[Albion] Season Ticket Holders – A Scheme to Donate Your Empty Seat to Inspire Young Footballers from Low-Income Families

[Oh_aye]

[Peacehaven Wild Kids tugs at his collar and walks away whistling to himself]

Ha. It absolutely wasn't supposed to be derogatory! Japanese fans and away supporters took up most of those available seats last season. Including mine apparently.

 

[Colonel Mustard]

Why do you need a block of tickets? Just give them two adjacent seats which are vacant.

As an aside, creating a block of donated seats ghetto-ises the scheme.

Well I call it a block, but could be a row, and as small as 6 or 8 seats. Means you can have one responsible adult if the kids are under 16, say. I’m simply trying to make the idea more practical as it would too administratively onerous IMO to try to organise regularly at short notice.

And sorry, I’m too old to have much patience with words like ghetto-ise when you’re trying to give away free PL tickets to local kids. I suspect they wouldn’t be too scarred by the humiliation.

 

[Herr Tubthumper]

And sorry, I’m too old to have much patience with words like ghetto-ise when you’re trying to give away free PL tickets to local kids. I suspect they wouldn’t be too scarred by the humiliation.

i see it differently, it can perpetuate marginalisation.

 

[hughfromalice]

Some obvious logistical problems, such as who accompanies the kids, but it shouldn't be beyond the club to sort those out. It's a nice idea.

Thanks Trueblue..... yes, it wouldn't take too much time/resources for the club to sort out how to administer a program like this.

 

[Neville's Breakfast]

Thanks A79. I get your concerns. The idea that I've suggested needs to be integrated into the context of what the club is already doing, including appropriate admin and safeguards. Integration example.... a tour of the training facilities followed by attending a match would be both instructive and exciting >> Theory/prepration contrasted to a practical test under real life pressures!!!!

I’m not sure why the club should do this though. It’s your idea and some people have expressed support so shouldn’t you as a group be using your time and resources to organise these tickets ? I don’t actually see what is preventing you from doing that.

 

[Colonel Mustard]

I’m not sure why the club should do this though. It’s your idea and some people have expressed support so shouldn’t you as a group be using your time and resources to organise these tickets ? I don’t actually see what is preventing you from doing that.

I suppose the point is that the club will have access to the data on ticket sales and have the authority to shift things round a bit and organise the admin and oversee any security/vulnerable kids issues etc. It would be quite hard to organise all that 'privately' I think?

 

[Neville's Breakfast]

I suppose the point is that the club will have access to the data on ticket sales and have the authority to shift things round a bit and organise the admin and oversee any security/vulnerable kids issues etc. It would be quite hard to organise all that 'privately' I think?

Maybe. But people could buy the tickets and donate to a charity. I just think it puts the club in a difficult situation because there are so many good causes. They already do a fair amount through Albion in the Community so perhaps that would be the starting point for anybody looking to donate tickets.

 

[Thunder Bolt]

It’s a nice idea but if I’m responsible for the behaviour of the people in my seat then it’s a non starter for me.

Far better for the club to organise some group tickets for clubs from deprived areas via AITC

The club used to give schools tickets for the north shelf, but seats are in such demand now, the shelf sells to fans.
I agree, it should be done via Albion in the Community, if it was done at all.

The only other way is, if you know you can’t make a game, ask around if your mates know of anyone deserving, put your ticket on the exchange, pay full price for it, in the youngster’s name.

 

[John Byrnes Mullet]

Great idea and this needs to happen. A great task for a member of the fan advisory team to escalate. It's a sad story when kids on the Moulsecoomb estate next to the stadium can't even watch the matches on TV and then seeing rich Japanese fans travelling from afar with a heavy carbon footprint gaining easy access to home games.

 

[Tom Hark Preston Park]

Not keen on some of the slights on our Japanese visitors being aired in this thread

 

[Justice]

Great idea and this needs to happen. A great task for a member of the fan advisory team to escalate. It's a sad story when kids on the Moulsecoomb estate next to the stadium can't even watch the matches on TV and then seeing rich Japanese fans travelling from afar with a heavy carbon footprint gaining easy access to home games.

The clubs dream customers are the Mitoma fan boys and girls. They buy a ticket and spend a shed load in the club shop, this is the price of modern football and It will always alienate locals who don’t have any expendable income.

 

[Tom Hark Preston Park]

Great idea in principle, just need to think through some of the practical issues eg 2 adjacent tickets needed for parent. / guardian?

Could be done at the point of a pair of adjacent tickets being put on the ticket exchange. Club could simply ask those putting the tickets on the exchange if they would like a refund if the tickets sell, or would they like to donate the tickets to a disadvantaged child and parent/guardian. This could then be matched up with a database maintained by, say, AITC. Job done!

 

[hughfromalice]

It’s a nice idea but if I’m responsible for the behaviour of the people in my seat then it’s a non starter for me.

