The Swan Dive: why Swansea’s attendances have taken a plunge?

[Dr. Winston]

The only reason rugby has such a high profile in Wales is because, entirely by accident, this small country of ours somehow for a short while in the 70s had the greatest team in the world in what is still a minority sport but was even smaller back then. The Welsh media understandably latched on to it, because it was success and it gave us a national reason to celebrate. And it went from there - became a nice excuse for a regular piss up, nice stick to whack the English with, etc.

Doesn't alter the facts though.

Even in the 70's they couldn't beat New Zealand.

 

[BendJack]

I think our comparison is closer to Hull City than Norwich. Both industrial port history, both had prem stints , both have rugby distractions , both working class demographics, both had questionable past owners and both have fluctuating attendances in the same ball park figure.

I'd have to agree with this based on a little research. Everything more closely matches Swansea.

Possibly include Sunderland in a comparison, too - although their population is a little more, it's not too significant to exclude it from the same bracket. All other metrics are very similar.

Sunderland average attendances are over 30k while Hull averages 21k per home game.

The club truly does need to do some research on this to improve attendances, drastically. An extra 5k in attendance is still a significant investment in to the club coffers.

 

[Ringwood]

On a support level, we could never compete with Sunderland.

 

[Ringwood]

I would put in the same bracket as Hull, Portsmouth, Plymouth, Burnley, Bolton, Bradford, Watford, Reading and Cardiff not so much on history but club size and fan base if each club was on the same league footing.

 

[cadleigh]

I would put in the same bracket as Hull, Portsmouth, Plymouth, Burnley, Bolton, Bradford, Watford, Reading and Cardiff not so much on history but club size and fan base if each club was on the same league footing.

I'm sure those are all very valid comparisons in terms of population make-up, local economies (or lack of thereof) etc, but what lessons can we learn from studying those clubs/cities in terms of the purpose of this thread (to examine why our attendances have been falling and what we can do about it)? (Well done Caiden for an excellent article and for kicking off this discussion.)

I held up Norwich as an example of a club that increased average attendances by around 10,000 during their first season back in the Premier League and after increasing ground capacity by 4,000, and pretty much maintained that new level - even when they were relegated to the third tier in 2009-10 (their average attendance that year was 24,756). They did this through a deliberate strategy of engaging supporters, affordable season ticket payment plans, partnership with the city council to make the matchday experience better, targeted campaigns to attract younger supporters and supporter funding initiatives like the Canaries Bond, which raised £5m to fund their academy (I think supporters who invested got their money back - it wasn't a chariable donation). If we can learn anything from the experience of Hull, Portsmouth, Plymouth etc then great.

Meanwhile here's another article on the subject (apologies if someone else has already shared this). I don't know West Bromwich as well as I know Norwich but I'm pretty sure it's not affluent. https://eflanalysis.com/news/west-b...ear-statistic-emerges-swansea-are-struggling/

 

[Dr. Winston]

An extra 5k in attendance is still a significant investment in to the club coffers.

The madness is that in terms of income it wouldn't actually make a massive difference.

Say, for a basic example we sold 18,000 STs at full whack of £459, that works out at around £8.2m. In reality a fair chunk of those would be concessionary prices so the actual amount would probably be closer to £5-6m, maybe lower. And that's if we sold every possible season ticket. An extra 5k on the gate at current prices might mean another two million or so. Peanuts compared to what we've just spent.

This is why an aggressive pricing strategy towards attracting and retaining younger supporters makes sense and probably wouldn't actually have that much of an effect on turnover.

We need to fill the ground for the sake of filling the ground.

 

[cmajack]

I wondered about that, so I looked up the official stats on the House of Commons constituency database.

Swansea West is indeed more deprived than either Norwich North or Norwich South by some way. The average unemployment rate in Swansea West is 4.8%, compared to 3.4% and 3.9% in the two Norwich constituencies respectively, and the average weekly wage is £613 (v £673/£651).

However, I was surprised to discover that both Neath & Swansea East and Gower constituencies have lower unemployment rates and higher weekly wages than either of the Norwich seats.

