Ideas to boost crowds

[JJ]

Provide the opportunity to participate in one of Albert's polls

 

[Vee]

I live in Melbourne and support both the Storm in the NRL plus the Richmond Tigers in the AFL. Because so many of my friends and relatives barrack for different teams I actually have an 'AFL Membership' instead of a club membership.

The AFL Membership for $600 a year provides access to:

• 40 Games a year at the MCG or Etihad Stadium (the two grounds in Melbourne) out of a possible 91 this season subject to capacity.
• Access to an Exclusive 'AFL Members Reserve' at both grounds. At the MCG this is a section of 10 bays across each level with premium viewing quality (from the centre to the 50m mark on the wing) that I can either pay a small upgrade fee ($7) to get a reserved seat in or just walk up and swipe my card and sit anywhere in that section that is GA for that game (which varies depending on crowd expectation).
• Priority access to finals tickets

It makes it really use for me as a sporting fan to be able to watch as many games as possible of a game that I really enjoy. Only last weekend for example I was going to the Storm V Rabbitoh's game at AAMI Park, but because I decided to leave home early before the Storm game I was able to head into the 'G and watch the 2nd half of the Collingwood/Melbourne AFL game.

Being making it easier to combine multiple sporting events into an afternoon/evening is one thing I would do to boost NRL crowds, particularly that of the Storm here in Melbourne. I would make the 5:30pm Saturday afternoon game the Storm trademark for home games, trying to match them up with big MCG AFL games (1:45pm or 2:10pm start games are finished by 5pm, where as the NRL is normally finished either by or just after the 7:25pm Saturday night start times).



The problem could be easily solved by placing the 'subject to capacity' clause and the ability to reserve a seat with your membership in the same way that the AFL membership currently does it. As an AFL member I get a weekly e-mail on the Thursday letting me know how much GA capacity is available in the AFL 'members reserve' each week to guide me into deciding whether I should upgrade my ticket or not go to the game due to capacity issues.



Once again looking at the AFL model (it's the easiest comparison), AFL members each have a 'club support' element to their membership, where a portion of the membership price is paid by the AFL to the club ( I believe it's around 30% of the cost, so approx. $200). Thus the clubs are still reimbursed in a similar way. There is also an agreement in place where they get a portion of the money from the upgrade fees & guest passes that members buy through out the season.

I think it's something the NRL should definitely consider for the Sydney Stadium's, so instead of having to appeal to such a wide range of supporters they can focus on a smaller group of members who are passionate enough to go to multiple games if the quality of seating/pricing is suitable.

That's the sort of thing I was wondering about.

Sounds pretty good to me.

Problems?

 

[Vee]

I went to Melbourne v Sharks at AAMI Park last year. Their game day experience was phenomenal. Even the most diehard AFL fan couldn't help but get excited after the pre-game spectacle - and it wasn't anything complicated either. Just very well-organised.

The other teams could take a hint from the Storm. Also the past few Origins in NSW have been pretty good at pumping up the crowd. They have a big budget of course but it's not like they're doing anything crazy.

I've been to the Broncos games they have hosted after Melbourne Origin games and I very much agree with this. I've always loved the big banners the fumblers run through and their crowd engagement. I wonder where this came from and why RL never developed a similar culture.

The Storm do a great job pre-game.

 

[OzDragon]

There's a Simpsons reference for everything

 

[El Diablo]

join an internet forum and spend all your time on it whining about crowd sizes while never attending a game

 

[El Diablo]

Ticket prices .. food .. parking .. all bullshit

Give us atmosphere .. I want it to feel like it did when I was a kid when I walked into an opening day sold out parra stad with 26k sold out .. and went wow

Make people say wow ..

That's what drives crowds .

you've never ever been to a game

 

[Cumberland Throw]

I live in Melbourne and support both the Storm in the NRL plus the Richmond Tigers in the AFL. Because so many of my friends and relatives barrack for different teams I actually have an 'AFL Membership' instead of a club membership.

