ticketing and memberships in the latest meeting.

As mentioned earlier, you can currently see the minutes from the whole meeting in full in this Twitter thread here. In particular, the tweets showing Page 2 and Page 3 show the notes from that particular area of the meeting.

If it needs to be said MFC relates to the club and/or its representatives, MSF relates to the Supporters Forum and/or its representatives.

-----------------------------------

Match Pricing / Memberships (MFC represented by Lee Fryett, Head of Commercial & Ticketing)

Match Pricing

- MFC are putting together a 5-year plan on match pricing which they want the MSF to be involved with. They say this will take 12-18 months to plan this out.
MSF chairman asked if Gibson and Bausor are on board with this 5-year plan and was advised by MFC that they are on board with being 'more creative around tickets'.

Membership Schemes

MFC say membership schemes have been on agenda but delayed by COVID.
- I'll go into more detail below but MFC advised that membership schemes are expected to be released in the following order:
1. 18-21 Membership
2. Junior Membership (Roary Club?)
3. Boro Pride scheme and/or Offshore Worker Scheme
- 18-21 scheme planned as previous offering of special Matchday tickets to that age group has been retracted due to concession abuse. So MFC wants to reintroduce something soon to bring back discounted tickets, a scheme like this will be able to validate young adults age.
- Offshore Workers scheme incorporating a season card with 'a stream and maybe a bundle of match tickets', to fit round offshore schedules if possible.
- Goal from MFC is to get supporters e.g. who currently only go to 6 games to go to 10 games but these solutions need to be seen as decisions that will affect the long term.
- Consensus from MFC is that massive % of fanbase may not be able to commit to full season but may commit to more games than they currently do
MFC Sports Services department doing in-depth research on what other sports do (not just football) in relation to memberships but don't want to over-complicate things
- Other MSF reps mention the problem of how the Championship in particular has a lot of midweek games, meaning people can't commit to season cards.
- As per match pricing, MFC will involve MSF in helping to shape these membership schemes and MFC will bring more details about the suggested memberships to the next meeting

-----------------------------------

I think that about covers the major points so if anybody has any feedback on that (or my presentation of these notes! 😅), please let me know either via this thread or DM.

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I thought it was great when they used to only charge 12 pound for the Friday night games under Karanka. Stadium was always bouncing, and im sure we diddnt lose a game on a Friday for a decent length of time. I know you get a lot of season ticket holders who like to moan about this but for me i would prefer the stadium to be full and im a season ticket holder. 

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What I kind of want to know more about is what they're talking about when Gibson and Bausor are 'open to being creative' about tickets. Being 'creative' doesn't really sound like they're willing to lower a standard matchday price and given this came up after the talk around membership schemes, I'm wondering what thoughts they actually have about your average Boro fan.

I can't say Boro Pride sounds like an afterthought in these discussions as I wasn't there but there's the talk about segmenting the fanbase so they can target people more specifically with things that suit them, it sounds like when they mention 'being creative' this is about targeting specific demographics rather than tackling, in general, the biggest problem of all; the average price of a standard matchday ticket against what the average Boro fan is willing and able to pay.

I'm looking forward to the first meeting and seeing how they bring these memberships back to the table anyway. I'm sure there's some lost context here.

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33 minutes ago, wilsoncgp said:

Goal from MFC is to get supporters e.g. who currently only go to 6 games to go to 10 games but these solutions need to be seen as decisions that will affect the long term.
- Consensus from MFC is that massive % of fanbase may not be able to commit to full season but may commit to more games than they currently do
MFC Sports Services department doing in-depth research on what other sports do (not just football) in relation to memberships but don't want to over-complicate things
- Other MSF reps mention the problem of how the Championship in particular has a lot of midweek games, meaning people can't commit to season cards.
- As per match pricing, MFC will involve MSF in helping to shape these membership schemes and MFC will bring more details about the suggested memberships to the next meeting

All of those things relate to how Boro can sell more tickets really.  Membership schemes, age groups etc.  I can appreciate why they want to do that, but like you I'm more interested in:

5 minutes ago, wilsoncgp said:

tackling, in general, the biggest problem of all; the average price of a standard matchday ticket against what the average Boro fan is willing and able to pay.