If you average the unemployment and weekly wage rates for the three Swansea seats and the two Norwich seats you get:
Swansea unemployment 3.3% Swansea average weekly wage £680
Norwich unemployment 3.65% Norwich average weekly wage £662

If you take out Gower on the grounds that it is not representative of Swansea as a whole, you still get:
Swansea unemployment 3.85% Swansea average weekly wage £660
Norwich unemployment 3.65% Norwich average weekly wage £662

So not a lot in it, really. Presumably some people would argue that Carrow Road attracts a fair number of supporters from more affluent outlying villages, but on that basis we should add back in the stats for Gower. I visit Norwich quite often, and I can assure you that a lot of their supporters come from the city itself, and that people shouldn't be misled by the Golden Triangle - there are some really deprived parts of the city.

Not that deprivation is necessarily an indicator of football support. There are five constituencies in Liverpool proper; two of them are amongst the five most deprived constituencies in England, and nearby Knowsley is also in that list. If you've been to Anfield you'll know that their supporters are not all coming in from Hightown.

Swansea has a population of 250,000, Norwich 150,000. They used to get similar gates to what we are getting now, they turned that around. I ask again - how did they do it and what can we learn from their success?

Could just be that Norwich fans are a far more loyal lot than our fickle supporters. It's as simple as that really.

 

[cadleigh]

Could just be that Norwich fans are a far more loyal lot than our fickle supporters. It's as simple as that really.

But what matters is change over time. It's not that Norwich filled their ground from time immemorial, the way Man City took huge crowds to games even when they were in third tier. Norwich had 6k empty seats before 2004. They filled them overnight and another 6k besides - and ensured that those new fans maintained the habit even when they went down. I guess what you are saying is that people from Norwich are intrinsically more loyal, so once they got those extra 10k in, keeping them was easier? It's a nice idea but I don't think it was as simple as that!

 

[Colin-swansea]

As much as accuracy can be gained from comparing the sizes of both cities – Norwich and Swansea, for me as far as football support is concerned the true comparison can only be seen when you look at both club’s playing history – what divisions they played in, especially from the period of post WW2.

Norwich have never played in the fourth tier of the pyramid, they have had spells in the old third tier of Division Three South, flirted between Division Two and Division Three (South) between the two wars, and following the resumption of the Football League after WW2 Norwich played in Division Three (South) up until promotion to Division Two in 1958/59, when Division Three was formed in 1958/59. In 1960/61 they were promoted to Division Two and remarkably have remained in the top two tiers to present day.

Just one season in 2009/10 they slipped down to third tier of the game.

65 seasons out of which 27 were either in the PL or Division One.

Just imagine how very few supporters the club has lost in all those years.

List of Norwich City F.C. seasons - Wikipedia

Compare those statistics with the Swans – a truly YoYo club where despite reaching the FA Cup s/final in 63/64, slipped to the Fourth tier in 3 seasons.

A small revival in the early 70’s brought another drop back to the 4th tier and also having to seek re-election to the Football League, albeit with gates averaging 2069.

Another revival brought First Division football only for the club to be closed down for a short time midway through 1985 and the dreaded fall back to the 4th tier.

Yet another revival from the depths of the 4th tier saw success brought by Terry Yorath only to fail to work on Frank Burrows’s success and slip back into the 4th tier in the mid-90’s.

Another mini revival in 1999 was shortly dispersed back to the 4th tier with average attendances this time of 4963.

Under administration for two years saw the club enter a golden era that brought a new stadium and Premier League football only for the club fail to build on the success despite a takeover and new Board of Directors from the USA.

This for me is the true comparison between two cities, while one other advantage Norwich didn’t have was a top rugby club in the city that enabled those fringe fans in dark days to spend their cash at St. Helens rather than at the Vetch Field. Looking back through the years high rates of unemployment especially during the Toshack era were blamed on the club’s demise but for me the downturn came before the FA Cup run to the s/finals where average gates dropped to 10,368, and where a successful reserve team playing in the Football Combination was dropped in preference to saving cash and a reserve team competing in the Welsh League. Playing in the Football Combination team was restored in the mid-60’s but the damage had been done as far as nurturing quality youngsters were concerned for the first team.

Apologies for the long post but my feeling is complacency and fickleness amongst the residents regarding the football club is not short term but has been inbred in the Town and outlying districts in years prior to its being awarded city status. Whether the blame can be placed at the club's Directors, or a lack of finance, you make your own mind up.

