The trend of ticket prices in English football

[SummerOnions]

So there's a march/protest going on tomorrow against rising ticket prices in the PL and football league in England. (http://www.theguardian.com/football...up-premier-league-ticket-prices-protest-march) and people generally seem to be aggrieved

Meanwhile in Germany:

The chief executive of the Bundesliga, Christian Seifert, says there would be “a huge shitstorm” if clubs such as Bayern Munich were to start charging as much for tickets as Premier League sides.

Seifert says that allowing as many people as possible – of all ages and social backgrounds – to go to stadiums is a guiding principle of German clubs, describing it as both a social responsibility and a business tactic comparable to that of the budget supermarket Aldi. The average Bundesliga ticket price is 23 euros and the league enjoys a 92% stadium occupancy rate; its average attendance of 43,500 is the highest of any football league in the world, almost 9,000 more than the Premier League’s

“Bayern Munich gets each year 30 to 40 million euros less than Manchester United from ticket sales, which means €300m in 10 years.We [the Bundesliga] don’t have influence on ticket prices. All the clubs can decide on their own but some kind of common sense prevails.

In addition to ensuring affordable tickets are available, German clubs elect to restrict the number of season tickets that they sell in order to ensure more fans get to see at least some of their teams’ matches. “Demand is huge but clubs choose to limit season ticket sales to 40 or 50% because they don’t want the same people going every week,” he added. “They want everyone to have a chance. It would be very easy to raise the prices and make more money out of the fans but the clubs tend to choose not to do so. From a pure economic perspective you can say ‘What a mistake’ but, given our holistic approach, I would say it is the right approach.”

Seifert says that this holistic approach is based on marrying “finances, the game and society: if we do not have success in all three dimensions, we do not consider it success at all.” He hailed the “basic treaty” that has existed between German clubs and the Bundesliga since 2002 enshrining the belief that “clubs are an established part of society, bring people together and cities and regions identify with them”.

So where do we see this going? Will the prices just keep on going up so we can continue to hyperinflate the transfer market?

I'm pretty convinced that at some stage there would be a tipping point where people would stop going on account of how much some tickets cost. For an away trip to London say, you could end up paying over £150 just to watch 90 minutes of football when you take into account travel and stuff

The German model seems fantastic but only seems to work as it is fan owned and so the owners, the Scudamores and the Murdochs don't have as much involvement in the cost of football across the country. Is there another way around it?

 

[Brizzle]

Prices will keep going up until they affect attendances. Supply & demand etc.