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iainb

Club Merchandise

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I'm opening this one up as a general topic following on from a "discussion" I've been having on the Leicester thread and their range of Championship & Shield winning merchandise available from the "Club Shop", which in my opinion is woeful. I've been to all the club sites and seen what's on offer elsewhere and to my surprise the results were very different.

I've not gone digging too far and only looked for links from the club's website home page

Premiership:

Belle Vue: Pretty basic compared to the best but better than most

Ipswich: No club shop

Kings Lynn: No club shop

Peterborough: Disappointing

Sheffield: Pretty basic

Wolverhampton: Pretty basic

 

Championship:

Berwick: No club shop

Birmingham: No club shop

Eastbourne: AMAZING! One of the clubs that all others should be aspiring to be like

Edinburgh: Pretty good... I do like the look of those tartan shirts!

Glasgow: Shop coming soon, disappointed in that, I expected better from Glasgow

Kent: No club shop

Leicester: Pretty basic, hardly anything cashing in on the clubs success

Newcastle: No club shop

Plymouth: Quite impressive from the newcomers, very similar to the Eastbourne offerings

Poole: AMAZING! One of the clubs that all others should be aspiring to be like

Redcar: Shop on website showing nothing available

Scunthorpe: No club shop

 

Some clubs seem to be running their own merchandise operation and others have  subbed out their operation to a company called Jaybea designs who look like a from the bedroom using a mobile phone company.

There's money to be made in club merchandise and many don't seem to have cottoned on (forgive the pun) to this. It's easier than ever in the age of the internet to get merchandise produced and sold. Some clubs are not even offering branded face masks in a global pandemic... Some people wouldn't know a business opportunity if it walked up to them and hit them in the face shouting "I'M A BUSINESS OPPORTUNITY".

 

Edited by iainb
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I think jaybea's business model must be pretty robust as jaybea have been the main provider of speedway merchandising to tracks for the last two decades. 

There can also be a considerable difference between buying online and buying at the track. Some have nice shops (Belle Vue) others are just a table on the terraces. Several tracks were completely without trackside purchase opportunities until recently due to covid regulations.

The real problem is that as fanbases contract the market for club branded items shrinks to the point where it becomes uneconomic to run anything other than a print on demand operation.

 

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It would be interesting to know whether the excellent offerings of Poole and Eastbourne are actually reflected by visibility of these items on the terraces.

Didn't Poole recently have a pop up shop at a shopping centre for pre Christmas merchandise celebrating one of their Championship victories?

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11 minutes ago, arnieg said:

I think jaybea's business model must be pretty robust as jaybea have been the main provider of speedway merchandising to tracks for the last two decades. 

I'm sure it works very nicely indeed for Jaybea. Does it work for speedway in general and the club individually though?

If I were a club that didn't want to do my own merchandise I'd be looking to sub it out to Eastbourne or Poole!

Edited by iainb

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5 minutes ago, iainb said:

I'm sure it works very nicely indeed for Jaybea. Does it work for speedway in general and the club individually though?

If I were a club that didn't want to do my own merchandise I'd be looking to sub it out to Eastbourne or Poole!

Poole run a good operation, with much more variety in their product range than most tracks. Isle of Wight have been the market leaders (I think they were the first to do facemasks by several months, and you can get Warriors coffee and underpants!).

However contracting out undoubtedly remains the best solution for many clubs. Unfortunately since the passing of Dave Rattenbury there have been few alternatives and perhaps jaybea would benefit from a bit more competition. But sadly with the declining market size we are unlikely to see new entrants to the market.

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13 minutes ago, arnieg said:

 you can get Warriors coffee and underpants!

I remember during Alan Grahame's testimonial year you could get "Big Al'" underpants lol

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At Belle Vue, some of the fans jackets came out with the Ark, I doubt they will ever buy the modern ones. The problem is getting a jacket or shirt that you can wear other than at speedway, as some of them are far too gaudy, also that shiny material does not look good on someone with more that a trim  figure.

The design of the Belle Vue badges, is very boring, jus the club logo, gone are the days of John Jones, when you got a good variety of designs over the years, and please Belle Vue get rid of the badges with stud fittings. As I see it there will not be a new badge coming out for 2021, except for the year bar, I hope I am wrong, as being a saddo, I have collected speedway badges for several years.

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30 minutes ago, iainb said:

I'm sure it works very nicely indeed for Jaybea. Does it work for speedway in general and the club individually though?

If I were a club that didn't want to do my own merchandise I'd be looking to sub it out to Eastbourne or Poole!

Speaking from personal experience, going solo on merchandise is a big financial commitment with, overall, a very poor rate of return.

Take shirts as an example - which sizes do you stock, how many of each size, what's the minimum order quantity, where do you store the stock, who sells it on your behalf. Then ask the same questions (except size perhaps) about each line of merchandise.

A specialist like Johnny can deal with all these points through economies of scale and knowledge of the business.

There is a good reason 'iainb' why four of the six Premier League Clubs choose to use Jaybea's services.

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21 minutes ago, NeilWatson said:

Speaking from personal experience, going solo on merchandise is a big financial commitment with, overall, a very poor rate of return.

Take shirts as an example - which sizes do you stock, how many of each size, what's the minimum order quantity, where do you store the stock, who sells it on your behalf. Then ask the same questions (except size perhaps) about each line of merchandise.

A specialist like Johnny can deal with all these points through economies of scale and knowledge of the business.

There is a good reason 'iainb' why four of the six Premier League Clubs choose to use Jaybea's services.

It's strange then that many riders sell merchandise, one assumes at a profit,  yet clubs seem unable to make it pay. I wonder if Eastbourne and Poole make money from it and if so what they are doing right and with all respect to yourself what you were doing wrong?

Perhaps a sport wide model is needed rather than individual clubs doing their own thing. 

Edited by iainb

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17 minutes ago, iainb said:

Perhaps a sport wide model is needed rather than individual clubs doing their own thing. 

100%..

Exactly the same way as the promotional plan should be one that is nationally targeted advertising the whole sport in the UK, not individual clubs doing their own thing for very minimal impact..

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Most speedway merchandise just seems geared for people to wear on the terracing, when i go in Man Utd shop everything is geared for general leisure ware for everyday use, i know theres a massive difference between speedway and football clubs financially but i would like to see more leisure ware type merchandise that i could wear socially not just at the track.

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Last merchandise i got at Berwick was a jacket, for which i asked just to be the logo and no sponsors as they can change every season and date your stuff. I wear my jacket obviously to the speedway, but can wear it to my local pub, and basically anywhere in general without it looking out of place 

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25 minutes ago, bellevueace said:

Most speedway merchandise just seems geared for people to wear on the terracing, when i go in Man Utd shop everything is geared for general leisure ware for everyday use, i know theres a massive difference between speedway and football clubs financially but i would like to see more leisure ware type merchandise that i could wear socially not just at the track.

I am aware of one club that went down this road.

 

They lost a shed load.

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1 minute ago, arnieg said:

I am aware of one club that went down this road.

 

They lost a shed load.

I'm aware of a supermarket that went bust... doesn't mean the model is wrong

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1 hour ago, iainb said:

I'm aware of a supermarket that went bust... doesn't mean the model is wrong

But it will be for those clubs that don't have sufficient time, capital and expertise. Hence Neil Watson's comment and the large number of clubs that settle for the Barber's fairly safe and pedestrian offer.

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