The AFL Membership for $600 a year provides access to:

• 40 Games a year at the MCG or Etihad Stadium (the two grounds in Melbourne) out of a possible 91 this season subject to capacity.
• Access to an Exclusive 'AFL Members Reserve' at both grounds. At the MCG this is a section of 10 bays across each level with premium viewing quality (from the centre to the 50m mark on the wing) that I can either pay a small upgrade fee ($7) to get a reserved seat in or just walk up and swipe my card and sit anywhere in that section that is GA for that game (which varies depending on crowd expectation).
• Priority access to finals tickets

It makes it really use for me as a sporting fan to be able to watch as many games as possible of a game that I really enjoy. Only last weekend for example I was going to the Storm V Rabbitoh's game at AAMI Park, but because I decided to leave home early before the Storm game I was able to head into the 'G and watch the 2nd half of the Collingwood/Melbourne AFL game.

Being making it easier to combine multiple sporting events into an afternoon/evening is one thing I would do to boost NRL crowds, particularly that of the Storm here in Melbourne. I would make the 5:30pm Saturday afternoon game the Storm trademark for home games, trying to match them up with big MCG AFL games (1:45pm or 2:10pm start games are finished by 5pm, where as the NRL is normally finished either by or just after the 7:25pm Saturday night start times).



The problem could be easily solved by placing the 'subject to capacity' clause and the ability to reserve a seat with your membership in the same way that the AFL membership currently does it. As an AFL member I get a weekly e-mail on the Thursday letting me know how much GA capacity is available in the AFL 'members reserve' each week to guide me into deciding whether I should upgrade my ticket or not go to the game due to capacity issues.



Once again looking at the AFL model (it's the easiest comparison), AFL members each have a 'club support' element to their membership, where a portion of the membership price is paid by the AFL to the club ( I believe it's around 30% of the cost, so approx. $200). Thus the clubs are still reimbursed in a similar way. There is also an agreement in place where they get a portion of the money from the upgrade fees & guest passes that members buy through out the season.

I think it's something the NRL should definitely consider for the Sydney Stadium's, so instead of having to appeal to such a wide range of supporters they can focus on a smaller group of members who are passionate enough to go to multiple games if the quality of seating/pricing is suitable.

Often wondered why the NRL marketing department doesn't just sign up to be members of a few big victorian clubs, etc..just to learn how they communicate and logistically mobilise 60k+ to games every week.. there must be an art to it that the NRL doesnt understand..

The whole of game membership thing would be a great start..

Obviously clubs would blow up and say "i will lose 5,000 members" to NRL house memberships, and vote it down..

And self interest will once again since 1908 reign supreme..

 

[Bgoodorgoodatit]

Where to start...

Scheduling is the #1 be all and end all. People want Sunday games. Let's start there. f**k off the 6pm Friday game and put 3 games on Sunday - either 2, 4, 6pm or 12, 2, 4pm.

If we're serious we piss off Thursday games too and put 2 on at 7.30 Friday, 1 in Sydney and 1 in either Brisbane or Melbourne.

Which brings me to the next point on scheduling.. starting times. Night games should start no later than 7.30pm. No one wants to be hitting full time after 10.

And another - public holidays. Instead of everyone writing off Roosters crowd average because of the Anzac Day boost, they should be copying it. Every public holiday that falls within the season should have 1 or 2 big stadium games. Every club should have at least 1 big holiday home game. Make traditions of them. If you think "Why do Roosters and Bulldogs get the big holiday games" you're right. 1 big crowd can boost a clubs average by thousands.

Still on scheduling - prioritise rivalry games! Big draw games should be played twice a year every year. For Sydney clubs, low draw interstate games should be the ones they sell off to QLD, Perth, NZ, Darwin.
Faux-conferences to generate the draw make this easy.


Next up, Prices. I don't think they're that bad, there are good offers around especially for family passes, but if enough people say they can't afford it (especially after parking/transport, food, drinks) then I'm not gonna argue. A recent article said they are too expensive for a lot of families but not expensive enough to actually generate any serious revenue for clubs, especially compared to the mammoth TV money.
Slash the prices of tickets and in-stadium purchases.
Sell the premium seats to season ticket members as is, but aside from those designate every other seat in the ground GA. Remove tiered ticketing entirely (except for season tickets). Premium tiered seating is a joke when you aren't selling out the ground. GA memberships $100 Adult $50 child. $15 Adult GA . $40 Family GA.


