Plans for the future

Quoted from Norseman

Not sure we averaged more than 7 or 8000 when we were in the equivalent of the championship .So cannot see gates doubling to 12000 .

Different times their seems to be a appetite for football generally nowadays

Quoted from dapperz fun pub

Different times their seems to be a appetite for football generally nowadays

Football is cool these days, plenty of folk getting involved that aren’t necessarily football nerds like a lot of us, add them Covid issue and I do think you’d see an up turn in attendances as we progressed through the leagues, or any team for that matter.

That said, town fans do sometimes have rose tinted specs when it comes to crowds…there’s no doubt that in the last ten years (of which only two season were truly any good) our away followings have increased but many of those seasons in the championship, we didn’t take masses to games. I’ve been to the likes of Birmingham and Wolves with town and we managed only 4/500…

I'm not sure why we would assume that doubling attendance figures isn't possible. I am sure Lincoln did something similar. And like any product or service, interest and and buy-in can happen at any point in time for a varied set of reasons. Ideas can and go from being totally unknown to globally known (Malcom Gladwell's Tipping Point has some great examples), from being a local relative success to a much bigger hitter in the commercial sense. in 2018 there were 159000 people in the NE Lincs area, basically Grimsby and Cleethorpes. If right now we are getting just shy of 6000 average attendance, that's 3.7% of the areas total population. To increase that to 11000 would mean attracting 6.9% of the total. Manchester has 553000 and Utd attract 57% on average, more than 10% and that is in competition with City and the other smaller clubs. So, numbers wise, I don't see why it isn't doable. Plus I also think that assuming we can't sounds like a self-fulfilling prophecy. One constant in the world is change. and we have seen living proof of that in the last 6 months, long may it continue.

Not sure using a club like Man Utd or Liverpool helps the argument given thousands of their regular fans aren’t local to the area…

It’s obviously doable but the obsession with getting large crowds is a bit weird. I don’t really care if there’s three or three thousand, so long as the team are committed and the club has a plan…a plan is a start after the last 17 years of shite…

We’ve probably got about 12,000 people worldwide who would go to BP every home if they could. The problem being that they’re worldwide and the ones who do live in this country perhaps wouldn’t travel up, down across every other week. I might be look at it a bit pessimistically but I think 12,000 seater is about right for a new/redeveloped ground.

Quoted from LH

We’ve probably got about 12,000 people worldwide who would go to BP every home if they could. The problem being that they’re worldwide and the ones who do live in this country perhaps wouldn’t travel up, down across every other week. I might be look at it a bit pessimistically but I think 12,000 seater is about right for a new/redeveloped ground.

Yeah anything larger than 12000 ish would be wasteful and spoil the experience of going to most games. Notts have a 20000 seat stadium that's a mostly empty echo chamber most games, some of their fans complain about it spoiling the atmosphere, and they are a better supported club than us generally (at home anyway).

We need a modern 7 days a week earning stadium, with good match day facilities and good match day experience potential including food/refreshments and crowd acoustics. That stadium needs to be large enough for usbto Realistically grow, whilst not being too large to spoil the atmosphere or be so expensive that we can't afford a decent team to play in it. Adding thousands of empty seats will mean more money has to be spent unnecessarily on repayments that impact on the playing budget.

To early to be building a new ground based on our attendances at the minute. Things can change in a heartbeat…..let’s get some stability behind us and a promotion or two then assess. If Hursty is plucked away from us and the next manager isn’t up to it then things can go downhill very quickly….. UTM!!

We have to look forward with realistic ambition. It’s a tricky one as it needs to cater for the income of the good times and capitalise on large away followings Should we rightfully be looking at progressing past league two . It’s pointless looking at crowds the last time we were in the Championship as it was a low period of support for all clubs . I remember at the time Hull City being in League two and struggling to average much more than 2000 home fans.

Despite things going really well this season to date and the breath of fresh air the 1878 leadership has brought with them when you look at the cost involved bloody hell it feels like a long way off but from what I’ve seen of Jason & Andrew they have the know how but will need other partners to make it a reality.

Quoted from LH

We’ve probably got about 12,000 people worldwide who would go to BP every home if they could. The problem being that they’re worldwide and the ones who do live in this country perhaps wouldn’t travel up, down across every other week. I might be look at it a bit pessimistically but I think 12,000 seater is about right for a new/redeveloped ground.

I agreed with you until I saw 2 sets of similar figures for average attendances, :-

Our own fishy site   https://thefishy.co.uk/story.php?id=8382729

and for a better breakdown with season finishes, etc    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Grimsby_Town_F.C._seasons

When you look at the seasonal average for the last 20 years the best gate was about 6,500 per year, and 6,000+ per season happened twice. This season, and we're full of enthusiasm, is about 6,000 (https://www.footballwebpages.co.uk/grimsby-town/attendances). In the last 50 years, we have only averaged 10,000+ in 4 seasons.

The reality of our location is that we have the North Sea on one side and 20/30 miles of fields on the other, neither of which bring in any supporters. Yes, I know some travel miles to our home games, as I did on many occasions when under 15,000 was a poor gate!

The realism of today will show that 7,000 will be a good gate, team winning, fine weather, and challenging for promotion. Even being as optimistic and enthusiastic as I am a 10,000 stadium would be more than adequate for our needs, based on current and past attendances. In 2019/20 season only 7 clubs in leagues 1 & 2 had attendances over 10,000 ( excluding Bradford ) so 10,000 max , or slightly less, would even do.

BP has served the club more than well over the decades and needs severe updating or we need a new stadium. The problem is, not so much where, but how to finance it on gates averaging 6,000 or less. A 3,000 gate will produce a team budget of about £1 million so it doesn't leave much to run the club and provide funds to pay for a new stadium, assuming we actually average 6,000.

£20 million has often been referred to as the magic number for a new stadium and, I seem to recall about half would come grants etc leaving the club to find £10 million in terms of hard cash. Think of Darlington, enough said. Redevelop BP, the club owns the land, so that is one less cost. Move the changing rooms to the Youngs Stand, as was the original idea, and replace the main stand, followed by the Osmond, and fill in the corners. It doesn't have to be done in one go and can be financed piecemeal as needed. Staying at BP would also mean there is no need for a car park as on-street has been a means for decades, and is only for 23/30 days a year.

When you consider all of this you can see why a new stadium is not a main priority for 1878. We will just have to be patient and see what they come up with. What we do know is that from their actions so far, we will not be told of pipe dreams or building a future on sand. The future home base of Town will be based on a secure affordable foundation.


UTM