2018 FA Cup - 1st Round - Sunderland at Vale Park

[smithie]

That was a great success as 1241 in total attended, less than 1000 home fans.

If we start putting up posters around the town we will just look more tinpot than we already are and I doubt it would make any difference to the gate.

There is plenty of opportunity to get tickets for those that can be bothered including on your phone. I suspect that not many casual observers will be going as they will watch it on the telly.

 

Potteries mentality. This is exactly why we'll be lucky to stagnate.

[Howjy04]

How hard would it have been to make a clear announcement, audible to everyone, that cup tie tickets were on sale? How much imagination did it need to put posters up about the Sunderland game?

 

The club will reap what they sow in terms of attendance for the Sunderland game. It's simply not good enough to assume people will come anyway. Our support is dropping off already and it's only October.

 

There's some serious wake ups needed.

Smithie,myself and 4 mates knew we could get tickets from 9am on Saturday morning.We strolled,from the RS,after the game,to the ticket office.There was a substantial queue buying Sunderland tickets.The exit from the paddock leads to an area where you could clearly see the shop was open.If people didn’t know tickets were available before and after the game they simply weren’t interested in getting a ticket.ST holders can get a ticket for their normal seat up to this weekend,then they go on general sale.

[smithie]

Go online then.....

 

Not everyone has or wants to use the Internet. Not everybody trusts paying for things online.

 

The closed-mind responses to any suggestion of trying to do things differently epitomise the mind set of so many fans it's scary.

[Howjy04]

Not everyone has or wants to use the Internet. Not everybody trusts paying for things online.

 

The closed-mind responses to any suggestion of trying to do things differently epitomise the mind set of so many fans it's scary.

 

You don’t need the internet Smithie.We had to go to the office because we couldn’t order our usual ST seats online.

[Regal Beagle]

Not everyone has or wants to use the Internet. Not everybody trusts paying for things online.

 

The closed-mind responses to any suggestion of trying to do things differently epitomise the mind set of so many fans it's scary.

 

You can't really blame people for close mindedness when it comes to trying different things and then say that we need to cater for people who don't trust the internet.

[Conrad]

Smithie,myself and 4 mates knew we could get tickets from 9am on Saturday morning.We strolled,from the RS,after the game,to the ticket office.There was a substantial queue buying Sunderland tickets.The exit from the paddock leads to an area where you could clearly see the shop was open.If people didn’t know tickets were available before and after the game they simply weren’t interested in getting a ticket.ST holders can get a ticket for their normal seat up to this weekend,then they go on general sale.

 

Sure we all know the ticket office is open from 9am every day bar Sunday, but the point I was making is, how would we be expected to know it was open after the Bury game if they don’t let folk know. It’s not usually open after games.

For folk like yourself who go past it on exiting the Railway then obviously they see its open, but for those in other parts of the ground, such as the Lorne Street wouldn’t walk round that way. Especially when there was no reason to know the ticket office would be open when usually it’s not.

[Frank Mustard]

That was a great success as 1241 in total attended, less than 1000 home fans.

If we start putting up posters around the town we will just look more tinpot than we already are and I doubt it would make any difference to the gate.

There is plenty of opportunity to get tickets for those that can be bothered including on your phone. I suspect that not many casual observers will be going as they will watch it on the telly.

 

What utter drivel. So advertising something makes you tinpot? I drove past a billboard which in effect is a large poster this morning advertising Emirates Airlines. You better let them know how tinpot they look and what a pointless exercise it is to put themselves out there to the general public.

 

One of reasons we are where we are is this negative mindset that fans will just turn up no matter what.

[smithie]

What utter drivel. So advertising something makes you tinpot? I drove past a billboard which in effect is a large poster this morning advertising Emirates Airlines. You better let them know how tinpot they look and what a pointless exercise it is to put themselves out there to the general public.

 

One of reasons we are where we are is this negative mindset that fans will just turn up no matter what.

 

Lots of clubs use billboards/posters etc....they too must be tinpot.

 

The negativity of some people is mind blowing.

[bycars rob]

Lots of clubs use billboards/posters etc....they too must be tinpot.

 

The negativity of some people is mind blowing.

 

You quoted the Morecambe example, i just pointed out that it wasn`t successful.

We get plenty of free advertising in the traditional local media and internet forums such as this site, why waste money on something that doesn`t work ?

[onestepatatime]

Sunderland have received allocation of 4195 tickets. They have sold out of their allocations for every away match this season.

[fraggle]

What a boring and nonsense thread this is becoming ....

[Jacko51]

What a boring and nonsense thread this is becoming ....

 

Agreed. Unless you live on Mars you will know Vale are playing the Mackems. Unless you have not been to Vale for ages, you will know you’ll need a ticket to get in. Phone, ticket office website - all available to buy a ticket. I suspect some folk want it personally delivered by the Chairman in his Tesla.

[pjg1876]

I suspect some folk want it personally delivered by the Chairman in his Tesla.

 

Delivery to residents of Nuneaton for bargain prices no doubt as he seems to spend plenty of his time there. Not that he has any say in the running of the club.

[smithie]

Agreed. Unless you live on Mars you will know Vale are playing the Mackems. Unless you have not been to Vale for ages, you will know you’ll need a ticket to get in. Phone, ticket office website - all available to buy a ticket. I suspect some folk want it personally delivered by the Chairman in his Tesla.

 

Let's see how many Vale fans turn out and we'll see how successful this stance has been.

[Hagrid]

Agreed. Unless you live on Mars you will know Vale are playing the Mackems. Unless you have not been to Vale for ages, you will know you’ll need a ticket to get in. Phone, ticket office website - all available to buy a ticket. I suspect some folk want it personally delivered by the Chairman in his Tesla.

 

You really overestimate the city's awareness of what happens at little, tinpot Port Vale. We're 14th in the most tinpot professional football league in the country, escaping non-league by a point last year and facing the likes of Stevenage and Newport. We're an irrelevance.

 

We simply don't exist on people's radars. None of my mates had a clue we had drawn Sunderland; the first round of the cup is a completely and utterly extraneous to them (as are we). Young people don't read the Sentinel, or listen to Radio Stoke. If they don't consume this media, how on earth are they supposed to know a 4th division club has drawn a 3rd division club (as big as they might be?).

 

Vale fans, or people with a passing interest with Vale, will know. But, as we are well aware, on a good day there's about 7500 of these.

 

In my view, with the excellent media team we have at Vale now, more creative methods have got to be employed to reach the people who simply don't think about Port Vale and have little access to news about them. Youtube, Twitter, Snapchat, Instagram. Student offers at Staffs and Keele. Going into every single school in the area with a player to get kids interested before their uncle takes them down the 365 megadome.

 

Wildes absolutely nailed it in 12/13. Pack the Park, ticket offers, blanket coverage, bringing the promotion team from the 90s back. Obviously he was helped by an imminent promotion.

 

The issue is, we have no one with the drive, creativity, and PR of Wildes at the club anymore.

 

There will be 5500/6000 Vale fans, and its another missed opportunity. We need to face facts; we're at the bottom of the hill, the lowest of the low. We've got a long way to climb. A bit of marketing isn't going to do us any harm.