Today's Announcement NOT About Stadium

[Ellerslie]

• You can be more cost competitive e.g. tickets at £20 on 45k will bring in more revenue than £40 at 18k. This will allow hopefully keep the prices within the loyal QPR fans price range and stop all the tickets being taken up tourist

Not sure this works as a business model unless they do no wish to recoup the cost of the stadium. Arsenal, for instance, have moved to a bigger, state-of-the-art ground and have increased ticket prices massively since moving.

£20 tickets would probably need to be subsidised from the sky money or other revenue stream, which could remove money from the transfer budget etc.

I can't see tickets being any more affordable than they are now if we move. You can't make tickets £20 if the break even point is £40.

[qpr]

Anfield is 45,000 & imo the best ground in England. Just a thought

[blueboy]

Not sure this works as a business model unless they do no wish to recoup the cost of the stadium. Arsenal, for instance, have moved to a bigger, state-of-the-art ground and have increased ticket prices massively since moving.

£20 tickets would probably need to be subsidised from the sky money or other revenue stream, which could remove money from the transfer budget etc.

I can't see tickets being any more affordable than they are now if we move. You can't make tickets £20 if the break even point is £40.

tickets at Arsenal are that cost coz of demand..they have 40k on a waiting list

[Ellerslie]

tickets at Arsenal are that cost coz of demand..they have 40k on a waiting list

That's true but they still used the price hike to repay the cost of the stadium. There seems to be a bit of hope that Fernandes, Mittal and the other investors will build this stadium for free. I don't think they will, I'm sure they will make the tickets as affordable as possible but they will need to recoup their investment within a reasonable time frame.

[blueboy]

they hiked up the price coz they knew they would get away with it,they knew the fans would pay

[alanfullerqpr]

Today fan base a 45k site seems rather large but buy the time the new stadium is built which is probably 5 or 6 years down the line our fan base could be far bigger than 45k especially if we attract big name players.

[lymehoop]

We didn't quite sell out our 33,000 allocation for the Cardiff play-off final. We're going to have to find a lot of new fans by the time this stadium is opened or we'll be playing in a half filled ground.

Go to admire the man's ambition though. I'm sure it's possible to achieve Tony's goals, it will be a lot of hard work for a lot of people though.

I think we're all going to have to accept an influx of "jonny-come-lately" fans too.

I knew a couple of r's who were put off by the hooligan element at sheepsville, if it was wembley we woul have ha no trouble selling 33,000

[QPR Richard]

45.000 far too big for a little club like us 35.000 would just about right 45K too many empty seats

Well, as I've said elsewhere, Reuters quoted TF as saying we could have sold 20,000 season tickets. Add to that members and non-members, away supporters, and you're not far off 30-35,000. Bearing in mind that the new stadium wouldn't be ready for several years and we are in the process of a major marketing drive, it's not hard to see why the board have gone for a bigger stadium. Imagine if we build 35k and find demand has increased massively? Even if we expand the stadium it will involve a lot of money to call the builders in a second time. Stadium MK has been built and they just need to put the seats in when demand grows.

Just a thought, but many reports carried the story saying it would be a 35k stadium. From what I've read, only Reuters called it right at 45k.

[Bigears]

Not sure this works as a business model unless they do no wish to recoup the cost of the stadium. Arsenal, for instance, have moved to a bigger, state-of-the-art ground and have increased ticket prices massively since moving.

£20 tickets would probably need to be subsidised from the sky money or other revenue stream, which could remove money from the transfer budget etc.

I can't see tickets being any more affordable than they are now if we move. You can't make tickets £20 if the break even point is £40.

Good points Ellerslie, but #### have always been more interested in making as much money as possible out of there fans even if it means out pricing there old hard core support as they have no loyalty to these fans. However Amit has always maintained he will not try and out price these fans and even resigned due to this point with the last board, having this increased capacity will allow them to keep certain prices affordable to low income families.

I agree you cant offer the prices below the break even point but with a higher capacity this break even point is lower the more seats you sell. Also the more seats you sell and the more demand you can create the higher charges you can charge for other off the feild money making activites like Advertising, corperate hospitality, TV revenue, sponsorship as more and more people see ur brand.

I fully understad your points but imo TF is thinking how to grow his brand and he will be thinking from a different angle than just QPR, he will thinking outside the box as to how to make the most of the new stadium, not only to include new events but also improve other activites mentioned above.

[QPR Richard]

This is where I think our new stadium will fit, bearing in mind most of these figures are based on football:

02 - 20k
White City Stadium - 45k
Emirates - 60k
Wembley - 90k

Our new stadium fits nicely between the 02 and Emirates capacities. Now look at the competition. From Wembley Arena to Hammersmith Odeon, there's sod all. Twickenham possibly, but that's got horrendous transport links. Draw a line from Wembley to the 02 and look at the competition west of that line. How many multi-purpose venues can you think of?

