Brilliant entertainment!

[Plymouth Gull]

Surely something like 'Kids come for free with paying adult' can be done for the Family stand? We need to keep getting youngsters coming through, supporting the club.

[Kernowgull]

I totally agree Nick, Kids need to be got young, and especially as we are so entertaining at present, its the perfect time. I think we should be handing out 200 free tickets a week to local schools, scout groups, footbalk teams, whoever, get them in for free, they may spend money on food and merchandise, and if 10 a season catch Yellow fever, thats extra fans in the future.

Im sure a bit of telemarketing to local schools could be done for free by the youth team, and would be good experience for their CVs should they not make it as a player. I also think putting on kids coaching sessions before games, a fiver gets coaching, entry and a can of coke could work.

The more full the ground, the better the atmosphere, and I dont see this would cost the club anything, even if it doesnt work. I dont think quid a kid works because a) people dont find out about it and b) disinterested parents still have to be motivated to go, and pay for themselves. Givibg schools tickets means the parents dont have to go, but then if the kids get hooked, they will drag their parents along, rather than vice versa

[yellowmonkey]

I have 3 sons who enjoy watching Torquay and all have old home shirts but i just cant afford to take them along as my income doesnt allow me to. By the time we all get in and they want a drink maybe food at half time thats just short of fifty quid. Two are now slowly going over to motor sport as they have built an electric car at school and a majority of the rallies they go to only cost me normally a couple of quid each.

[Dave]

Not sure there is a need to panic over our early season attendance figures, our current gates figures are suggesting our average for this season is going to be up on the last three seasons overall, the last three season averages were 2869,2630 and 2858.

We normaly see gates of around the 2200 mark early season, and Tuesday nights tend to be around the flat 2000 mark, so far this season with one Tuesday night game played already our average for the first two games is 2624, and should we match last seasons gate of 4157 for the Plymouth game that will give us an average of 3135 for the first three games, with Exeter and Rovers still to come and hopefully another seasons pushing at the right end of the league table I can't see any reason why the club can not achieve an average for this season of 3000 plus.

Think two factors have come into play, fans have seen two seasons of consistancey chasing promotion, and many myself included wondered whether Bristows Bench would have an effect, so far so good it appears that the bench is helping, few of my friends have gone in there and are thinking of switching from the popside (season ticket holders)

I have read a few replies on this thread about the club doing more work with local kids, they already are, this must be understood, Torquays in the community scheme is very sucsessful, running courses and school holiday clubs, they also often attend both primary and secondery schools right across the bay, Newton Abbot and across teignbridge, not sure how much more they can do there.

My suggestion would be a family ticket, data could be gathered from other clubs who run this scheme pretty sure Northampton do or use to, and would help the likes of Yellowmonkey and others in his situation, make it availble for both the Bench and family stand.

[DevonYellow]

Parry, yes, t'would be delightful, in exactly the same way that it would be delightful if we had a 25,000 all seater stadium which was sold out every week. Unfortunately, down here in God's waiting room, we have a populous with neither the resources nor the inclination to attend. Yeah, cheap deal, brilliant, but if people haven't got £60 for football, they haven't got £48 (a 20% discount, representing the absolute limit that anyone could possibly ask the club to swallow). It's not like we can make it a fiver for a family of four to get in, because we'd go broke inside a week.That said, apathy is what really costs us, not the money. Friday, I paid more to get into Plymouth Aquarium than I did to watch yesterday's match (as a concession season ticket holder, I think I pay something in the order of £9/match). The place was packed, largely with disinterested parents lugging their disinterested kids around somewhere "fun". It's not a lack of money. You pay more to get into the zoo or the aquarium or for a coffee and a muffin at Starbucks than you do to watch Torquay. People don't turn up because they don't care. I've got a mate, from down here, of course, who is an Arsenal "fan", watches all the games on the interweb, refuses to watch Man Utd or Tottenham on MOTD, throws his toys out of the pram if they lose, all the usual armchair fan bollocks. Will he come to Plainmoor? Will he heck as like (one for you there, Andy), because he just doesn't care. He thinks it'll be 22 amateurs hacking aimless balls around a muddy field with jumpers for goalposts. I try to tell him, but he is one of the millions brainwashed (if that isn't a bit "tin foil hat") by the Premier League's relentless campaign to get everyone to believe that only it can provide anything like quality football and that everything else is a waste of time.

I stand with the same little gang of people that I've been standing with for 8 years now (some come and go, mainly to the bathroom in Troj's case). As you would expect with Torquay, one of our number is a hotelier (there are, in fact, a number of hoteliers, but this one is relevant to the story). He often brings along guests from his hotel to matches and they love it, we've even had foreigners standing with us. One chap he brings along is a fella called Chris. Chris is indecently well off, through a combination of exceptionally hard work and a winning smile. He is now a fan to the point where, despite being all over the world on business for the majority of the season (he missed the Rochdale game for the sake of having been called to Japan on very short notice), he is a ST holder. He buys 50:50 tickets in batches of 10, drinks like a pro in the Gull's Nest and recently sponsored the Leeds PSF. All this income from just one 'off the cuff' (pressganging) visit. Sadly, it is nigh on impossible to get new fans through the door in this manner, since the overwhelming majority haven't two dimes to rub together, nor the inclination to try something new and unfamiliar.

Dutch, similar applies. You and I know that proper football is what we go to watch every week. Sadly, trying to convince the Premier League generation that this is the case is akin to persuading the same people that Fosters lager is not a proper drink, they simply won't have it.

Matt.

The comparison with the aquarium isn't fair though as once you've paid to get in you can go for free as many times as you like in the next 12 months, making their "season ticket" cheaper than ours - it may have been full but how many of them paid to get in on that day?

You're right about the apathy though and thats why its so hard to get new punters in. Couple that with the fact that £20 to sit in the bench IS a lot of money when the average wage here is so low and i reckon messrs Sugar and Branson would struggle to boost attendances.

The club need to keep trying to think up new promos and marketing, and we need to keep trying to convince our premiership-football-brain-washed friends to give plainmoor a try. As Mike Bateson used to say "bring-along-a-friend"!