End of the line for the Fans Forum?

The notes from last week's fans Forum were published today. They make for fairly depressing reading and I am left thinking that the bell is tolling for the Fans Forum.

Thomas Sandgaard was very gung-ho when he took over the club and took every opportunity to engage with supporters in his bid to get up to speed with following the club and trying to better understand what makes us tick. He supported the continuation of the Fans Forum and there was good early engagement. However, he has been here two years now and all the evidence suggests that he hasn't really listened to what fans have to tell him. The club have made mistake-after-mistake, many of which they have unwound after negative reactions from supporters - most of these could have been avoided if they had listened more carefully in the first place.

As time has passed, the value supporters derive from reading the notes of these regularly postponed or delayed meetings has diminished. Perhaps they were never that successful but they at least gave supporters an opportunity to ask awkward questions and record verbal answers. They also ticked a box for the owners with the football authorities who make some form of supporter engagement a condition of ownership.

Fitting then, that last Thursday's meeting should have started with the apologies of those who couldn't be there, including Clive Harris (Armed Forces Addick) who also requested that an email from him be read out. It informed us that he considered the forum "a futile, box-ticking exercise" and is presumably no longer attending. I know Clive fairly well and he loves the club like I do and both since we were boys. He is a regular bloke with an in-built sense of duty which has come through in everything he has done in his life. He is also one of those pragmatic and positive people who believe anything is achievable. A 'people person,' saying that the Forum he was part of was a waste of time wouldn't have come easy to him.

I then noted that the only Club Representative present in the room was long-suffering Tom Rubashaw, the Comms Manager. Thomas Sandgaard and Raelyn Maloney joined-in via Zoom (on Tom's laptop I believe) - can't have been easy all 'round. Ian Wallis (Bromley Branch) questioned why there weren't more Club Representatives present. Tom Rubashaw gave the stock corporate answer that he had chased up on all the action points with the various Club Reps and was covering for everyone. Thomas Sandgaard asked that all the senior staff be invited in future. 

I am sure we have been here before and all-of-a-sudden it felt very much like "a futile, box-ticking exercise." It was hard reading through the notes after this to see anything of much substance and many of the same responses from the Club that don't satisfactorily answer points or simply kick the can down the road, to coin a phrase;

- the club would learn from the recent Leo Rifkind Tweeting PR Disaster.

- confirmation that the club's strategic focus was now on financials, not footballing success.

- TS doesn't have plans to sell the club - but he wouldn't be saying he was in any event.

- advice was again offered from all of the supporter groups present but again was answered unsatisfactorily. TS said that supporter input was important and aided decision-making but history tells us it's usually ignored. 

- questions were asked about the large staff turnover this year and the loss of very experienced individuals who have done good work for many years. TS refused to be drawn on individuals (understandably) but also gave some very general statements about hiring and firing in an attempt to make it look like business-as-usual, which it simply hasn't been.

- he did pretty much the same in relation to questions on the current pricing policy. Everyone knows it isn't working but TS told us that there hadn't been complaints at the ticket office! Perhaps because they see very few fans nowadays. He also didn't believe the late buying surcharge (Meire Tax) impacted sales. I was left wondering if he really thought there was a problem beyond us being 14th in League One.

- it didn't get much better after that when he claimed our latest 'pack-of-3' deal (£59-93) would help improve affordability. He really doesn't get it that £3 off an already expensive ticket doesn't feel like a bargain, especially when you are being asked to pay for three upfront. It's not going to make you sit up and think about ringing friends or family for a day out at the Valley. It was pointed out that Ipswich's similar deal was £45 for three tickets or £20 to sit anywhere. His answer to that was that "Ipswich is in a different part of the country" which was another cop-out. He did agree to "look at" the additional telephone and online surcharges (£2.50 and £1.50 respectively) but I won't hold my breathe.

- the fan enforced U-turn on the poorly conceived Generous Robots sponsorship was also raised but TS didn't want to elaborate on that either beyond saying the deal "came to an end in a way that suited both parties" and confirmed we had been paid. Presumably only a fraction of the original deal which I don't believe was that much in the first-place. 

- he got a kicking on the Club Shop too, the stuttering supply of replica kit, the extortionate cost of a few other items that are stocked and the lack of availability of anything else. Again, we have been here before and the promise was that Castore was the answer to all the problems. Raelyn Maloney expressed disappointment and said they had applied what pressure they could. We were then given a Castore statement which ticked the 'pandemic, supply-chain, working hard and as-soon-as-possible boxes,' which was weak. Probably only as weak as our contract with Castore.

Thinking about doing away with the Fans Forum begs the questions, how to do it and what to take it's place? How to manage that with fans and to keep onside with the EFL regulations?

One way would be to beef up the Fans Advisor role. A couple more bodies to help filter the fans questions and feedback answers from the Club's owner and his senior team - Lucy Bishop is already the Chair. I noted that Lewis Catt, a new Fans Advisor was introduced at the start of the meeting...

One of the original ideas at the birth of the Fans Forum was a fan in each stand so that they could take complaints about the number of chips of the size of the queues. Perhaps they could reinvigorate that but with more Club control? A sort of Fans Engagement Team if you like. Lo and behold, the next news item on the official site today was just that! Three new fans representatives for matchdays. 

You have to wonder don't you? They could also claim to be responding to Clive Harris' criticisms...