I don't really understand why it takes 12-18 months to come up with a 5 year plan on ticketing, or what a 5 year plan even means, it seems more about the aforementioned schemes than anything to do with pricing?  Things like quarterly season tickets, Saturday only season tickets, and whatever else they come up with will no doubt be useful for a lot of people, but unless the pricing is changed for everyone then we still have expensive tickets compared to other clubs.

 

 

 

 

P.S. I ❤️you.

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18 hours ago, wilsoncgp said:

Membership Schemes

MFC say membership schemes have been on agenda but delayed by COVID.
- I'll go into more detail below but MFC advised that membership schemes are expected to be released

Sounds promising regarding this section. Boro Pride was a really good incentive in my eyes, especially for fans in similar positions to myself. Being based down south, it was often easier for myself to get to away games than the home games. But the points system all but killed off my chances of getting away tickets.
I'd be happy for it to return and take maybe 3rd priority after ST holders, then fans with the eligible amount of points but before GS. I know @Humpty also thinks Boro pride should make a comeback.

I'd also love the club to look into improving the ticket transfer system and have it unrestricted (if possible). I remember in the past @jamesp trying in vein to get away tickets and not being able to transfer them to myself despite us trying every which way.

Other than all that the obvious pricing of tickets is a huge factor I believe in fan attendance. I'm sure our walk-up prices are the highest in the league?

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1 hour ago, DanFromDownSouth said:

Sounds promising regarding this section. Boro Pride was a really good incentive in my eyes, especially for fans in similar positions to myself. Being based down south, it was often easier for myself to get to away games than the home games. But the points system all but killed off my chances of getting away tickets.
I'd be happy for it to return and take maybe 3rd priority after ST holders, then fans with the eligible amount of points but before GS. I know @Humpty also thinks Boro pride should make a comeback.

I'd also love the club to look into improving the ticket transfer system and have it unrestricted (if possible). I remember in the past @jamesp trying in vein to get away tickets and not being able to transfer them to myself despite us trying every which way.

Other than all that the obvious pricing of tickets is a huge factor I believe in fan attendance. I'm sure our walk-up prices are the highest in the league?

Cheers for that Dan.

I was never a Boro Pride member when I was down South I don't think. I know the chair Mark Motley is the rep from Middlesbrough Supporters South and Lee Fryett, the guy providing this feedback as the Head of Commercial & Ticketing, also used to be a Boro Pride member himself when he was working in London and they both confirmed in this last meeting that it benefited them and they felt closer to the club because of it. I know they also said the general principle of these schemes is 'to reward loyalty, but at the same time protect season card members too'.

EDIT - I just realised I meant to say, if I find time, I want to have a look through the ticket prices across the league before this meeting too as I want to best represent our thoughts on the matchday prices. So I'll basically be looking to check where we sit on that table of matchday prices. It's probably gonna be harder to go back through the past few years and find that information though.

They didn't mention anything about transferring tickets and I've never actually gone through that process myself. Can you go into more info about what you mean there in terms of what happened? Is it just related to buying away tickets for another person using the season ticket holder's privilege to do so? I'm trying to gauge if this situation is that James was trying to use his priority to get you tickets so you could bypass what the points system is maybe trying to achieve and maybe removing the restrictions isn't a great idea? Trying to pre-empt any discussion they might have that this might not be in good faith basically, mate.

Just as an example to better explain what I'm getting at and you can let me know if I'm just being daft. For argument's sake lets say we have 3 Boro fans. I have 160 points, you have 30, and lets say Humpty has 80 points. The club release a statement about tickets saying tickets will go on sale to 150+ points, then to 70+ then on General sale over the course of a day (similar to what's happened with the Derby County tickets).

I don't want to go so I waive my right to buy ticket/s, you and Humpty both want to go to the game but both of you are worried tickets will be sold out. Humpty hopes his 80 points will at least get him in ahead of General sale but you contact me and ask me for my tickets. I say yes, transfer you my right to tickets and they sell out before Humpty gets a chance to buy. Is that something you can see potentially happening with this transfer system?

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