The Rules. This is likely a minor issue if everything else is smooth sailing, but they've made it an issue. Spending big on refereeing revolutions that result in no improvement, ill-advised tinkering with rules, and banning exciting parts of the game. They create ill feeling around the game and give free ammo to critics. There will always be sooking about refereeing, but the problem now is the rulebook and the referees coaching and systems making a difficult job close to impossible.


And finally Create some positive feeling in the game. In Rugby League it constantly feels like "the game is dying" is drowning out anything good, EVEN AMONG OUR OWN FANS. It makes people less enthused to spend their money on it.
The NRL needs some serious pushback on this. Make fans want to be part of something big. Regular, exciting events. Expansion and internationals. For every insular sook calling them mickey mouse games and whinging about injuries, there are far more who have a great time and will come back again. Think of the Pacific tests earlier this year!
Build the Pacific Cup into a tournament that runs parallel to Origin (and give them both breathing room from the regular season).
Invest in the Kangaroos and the Kiwis. Get them playing more games every year home and away. Support the World Cup.
And expand the bloody competition. A game that is dying looks inwards, a game that is thriving looks outwards.

PS one more
Game day experience
It's probably the least important for some people here, and the old merkins will say "who cares we're there to watch football not sing and listen to music" BUT it ties into the above positive feeling and being part of big events.
I'm not sure the answer is to copy American sports outright or anything like that, but it would be good to see some effort. Most clubs pre-game and half time is dead air. A long, pointless wait after the reserve grade game which makes the idea of showing up to actually watch it completely unappealing.
There are some great ideas floating around the sporting world, even within Rugby League.
Even something as simple as the viking clap has improved Raiders fans enthusiasm for attending games and given them a unique selling point.
Toronto Wolfpack have a craft beer bar at the game. (at Roosters we drink overpriced VB)
Newtown Jets recently tied in a game to a food and beer festival, while American football does tailgate parties pre game - Imagine something like this in that big usually empty Roosters carpark, probably illegal in this stupid arse backwards city anyway but the idea can be adapted.
American sports fill dead airtime with music and performance - maybe it's not for us but again ideas can be adapted.
English fans create their own atmosphere with constant chants and songs.
Just make an effort - the NRL gameday experience around the game (which is usually great) is f**king dire.

Great Post Adam. Biggest one for me is your point re scheduling... This shit isn't rocket science. hopefully with control of the draw back we can start to stem the flow.. Just off the top of my head we had both our Souths games and one dogs game on a Thursday night this year. id estimate that conservatively over those three games alone both clubs have have lost 50,000 bums on seats.. and That's just three games for one team and entirely the fault of the shitty schedule...

 

[OldPanther]

I live in Melbourne and support both the Storm in the NRL plus the Richmond Tigers in the AFL. Because so many of my friends and relatives barrack for different teams I actually have an 'AFL Membership' instead of a club membership.

The AFL Membership for $600 a year provides access to:

• 40 Games a year at the MCG or Etihad Stadium (the two grounds in Melbourne) out of a possible 91 this season subject to capacity.
• Access to an Exclusive 'AFL Members Reserve' at both grounds. At the MCG this is a section of 10 bays across each level with premium viewing quality (from the centre to the 50m mark on the wing) that I can either pay a small upgrade fee ($7) to get a reserved seat in or just walk up and swipe my card and sit anywhere in that section that is GA for that game (which varies depending on crowd expectation).
• Priority access to finals tickets

It makes it really use for me as a sporting fan to be able to watch as many games as possible of a game that I really enjoy. Only last weekend for example I was going to the Storm V Rabbitoh's game at AAMI Park, but because I decided to leave home early before the Storm game I was able to head into the 'G and watch the 2nd half of the Collingwood/Melbourne AFL game.