Far better for the club to organise some group tickets for clubs from deprived areas via AITC

AITC hasn't been on my radar, especially as I've recently come from overseas and now live in Leicestershire. You've stimulated me to contact them. Perhaps they might be interested in taking carriage of a program built on ideas adapted from this thread. By the way, from 1 August they are changing their name to Brighton and Hove Albion Foundation.

A key idea of this proposal is to decouple the person offering use of their free seat from the recipient by pooling through a data base controlled by the club or some other third party like AITC. The club/third party allocates the seats.

 

[Tom Hark Preston Park]

AITC hasn't been on my radar, especially as I've recently come from overseas and now live in Leicestershire. You've stimulated me to contact them. Perhaps they might be interested in taking carriage of a program built on ideas adapted from this thread. By the way, from 1 August they are changing their name to Brighton and Hove Albion Foundation.

A key idea of this proposal is to decouple the person offering use of their free seat from the recipient by pooling through a data base controlled by the club or some other third party like AITC. The club/third party allocates the seats.

A perfectly workable scheme has been proposed by myself (in the post directly above yours, post #52). It meets all of your criteria in post #53 - given that your idea is generally agreed to be a non-starter for an unaccompanied young person for safeguarding reasons.

Proposed scheme as follows:

1. Two or more folks with adjacent seats (family members, mates etc) decide they can't make the game

2. They place their tickets on the exchange and tick a box that says instead of a refund they want to pass their tickets for use by a disadvantaged young person and their parent/guardian

3. Club offers tickets at no charge to AITC

4. AITC offers tickets at no charge to disadvantaged young person and their parent/guardian who have been pre-approved by AITC

Simples!

 

[Super Steve Earle]

I emailed Paul Barber a couple of years ago about spreading the Senior Citizens discount to the blocks that don't have it, to save lower income retirees from having to move from their favourite seats in West Lower to more affordable ones in retirement. It met with a flat refusal as every £1 counts at the business end of matchday. I imagine providing resources for this type of scheme would meet with a similar reply.

 

[chaileyjem]

During Covid the club gave away 1000 PL tickets to NHS and emergency workers for those sceptical that the club would refuse to engage with such schemes

Free Premier League and WSL tickets for emergency workers

Club donate more than 1500 tickets to thank pandemic heroes

www.brightonandhovealbion.com

Wrexham had a scheme giving away tickets to charities and people in the community last season and in the end gave away 4000 tickets. https://worldsoccertalk.com/news/wr...-4000-seats-provided-20230310-WST-422996.html

 

[hughfromalice]

I imagine the club can switch tickets i.e. me and you donate our separate tickets in different parts of the ground, the club sell these as usual, but without refunding us, and provide 2 adjacent tickets elsewhere to this scheme.

If the club work with a charity they can, in effect, outsource the low income decision making.

I like the principle of this scheme and would donate to it.

The switching of two separate single tickets to provide two adjacent tickets- so that a minor and supervizing adult - is a good idea. It could easily be automated with a bit of software written for the specific purpose.

 

[hughfromalice]

I emailed Paul Barber a couple of years ago about spreading the Senior Citizens discount to the blocks that don't have it, to save lower income retirees from having to move from their favourite seats in West Lower to more affordable ones in retirement. It met with a flat refusal as every £1 counts at the business end of matchday. I imagine providing resources for this type of scheme would meet with a similar reply.

Very interesting post. I get your point. This proposal needs to be pitched to the club so that it is clear that it can be administered in a revenue neutral way.

 

[amexer]

I support any scheme that helps the disadvantaged but this should not be restricted to youngsters. When we were able to give tickets away so many in our group were able to treat someone they knew who could never afford a ticket. That has now ended because although all of us would be willing to join sharing scheme none know of any members who are not ST holders and are not willing to tell the recipient of the ticket that we would like to treat them but before we do they will have to pay £30ish to become a member. I used to get a couple of relatives with mental health issues to the odd game and one of us used to pick his 90 year old uncle up from his rest home and get him to a game. A club scheme would not work for these deserving people because they obviously have to sit with us.
Appreciate club now allow one pass on of a ticket and would like to see this increased to 3

 

[amexer]

I support any scheme that helps the disadvantaged but this should not be restricted to youngsters. When we were able to give tickets away so many in our group were able to treat someone they knew who could never afford a ticket. That has now ended because although all of us would be willing to join sharing scheme none know of any members who are not ST holders and are not willing to tell the recipient of the ticket that we would like to treat them but before we do they will have to pay £30ish to become a member. I used to get a couple of relatives with mental health issues to the odd game and one of us used to pick his 90 year old uncle up from his rest home and get him to a game. A club scheme would not work for these deserving people because they obviously have to sit with us.
Appreciate club now allow one pass on of a ticket and would like to see this increased to 3