Back in the 80’s, Brummie comedian Jasper Carrott used to have a gag in his routine where he'd be at St. Andrews watching 
But while the nation’s media focus on the big guns in the Premiership, the same thing is happening further down the leagues – and
Who’d have thought that we’d attract less than 5,000 fans for a Cup match with a Premiership side? It happened last week. We should have had a full house (or at least an attendance pushing the 9,000 mark) for a match like that. The problem was the marketing, again. In fact, unlike the league matches, which are prohibitively expensive for pay-on-the-day fans, there was a decent pricing policy for the Pompey game, but it wasn’t very well promoted – and one of the biggest shocks of the Carling Cup so far was seen by more empty seats than fans at Priestfield last Tuesday night – and that can’t be right.
Fans have also been disillusioned by a combination of factors of late. With results going against us, it becomes more difficult for fans to dig deep into their pockets to pay in excess of £20 per game for League One football when we’re shipping over two goals a game. Moves are afoot to improve matters in our defence, which you’d expect, but are there moves to improve the attendances by offering more competitive prices across the board? If so, we’re not aware of them.
There is a Kids for a Quid promotion for Tuesday night – and that initiative should be encouraged. With so many empty seats, why not run such a promotion for the whole month? The kids can go regularly for a month, then, when the prices go back to normal levels, they will hopefully have the bug and be able to persuade their parents to keep taking them from then on.
However, the over-inflated prices are stopping that becoming a viable solution. Unless you’re a season ticket holder, or pretty well off, the chances are you’ll have to pick and choose your games, especially if you have a football-mad family who also want to go to games. These people are exactly the people who we must work harder to get into Priestfield on a regular basis. We’ve never really sold the club to the people of
Like it not, we’re in competition with Charlton – and we therefore have to be a lot more pro-active in both our ticketing policy and our marketing, because at the moment, it’s clear to see that there’s only one club offering a competitive deal for the fans of Kent, and it isn’t us.
For example:
Charlton v Fulham
Match ticket prices are for ALL AREAS of the ground
2x Adult @ £20 each
1x u16 @ £10
3x Valley Express @ £5 each
TOTAL = £65
Gillingham
Ticket prices for Block C Lower - Medway Stand
2x Adult = £26 + £26
1x u16 = £15
TOTAL = £67
It’s marginally cheaper to be in an inferior area of the ground, but the facts are clear. Not only are Charlton offering a better product, but they’re offering it at better prices, too. Even with the travelling costs, it’s still cheaper to watch a
Now these families who want to take their kids to a game may not necessarily have strong ties to either
We need more initiatives like Kids for a Quid, and the proposed Football League scheme to let under eights in for free with a paying adult is exactly what clubs like
Premiership prices for League One football won’t wash with many fans – and the huge drop in attendances has proved that. There’s no easy solution, but surely a fan in the ground is better than one sat at home because they can’t afford to go. At the moment, we’re alienating a significant proportion of our fanbase – and we need all the support we can get. The only way to improve matters is to re-address ticket prices.
But what can we do?
Scrap the grading system
It makes no sense. The majority of clubs in League One are Northern-based, so why charge the fans of bigger clubs such a
Kids for free
The new Football League scheme will do exactly this. Kids under the age of 8 will be let in for free if accompanied by a paying adult. It gets the kids into the grounds and brings the game back to the youngsters, without whom there will be no fans of the future.
Lower pay-on-the-day prices
To ask a regular pay-on-the-day fan to pay in excess of £20 to watch League One football is madness, pure and simple. To do so when the nearest Premiership club, (which is marketing aggressively in your catchment area), is cheaper than you in many cases, is plain stupid. There should be a sensible price ceiling (surely no more than £20) for most areas of the ground, with the possible exception of the centre blocks of the Medway Stand. We simply have to make watching
Paul Scally felt the need to keep ticket prices largely the same as they were last season. I can only think that he thought that we wouldn’t be getting any new fans after our relegation – and perhaps thought that we should get as much out of the current ones as possible. Well, a significant number of those fans aren’t having it – and have not renewed their season tickets and/or are now picking and choosing their games. It isn’t working – and we need to go back to the drawing board, come up with some competitive prices for the Gills – and market the hell out of them.
You won’t meet a Gills fan who doesn’t want to see the club succeed – and they’ll spread the word too. Indeed, this very website is fully behind the club and wants to see it succeed – and we’ll fully back and promote any initiatives from the club to try and improve attendances at Priestfield. BUT the responsibility lies with the club to make the difference.
If we don’t have a rethink, the fanbase will continue to waste away. The club is capable of better than this – and the regular fans that DO go every week deserve better than this. Matters on the pitch will take care of themselves. It’s off the pitch that the club needs to focus its efforts. In a marketplace where brand loyalty is king, we’re allowing ourselves to not just put off potential new fans, but we’re also beginning to alienate those we’ve already got. An empty seat is a wasted opportunity. Every home game, thousands of opportunities are wasted. We can do better. We must do better.