Being making it easier to combine multiple sporting events into an afternoon/evening is one thing I would do to boost NRL crowds, particularly that of the Storm here in Melbourne. I would make the 5:30pm Saturday afternoon game the Storm trademark for home games, trying to match them up with big MCG AFL games (1:45pm or 2:10pm start games are finished by 5pm, where as the NRL is normally finished either by or just after the 7:25pm Saturday night start times).



The problem could be easily solved by placing the 'subject to capacity' clause and the ability to reserve a seat with your membership in the same way that the AFL membership currently does it. As an AFL member I get a weekly e-mail on the Thursday letting me know how much GA capacity is available in the AFL 'members reserve' each week to guide me into deciding whether I should upgrade my ticket or not go to the game due to capacity issues.



Once again looking at the AFL model (it's the easiest comparison), AFL members each have a 'club support' element to their membership, where a portion of the membership price is paid by the AFL to the club ( I believe it's around 30% of the cost, so approx. $200). Thus the clubs are still reimbursed in a similar way. There is also an agreement in place where they get a portion of the money from the upgrade fees & guest passes that members buy through out the season.

I think it's something the NRL should definitely consider for the Sydney Stadium's, so instead of having to appeal to such a wide range of supporters they can focus on a smaller group of members who are passionate enough to go to multiple games if the quality of seating/pricing is suitable.

If this was an option I'd go to more games.

 

[Perth Red]

As to the suggest of an "NRL season membership which guarantees entrance to any NRL game?" I could see a logistical problem with there being more people wanting to attend a game who hold that ticket tan could fit into the venue? Could you imagine the complaints?

Add in that money would be going into the NRL's coffers whereas revenue from ticket sales to regular season games go to the home club. I somehow doubt any of the current 16 NRL clubs would support the idea somehow. Sorry to sound like a party pooper Canard.

You could get around that by putting X amount of general NRl membership tickets online for booking in the week leading up. Depending on the venue and fixture would determine how many would be available. This would also create demand for people who weren't members to buy tickets early to make sure they can get in. Allianz and ANZ isn't going to be an issue, just the smaller grounds.

 

[Wests is Best]

Why would I go to a Saturday game and miss Super Saturday on Fox?
Jokes aside, it comes down to scheduling as has been said.
The game sold the right to make the schedule to the tv execs (albeit if for big $$).
So who is surprised that its more appealing to watch NRL at home where its 50c for a frozen pie and about $1.30 for full strength beer in glass or heaven forbid a can?

 

[carcharias]

Why would I go to a Saturday game and miss Super Saturday on Fox?
Jokes aside, it comes down to scheduling as has been said.
The game sold the right to make the schedule to the tv execs (albeit if for big $$).
So who is surprised that its more appealing to watch NRL at home where its 50c for a frozen pie and about $1.30 for full strength beer in glass or heaven forbid a can?

Ha
True

Although I make my own beer
About 60 cents a schooner
Tastes like shit
But ey
You just get on with it.

 

[POPEYE]

When there was no tv coverage you struggled to get into the SCG . . . ban tv and let the players work on the garbos to make ends meet, that's the answer

 

[Last Week]

I live in Melbourne and support both the Storm in the NRL plus the Richmond Tigers in the AFL. Because so many of my friends and relatives barrack for different teams I actually have an 'AFL Membership' instead of a club membership.

The AFL Membership for $600 a year provides access to:

• 40 Games a year at the MCG or Etihad Stadium (the two grounds in Melbourne) out of a possible 91 this season subject to capacity.
• Access to an Exclusive 'AFL Members Reserve' at both grounds. At the MCG this is a section of 10 bays across each level with premium viewing quality (from the centre to the 50m mark on the wing) that I can either pay a small upgrade fee ($7) to get a reserved seat in or just walk up and swipe my card and sit anywhere in that section that is GA for that game (which varies depending on crowd expectation).
• Priority access to finals tickets

It makes it really use for me as a sporting fan to be able to watch as many games as possible of a game that I really enjoy. Only last weekend for example I was going to the Storm V Rabbitoh's game at AAMI Park, but because I decided to leave home early before the Storm game I was able to head into the 'G and watch the 2nd half of the Collingwood/Melbourne AFL game.

