Jim Frevola on AFC Bournemouth ticket prices and initiatives

In an exclusive interview with the Daily Echo, Cherries’ president of business discussed a variety of topics including renovations to the stadium, new ticket initiatives, rising shirt prices and plans for a new space for supporters to meet up pre-match.

This two-part special will be available to our subscribers this week.

One topic which merited plenty of discussion among supporters this summer was the rising of season ticket prices, after an eight-year freeze. The cheapest adult season ticket now costs £594, up from £550 previously.

“That was a tough decision,” said Frevola, who joined the club in December.

“It was a 9.7 per cent season ticket ‘blended average’ increase, eight per cent for 75 per cent of the seats, which we thought was a reasonable number.

“We certainly saw (other) clubs going a lot higher and we saw clubs going a little bit lower.

“People think ‘well that percentage certainly can’t mean a lot to the club’. But if we don’t ever raise prices, we’ll be out of business, because we have costs going up, we have prices increasing and we’ve been impacted too.

“People have been impacted, we’re certainly sensitive to that, but if we don’t raise prices, we can’t give our staff raises, we can’t continue to pay for the food that people are getting in here, we can’t make improvements to the stadium.

“Not that we’re correlating it directly to players, but ultimately at the end of the day, if we don’t raise any prices, it will impact the overall quality of what you see, whether it’s on the pitch or off the pitch.

“Every single business in the world has to face those realities and if people just stick their head in the sand and don’t raise prices, they’re not doing themselves justice, let alone the fanbase.”

There are currently no new season tickets available for supporters to purchase, yet prices have been raised by a higher percentage in many parts of the ground for those buy separate match tickets each week.

Asked why prices have gone up more for non-season ticket holders than those who do have season tickets, Frevola said: “That’s a really good question.

“The reality is that non-season ticket holders have an option of which games to choose, which games to not choose, they’ve got a little bit more flexibility.

“From the way we’ve seen statistically, it’s more in-line with how it should be, with the percentage breakdowns from match holders to season ticket members. That was a little bit more of a level setting that we were trying to do.

“It wasn’t like we were trying to stick it to one group at a higher level than the other. It had nothing to do with that.”

He added: “This is one where we do compare ourselves to others around the league, the matchday pricing.

“We’re still really in line, I would say. There was a club in League One, their prices were just announced and they were much higher than ours. I was surprised by that.

“We do compare, we do benchmark, we do pay attention to what other clubs are doing, but we also know that we have basically 10,000 home seats.

“It’s an 11,000-seater stadium, just over 1,000 for the away end. We have to maximise every opportunity we can in this building, with such limited capacity.

“We’re drastically disadvantaged compared to other clubs in the league.

“Luton will now even have more than us, because they’re putting in more seats!

“So we’re at a disadvantage and the demand is there for the tickets, for the 10,000 that we have. We’ve got to figure out every way possible to run this like a business, while still being respectful to the supporters and the loyal fans.”

Another new tweak to ticking pricing for the upcoming campaign is the introduction of categorisation of matches.

From this season, games will cost different amounts to attend, depending on the opponent. Seven matches are defined as ‘category A’ and will be the most expensive. Eight are listed as ‘category B’, with four in the cheaper ‘category C’ bracket.

Asked why the club opted to bring in this system, with the argument from some fans they pay to watch Cherries, not the opposition, Frevola explained: “The reality is, statistically, that is not how it goes, meaning people think that they pay to go and see Bournemouth, but we sell tickets at a faster clip for Man United than we do for Burnley.

“People say that they’re buying, but the velocity of the sales and the demand statistically, that’s not the case.

“It’s higher for the bigger six and we threw Newcastle in there for two reasons. One, their manager, that played into it for sure. And then also the way with their new ownership and their structure, they are spending like a big six club now.

“This is variable pricing, dynamic pricing is something we might want to evolve into.”

With a variety of new initiatives, Cherries are trying to make it easier for new supporters to attend league matches.

A problem for many of the matches against ‘big six’ clubs is the issue of away supporters finding their way into the home sections.

“We don’t love that,” admitted Frevola.

“We’ve actually been debating internally, Nick (Zombolas) our chief ticketing officer who came in a few months ago, he had a conversation with the Cherries Trust the other day, picking their brain about an idea.

“There’s a bunch of other clubs that do a warning system, if you’re a season ticket member and you don’t show up for 14 matches, or don’t resell your ticket, then maybe you can’t renew next year.

“We’ve debated that. I think there would be a lot of fans that would like us to do that, I think there would be a lot of fans that would be mad at us if we did that.

“I don’t know that we’re going to do that this year. We’re on the fence about it, but we’re not immune to the fact that people sneak in.

“If they’re respectful, if they sit there and they clap when their team scores and they sit back down and they’re respectful to the folk around them, that’s a fact of life.

“If they’re being disrespectful, I encourage people to tell a steward, who will come and speak to them and if it gets to be really extreme, we’ll have them removed.

“But if they’re behaving well, they’re supporting their club and they’re being respectful then I don’t know there’s much we can do about it, because it happens everywhere. It’s not a Bournemouth unique issue.”

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The only way fans generally have been able to attend home Premier League matches at Vitality Stadium in recent years is by building up their ticket points.

