Lincoln City Programme, 27th October 2007
Policy on Complementary Matchday Tickets
At a Board Meeting prior to the start of last season (on 31 July 2006) the BFC Board adopted a formal policy for the issue of complementary tickets.
In formulating the policy the Board recognised that the issue of complementary tickets are:
- Part of an obligation to Football’s governing bodies e.g. The Football League and The FA.
- A valid way of promoting the Club.
- A method by which value can be exchanged with commercial sponsors and partners.
- Part of the benefits packaged offered to all Club staff.
The Club’s policy is to:
Maximise the revenue from matchday attendance with the minimum number of complementary tickets issued whilst meeting its obligations and commercial and promotional objectives. The Club Secretary strictly controls this allocation and an audit is provided on a match-by-match basis.
At the end of each season the Chief Executive Officer and representatives from Bees United will review the effectiveness of both the allocation and policy.
Allocation Breakdown
Currently the allocation currently falls into four areas:
- Obligation to the football authorities. As well as meeting our obligation to the Football League and The FA this area also includes tickets for the away club and other club scouts (both of which are on a reciprocal basis) and the match officials.
- Promoting the Club. This covers any tickets provided to promote the Club and to encourage future support. Included in this category are tickets provided as prizes and those to organisations to help to develop of business relationships with the Club. Tickets provided to the Community Sports Trust (CST) also fall into this category. The CST carefully monitor these tickets and by following up with recipients evaluate their effectiveness.
- Commercial Sponsors and Partners. As part of our sponsorship deals we provide tickets to our business partners.
- Staff. All staff are allocated tickets, including first team squad and coaches, centre of excellence staff, youth team and ground and office staff.
Performance
Last season the number of tickets were reviewed and changes made to the allocation. The average complementary tickets per game totalled 458 which was below the budget of 650, this was mainly due to a decrease in Community Sports Trust numbers.
This season the Club are aiming to hold last season’s reduction with a budget set of 450 tickets. Across the first 5 matches of this season we are currently running a little below this budgeted figure.
Typically for each match the allocation will be as follows: Category 1: 50, Category 2 & 3: 250 and Category 4: 150.
Comments can either be sent to Jon Gosling on or directly via comments page.
13th November 2007