I would guess Phil Beard is the big driving force behind this and knows the potential a 45k stadium has.

[stainrodisalegend]

Good points Ellerslie, but #### have always been more interested in making as much money as possible out of there fans even if it means out pricing there old hard core support as they have no loyalty to these fans. However Amit has always maintained he will not try and out price these fans and even resigned due to this point with the last board, having this increased capacity will allow them to keep certain prices affordable to low income families.

I agree you cant offer the prices below the break even point but with a higher capacity this break even point is lower the more seats you sell. Also the more seats you sell and the more demand you can create the higher charges you can charge for other off the feild money making activites like Advertising, corperate hospitality, TV revenue, sponsorship as more and more people see ur brand.

I fully understad your points but imo TF is thinking how to grow his brand and he will be thinking from a different angle than just QPR, he will thinking outside the box as to how to make the most of the new stadium, not only to include new events but also improve other activites mentioned above.

Mittels and Fernandez have come across as decent people so far but they aren't saints. They will want to maximize the revenue, simple. Give them the choice between some old time fan like Hammer who goes on about "giving people a good clump" and a nice middle class family who are new to football but who will spend money at the restaurant first and the cinema after, I know which they will go for.

Second, I'm afraid you make the common mistake of thinking that ticket prices will ever get near the break even point. You could charge a hundred quid a ticket and the club - in the short and medium term at least - will still be costing masses more to run that it is bringng in through gate receipts and even tv rights. We as fans, even when we ranted about Briatore and how we were being ripped off etc, only pay a tiny proportion of what it costs to keep our hobby afloat. Can you imagine Amit going along to Lakshi Mittel and saying "hi pops, we want to spend £180m of the fortune you ground out in India on a stadium but keep prices really, really low to keep 15,000 fans happy." Its not reality. Am sure the board will be quite ruthless in exploiting whatever revenue streams they can, including from us, and I for one cant blame them.

[Del]

This is where I think our new stadium will fit, bearing in mind most of these figures are based on football:

02 - 20k
White City Stadium - 45k
Emirates - 60k
Wembley - 90k

Our new stadium fits nicely between the 02 and Emirates capacities. Now look at the competition. From Wembley Arena to Hammersmith Odeon, there's sod all. Twickenham possibly, but that's got horrendous transport links. Draw a line from Wembley to the 02 and look at the competition west of that line. How many multi-purpose venues can you think of?

I would guess Phil Beard is the big driving force behind this and knows the potential a 45k stadium has.

Add to that the fact it will apparently have a roof, and it will be the largest Arena in London for events, which would to many make it more preferable than the emirates, even though it will hold less people.

[blueboy]

there is deffo room for an indoor stadium of this size..what with Earls Court going.Wembley arena is only 10k cap...Olympia is even smaller.Perhaps we could take back some of the events/shows that have gone up to the NEC in B'hm...like .Trade fairs,Motor show..etc etc...as well as pop concerts.The 02 is on the other side of London and half the size..i think if we dont build this,somebody else will

[Bigears]

Mittels and Fernandez have come across as decent people so far but they aren't saints. They will want to maximize the revenue, simple. Give them the choice between some old time fan like Hammer who goes on about "giving people a good clump" and a nice middle class family who are new to football but who will spend money at the restaurant first and the cinema after, I know which they will go for.

Second, I'm afraid you make the common mistake of thinking that ticket prices will ever get near the break even point. You could charge a hundred quid a ticket and the club - in the short and medium term at least - will still be costing masses more to run that it is bringng in through gate receipts and even tv rights. We as fans, even when we ranted about Briatore and how we were being ripped off etc, only pay a tiny proportion of what it costs to keep our hobby afloat. Can you imagine Amit going along to Lakshi Mittel and saying "hi pops, we want to spend £180m of the fortune you ground out in India on a stadium but keep prices really, really low to keep 15,000 fans happy." Its not reality. Am sure the board will be quite ruthless in exploiting whatever revenue streams they can, including from us, and I for one cant blame them.

I know the break even point of tickets raises with the increase of the overall running of the club, the point I am trying to make here is that this break even point is less with a higher capacity of seating.
I also appreciate that TF is in this to make money as that is what he does, but what he has shown is he is willing to invest millions short term to make 10’s of millions in the longer term. Doing this means he will know that he will have to generate more customers coming through the doors, now I am not saying he will keep the prices low but having a higher capacity and lowering the prices is one way of doing it. Once you have created the situation of selling out at £x’s then increase prices as you would have created the demand.
Just a thought of one of many of potential longer term strategies he may have to justify building the 45k stadium instead of a £30k which people are saying.

Good debate very enjoyable as it good to see things from many point of views.

[SuperHoopNik]

Sky Sports have just tweeted:

Major news for QPR fans coming up in next hour. #SSN