Cherries have made a concerted effort this summer to make that a more attainable task, offering home points for both upcoming pre-season friendly matches against Atalanta and FC Lorient.

By attending those fixtures, it will open up doors for supporters to have a chance to then attend Premier League games.

Frevola explained: “Not including season ticket holders, 90 per cent of our database don’t have home points, which is absolutely crazy.

“We have about 10,000 seats in the building, 19 Premier League games, that’s 190,000 potential seats.

“Last season, we only had 12,000 unique people buy tickets, so basically it’s the same 12,000 people, amazing loyal supporters that we embrace and love, buying every single match.

“There’s very few new people buying tickets. If you’re trying to grow a fanbase, if you’re trying to make a fanbase deeper, if you’re trying to build or renovate a building and add 12,000 new seats, you can’t fill a 20-22,000-seater stadium with 12,000 people, it doesn’t work.

“So you have to grow your fanbase. But that stat is actual – the same 12,000 people bought every game last year. We’ve got to do better than that.

“But that doesn’t mean we’re not loyal to those people, so it’s a double-edged sword. It’s tricky. We’re not trying to change that overnight, but we’ve got to get some more unique people with access.”

He continued: “We’re keeping it (home points for friendlies), we’ll do it again next year. We’ve already sold more pre-season tickets this year than we did last year, by a good amount already.

“We’re opening the South Stand, for Atalanta we’ll be pretty close to capacity, I’m hoping the home seats will be full.

“We didn’t anticipate having to open the South Stand, so we’re excited that we’re doing it for Atalanta. We’ll see if we have to do it for Lorient.

“We have over 4,200 new people with points, just because of this pre-season.

“Making the assumption that they use their ticket, we’ve added 4,200 new people with points to the system. That’s 57 per cent growth already of our database that has points. That’s crazy. People want a home point, they couldn’t get it.

“Every email, every complaint in our box office, the happiest people that we’re doing it, besides the people that now have the points, are the people that work in our box office!

“All the complaints, all the emails were people wanting to go to a game but couldn’t get a point. It was the chicken and the egg. Between pre-season, two women’s matches, three unders (development squad), now you have seven opportunities to get a home point this year.

“That’s a big deal. And it’s not just for the people who have zero home points.

“The people that have six or seven home points, the first two (Premier League) matches sold out at the 10-point level. So if you have seven, eight, nine points, we didn’t get to you which stinks, I hate that we didn’t get to them.

“There’s now a chance for them to jump up into the higher bucket and increase their chances. That’s all we’re trying to do, give the folks on the lower end of the ladder the chance to get more home points, give the folks on the higher end of the ladder the chance to fatten up their home points, but give the folks like these 4,200 people, who now have a home point, give them a chance.”

Outlining the four different ways supporters can now get hold of tickets, Frevola said: “Cherry Tuesdays, a new initiative.

“Once the match sells out, on the following Tuesday, we release a very limited number of seats.

“We actually had a one per cent higher season ticket renewal rate this year than we did last year, when we were promoted. That is with a price increase.

“That was phenomenal, the fan reaction to season ticket renewals was great.

“The amount of folks that didn’t renew, that number of seats is about the same number we’re holding back for Cherry Tuesdays, so we’re not really taking ticket quantity-wise away from last year’s allotment.

“It’s not a lot of seats, but it’s enough that of the first two Cherry Tuesdays that went on sale, over 40 per cent were bought by people with one or two points.

“So there’s a real reason to go and get a point, now you can get onto the ladder.

“Everybody with one or more points is eligible, so 60 per cent of those had two or more points.

“The other way is the ticket exchange. Season ticket holders can put a seat on the ticket exchange, if they can’t attend.

“You have to have one home point to buy on the ticket exchange. That’s why getting a home point in the pre-season or a women’s match is so important.

“We have a lot of people that bought the women’s match in April that got a point, those are the ones that are buying for Cherry Tuesdays right now.

“You can get Premier League tickets from returns the day before a match. The away teams return tickets, we have to hold seats by league rules for players, if they release them, those get released the day before. You have to have one home point.

“The fourth way you don’t even need a point.

“I think people know about it but they don’t think about it - hospitality. Every club in the league sells hospitality tickets to people without points.

“We have hospitality tickets available right now for pretty much every match. Yes, it’s a little bit more money, but you get a nice meal, you get a nice experience, you’re in the Main Stand.

“We’ve doubled the size of our hospitality offering this year, so we have even more seats available to fans without a point.

“So we’ve got more ways for fans now with one point, we’ve got more ways for fans to get a point and we’ve got more seats available for no points. To me it’s a great win.

“Those are you four best ways in.

“Then we introduced a new one, very limited, higher end hospitality in our boardroom.”

Frevola was also keen to make one further point clear, amid these schemes to get new supporters through the doors.

“There’s a perception out there that we don’t like season ticket holders,” he said.

“That could not be any further from the truth.

“There will never be a scenario where we don’t want season ticket holders, where we’re trying to restrict the number of season ticket holders.

“If we go to a new building and capacity is 20,000, just to use that number as it’s been floated around, we’d love for there to be 13-14,000 season ticket holders. That’s our goal.”

Check back to the website later this week for part two of the interview, where Frevola discusses renovations to the ground during the summer, changes to the matchday experience, raising prices on replica shirts and a new area for fans to meet pre-match.