Were are the Brum Fans

[GiveusaB 1,145]

The only way we/bham could improve on crowd numbers is: if we had a radical change of team name and became a collaborated/amalgamation of B'ham/Coventry/Cradley... (possibly Wolverhampton next season...)

I can't see why that wouldn't work.... after all, what's in a name?

Edited May 5, 2023 by GiveusaB

[Fromafar 10,363]

The racing was decent all be it the track was slick.

[mikebv 10,278]

On 5/5/2023 at 9:42 AM, StevePark said:

It wouldn't be a new approach (maybe it would but only in Birmingham's case) as Berwick tried it for a few weeks when John Anderson was promoter.  He told me that he would charge £10 a meeting "if he could" but it made very little difference to the amount of people attending and therefore lost a bucket load of ££. It might work for Birmingham as it has a larger catchment area, but the simple fact is, if you are not a speedway fan you probably won't be interested, even at a tenner and even more so if the team is a poor one.

The issue always appeaed to me that when tracks did "£10 Speedway" it was very much part of a marketing plan akin "Build it and they will come"..

And was a one off, maybe tops two, meeting venture.. 

The trick that I never saw happen was to use the night as a launch pad for further targeted offers down the line...

Names, mobile numbers, email and home addresses, birthday dates of the adults and more importantly maybe the kids, etc could all have been gleaned on the nights that the "special" was done..

And with that info you then target market ongoing..

Expecting someone to pay a tenner, or even nothing at all, for anything, and then expect instant constant repeat purchasers at circa twenty quid is utter folly..

Get someone attending four or five times over say a couple of months and you have more chance of hooking them long term..

A £10 Speedway night" should be planned both on and off the track and see clubs armed at the end of it with an incredible amount of information from which to build their business.. 

And see the fans there that night leave armed with tangibles such car stickers, pens, and other "cheap as chips" memorabilia that gets your reach out there on a base level, and also armed with contact info for those at the club, and links to club websites, fans groups etc... 

(But maybe not a link to us on here)..

[iainb 5,017]

3 hours ago, mikebv said:

The issue always appeaed to me that when tracks did "£10 Speedway" it was very much part of a marketing plan akin "Build it and they will come"..

And was a one off, maybe tops two, meeting venture.. 

The trick that I never saw happen was to use the night as a launch pad for further targeted offers down the line...

Names, mobile numbers, email and home addresses, birthday dates of the adults and more importantly maybe the kids, etc could all have been gleaned on the nights that the "special" was done..

And with that info you then target market ongoing..

Expecting someone to pay a tenner, or even nothing at all, for anything, and then expect instant constant repeat purchasers at circa twenty quid is utter folly..

Get someone attending four or five times over say a couple of months and you have more chance of hooking them long term..

A £10 Speedway night" should be planned both on and off the track and see clubs armed at the end of it with an incredible amount of information from which to build their business.. 

And see the fans there that night leave armed with tangibles such car stickers, pens, and other "cheap as chips" memorabilia that gets your reach out there on a base level, and also armed with contact info for those at the club, and links to club websites, fans groups etc... 

(But maybe not a link to us on here)..

Exactly how I started going to Speedway, the freebie 2nd half and it wasn't 1 second half and I was in, like you said it was 4 or 5 and then the odd paid full match and then got hooked from there

Edited May 6, 2023 by iainb

[Nickinho 429]

On 5/4/2023 at 8:12 AM, stevehone said:

Nothing to do with BSN Cup or KOC, it’s just too expensive for people

And the football isn't?

[lisa-colette 6,032]

12 minutes ago, Nickinho said:

And the football isn't?

It is all about VFM. People don't mind paying more (as long as finances allow) as long as they think they are getting their money's worth. 

[Fozzie4388 679]

48 minutes ago, Nickinho said:

And the football isn't?

I worked it out recently it costs me £30 a month to go watch my local football team in the championship whether it's 1, 2, 3 or 4 home games in that month 

Where as if I want to Cross the Humber to go to Scunthorpe speedway for 1 meeting it costs me over £30 with £20 enterance, £1 programme, £3 bridge toll then 70+ miles worth of petrol

So football isn't always as expensive as speedway. 

Edited May 8, 2023 by Fozzie4388

[steve roberts 9,246]

2 hours ago, Fozzie4388 said:

I worked it out recently it costs me £30 a month to go watch my local football team in the championship whether it's 1, 2, 3 or 4 home games in that month 

Where as if I want to Cross the Humber to go to Scunthorpe speedway for 1 meeting it costs me over £30 with £20 enterance, £1 programme, £3 bridge toll then 70+ miles worth of petrol

So football isn't always as expensive as speedway. 

...the price of fuel is what largely dictates my not travelling and to be fair I did limit my trips to other tracks during my last years attending speedway keeping very much to my local track at Cowley where I lived within walking distance.