Being making it easier to combine multiple sporting events into an afternoon/evening is one thing I would do to boost NRL crowds, particularly that of the Storm here in Melbourne. I would make the 5:30pm Saturday afternoon game the Storm trademark for home games, trying to match them up with big MCG AFL games (1:45pm or 2:10pm start games are finished by 5pm, where as the NRL is normally finished either by or just after the 7:25pm Saturday night start times).



The problem could be easily solved by placing the 'subject to capacity' clause and the ability to reserve a seat with your membership in the same way that the AFL membership currently does it. As an AFL member I get a weekly e-mail on the Thursday letting me know how much GA capacity is available in the AFL 'members reserve' each week to guide me into deciding whether I should upgrade my ticket or not go to the game due to capacity issues.



Once again looking at the AFL model (it's the easiest comparison), AFL members each have a 'club support' element to their membership, where a portion of the membership price is paid by the AFL to the club ( I believe it's around 30% of the cost, so approx. $200). Thus the clubs are still reimbursed in a similar way. There is also an agreement in place where they get a portion of the money from the upgrade fees & guest passes that members buy through out the season.

I think it's something the NRL should definitely consider for the Sydney Stadium's, so instead of having to appeal to such a wide range of supporters they can focus on a smaller group of members who are passionate enough to go to multiple games if the quality of seating/pricing is suitable.

For this to work in Sydney, it'd realistically only work for ANZ Stadium. You could throw the SFS in there, but it's only the Roosters who play there.

So, at ANZ it's Souths, Bulldogs, next year only Parra, Tigers and Dragons part time.

This year, between those 5 clubs, there were 35 matches, with the Tigers playing 4 home matches and Saints playing 2 matches. That total will drop to 24 when Parramatta move back to Parra. Maybe some other clubs with them.

I think that the clubs are on the right track with the reciprocal rights. All 5 of those teams should play each other twice, at ANZ, every year.

That's 20 matches. Let Nine have 10 of those on prime time and have the other 10 on a Sunday afternoon. Not in the Origin period. All members of all teams should be invited.

For those 20 matches, a 'NRL membership' could work.

 

[siv]

Scheduling

Get rid of ThNF a d FNF 6pm and Sat 3pm

Play
Sat 7:30pm 2 games
Sun 2:00pm 2 games
Sun 4:00pm 2 games

Next mandate all Eastern stand Seating all stadiums lower decks are GA in a first come first basis. That will bring people from behind the posts closer to everyone else and improve the atmosphere

Basically if you want a good seat get in early. And not sit at the pub

Allow BIG flags to return for supporter groups in areas near the corner oosts Eastern Stand

Bring back 3 national grades on game day without the stupid 45 min grass growing session between grades

If that means ANZ can only play 2 matches a weekend so be it

Family GA tickets $50 max

All junior RL players to get a free season pass

 

[cleary89]

Maybe just make members and game day tix cheaper
Then you'll get more members and locals show up.
Kids $10 entry + drink and hot chips or something.

Surely you'd have more success catering to the fans who live nearby but are on a tight budget.
There'd be a heap of people that'd probably love to go but can't afford to take the whole family and feed them.

Sure. But if your a memeber of a club you should be encouraged to go to other games. I would go to games as a neutral if tickets werent bloody expensive. Make it cheaper for everyone is good, but if they cant do that then at least make it cheaper for members.

 

[Timmah]

Will there be games played before first grade still?

Greenberg said in a Twitter Q&A last week that would be at the discretion of each club. You'd hope that most clubs would do it but who actually knows

 

[Timmah]

Family GA tickets $50 max

All junior RL players to get a free season pass

Both of these are already either common or in place.

 

[Timmah]

Timmah, are you saying they will only have the 1 game on, namely first grade? I doubt it some how. I suspect the new state based replacement competition games will just slot straight in.

Yes - it will be up to clubs to decide if they want a curtain raiser.

 

[siv]

Both of these are already either common or in place.

Nope they stopped Junior RL season passes a few years ago

Now you only get 1 game if you can navigate the online process in time