[Deano 1,318]

On 5/4/2023 at 9:18 AM, DiveBomb said:

Don't think the price is that bad. I just think it's a number of things that aren't helping the situation

1. The team isn't great this year

2. The location puts people off 

3. Birmingham speedway has been slowly declining for a while now

4. The cost of living 

5. Away fans don't want to travel there as much due to location and cost of living

6. Poor advertising around the area

7. The younger generation aren't interested or have never even heard of speedway 

8. Lack of local derbies

9. The viewing experience is only good in a few areas of the stadium.

 

 

No9 has been a problem since 2007. Speedway fans are a fickle bunch on so many levels. Tell them to stand in a place they don’t like standing to get a view doesn’t help. Then the stadium owners build a bus shelter blocking one of the few viewing positions. The opening years people would stand 10 rows thick in front the starting gate unable to see through the tall geezers at the front as the ground is flat. The stadium just isn’t designed for speedway and it erodes away the enjoyment of those first experiences for new fans. I’ve introduced four regulars 14 year olds they do love it. They go to Arthur Terry Four Oaks Sutton Coldfield. There are glimmers of hope. Get some bikes in the school, they must talk about it. 

[Deano 1,318]

Additionally there’s an engineering college (Make U.K.), just across the road up Holford Drive. The place is full of well paid young apprentices from big local companies (Jag, Land Rover, Sertec), check out their website. BMW and West Midlands trains apprentices are based at James Watt campus Great Barr again well paid. Worth investigating surely as these kids have no commitments like adults with families.

Edited May 13, 2023 by Deano

[Petecc 352]

On 5/4/2023 at 9:18 AM, DiveBomb said:

Don't think the price is that bad. I just think it's a number of things that aren't helping the situation

1. The team isn't great this year

2. The location puts people off 

3. Birmingham speedway has been slowly declining for a while now

4. The cost of living 

5. Away fans don't want to travel there as much due to location and cost of living

6. Poor advertising around the area

7. The younger generation aren't interested or have never even heard of speedway 

8. Lack of local derbies

9. The viewing experience is only good in a few areas of the stadium.

 

 

Firstly these are your opinions and I'm not going give you grief for that.

1 2 3 your opinion 

4 that is affecting all clubs

5 your opinion 

6 I have never seen so much advertising before In one season. Backs of local buses,free local newspapers,  Internet, shopping centre displays. The list goes on.

7 always a hard sell for all clubs

8 I agree

9 I also agree

10. And that's my opinion 

Edited May 13, 2023 by Petecc
Spelling

[FishersGate 522]

17 minutes ago, Petecc said:

Firstly these are your opinions and I'm not going give you grief for that.

1 2 3 your opinion 

4 that is affecting all clubs

5 your opinion 

6 I have never seen so much advertising before In one season. Backs of local buses,free local newspapers,  Internet, shopping centre displays. The list goes on.

7 always a hard sell for all clubs

8 I agree

9 I also agree

10. And that's my opinion 

Opinions are like a#se holes everyone's got one ! Theres always more advertising a club can do. I don't see it being no where as hot as other sports advertising. Shopping centres and buses is all good but it's social media that's the key now. And most clubs are crap at it. This is coming from a younger fan.

[uk_martin 1,606]

11 hours ago, Deano said:

Additionally there’s an engineering college (Make U.K.), just across the road up Holford Drive. The place is full of well paid young apprentices from big local companies (Jag, Land Rover, Sertec), check out their website. BMW and West Midlands trains apprentices are based at James Watt campus Great Barr again well paid. Worth investigating surely as these kids have no commitments like adults with families.

I wish you more luck in presenting the case to the management than I had. Going back to the early days, all I got was a "meh" reaction when I pointed out the existence of the Motorsports Engineering Faculty at Birmingham City University that's only 2 miles away. But hey, who needs them? What do these professors and students know? They could have had some work experience at the Brummies and then buggered off to McLaren F1 and all the effort would have been in vain. OR they could have looked at how speedway engines were designed and tuned, and maybe found cost savings in how things were done...but that would have been a threat to the established way of doing things, and you can't have that, can you?

[mikebv 10,278]

7 hours ago, uk_martin said:

I wish you more luck in presenting the case to the management than I had. Going back to the early days, all I got was a "meh" reaction when I pointed out the existence of the Motorsports Engineering Faculty at Birmingham City University that's only 2 miles away. But hey, who needs them? What do these professors and students know? They could have had some work experience at the Brummies and then buggered off to McLaren F1 and all the effort would have been in vain. OR they could have looked at how speedway engines were designed and tuned, and maybe found cost savings in how things were done...but that would have been a threat to the established way of doing things, and you can't have that, can you?

Having stepped into the "speedway bubble" once, it was truly staggering the amount of delusion they had about what they offered, and even more staggering was how these people were "successful businessmen" outside the sport, if they ran their own businesses in the same "head in the sand" way...

The sport is still ran by so many middle aged men in an "analogue way", which was no doubt fine when some of the ludicrous decisions made didnt hit the public domain instantly...

Like it does today..

Same old. Same old. Doesnt cut it nowadays, and if you dont have a growth mindset, seeking constant evolution through innovation, trying new ideas, and driving improvements, then you simply have no chance.

 

[Deano 1,318]

10 hours ago, uk_martin said:

I wish you more luck in presenting the case to the management than I had. Going back to the early days, all I got was a "meh" reaction when I pointed out the existence of the Motorsports Engineering Faculty at Birmingham City University that's only 2 miles away. But hey, who needs them? What do these professors and students know? They could have had some work experience at the Brummies and then buggered off to McLaren F1 and all the effort would have been in vain. OR they could have looked at how speedway engines were designed and tuned, and maybe found cost savings in how things were done...but that would have been a threat to the established way of doing things, and you can't have that, can you?

There will always be rich people with more money than sense. You only have to see the queues of people wanting to buy the next failing football club.

Those young kids at Birmingham Uni could have been the next generation throwing their money into speedway.