 

[cadleigh]

As much as accuracy can be gained from comparing the sizes of both cities – Norwich and Swansea, for me as far as football support is concerned the true comparison can only be seen when you look at both club’s playing history – what divisions they played in, especially from the period of post WW2.

Norwich have never played in the fourth tier of the pyramid, they have had spells in the old third tier of Division Three South, flirted between Division Two and Division Three (South) between the two wars, and following the resumption of the Football League after WW2 Norwich played in Division Three (South) up until promotion to Division Two in 1958/59, when Division Three was formed in 1958/59. In 1960/61 they were promoted to Division Two and remarkably have remained in the top two tiers to present day.

Just one season in 2009/10 they slipped down to third tier of the game.

65 seasons out of which 27 were either in the PL or Division One.

Just imagine how very few supporters the club has lost in all those years.

List of Norwich City F.C. seasons - Wikipedia

Compare those statistics with the Swans – a truly YoYo club where despite reaching the FA Cup s/final in 63/64, slipped to the Fourth tier in 3 seasons.

A small revival in the early 70’s brought another drop back to the 4th tier and also having to seek re-election to the Football League, albeit with gates averaging 2069.

Another revival brought First Division football only for the club to be closed down for a short time midway through 1985 and the dreaded fall back to the 4th tier.

Yet another revival from the depths of the 4th tier saw success brought by Terry Yorath only to fail to work on Frank Burrows’s success and slip back into the 4th tier in the mid-90’s.

Another mini revival in 1999 was shortly dispersed back to the 4th tier with average attendances this time of 4963.

Under administration for two years saw the club enter a golden era that brought a new stadium and Premier League football only for the club fail to build on the success despite a takeover and new Board of Directors from the USA.

This for me is the true comparison between two cities, while one other advantage Norwich didn’t have was a top rugby club in the city that enabled those fringe fans in dark days to spend their cash at St. Helens rather than at the Vetch Field. Looking back through the years high rates of unemployment especially during the Toshack era were blamed on the club’s demise but for me the downturn came before the FA Cup run to the s/finals where average gates dropped to 10,368, and where a successful reserve team playing in the Football Combination was dropped in preference to saving cash and a reserve team competing in the Welsh League. Playing in the Football Combination team was restored in the mid-60’s but the damage had been done as far as nurturing quality youngsters were concerned for the first team.

Apologies for the long post but my feeling is complacency and fickleness amongst the residents regarding the football club is not short term but has been inbred in the Town and outlying districts in years prior to its being awarded city status. Whether the blame can be placed at the club's Directors, or a lack of finance, you make your own mind up.

Good post, Colin. I think that explains very well why older Swansea supporters may be more fair-weather fans. But anyone who is 21 or younger will never remember a time when the Swans were out of the top two divisions or the dubious joys of the Vetch Field. They may remember periods of turgid football, the disappointment of relegation, and the chaos of the change of ownership, but all that history from the 60s to the end of the 90s is just that to them - words on a page. As Dr Winston said, it's the young supporters who are key. I have faith that our owners are smart enough to realise this and will be planning accordingly.

 

[Ringwood]

As much as accuracy can be gained from comparing the sizes of both cities – Norwich and Swansea, for me as far as football support is concerned the true comparison can only be seen when you look at both club’s playing history – what divisions they played in, especially from the period of post WW2.

Norwich have never played in the fourth tier of the pyramid, they have had spells in the old third tier of Division Three South, flirted between Division Two and Division Three (South) between the two wars, and following the resumption of the Football League after WW2 Norwich played in Division Three (South) up until promotion to Division Two in 1958/59, when Division Three was formed in 1958/59. In 1960/61 they were promoted to Division Two and remarkably have remained in the top two tiers to present day.

Just one season in 2009/10 they slipped down to third tier of the game.

65 seasons out of which 27 were either in the PL or Division One.

Just imagine how very few supporters the club has lost in all those years.

List of Norwich City F.C. seasons - Wikipedia

Compare those statistics with the Swans – a truly YoYo club where despite reaching the FA Cup s/final in 63/64, slipped to the Fourth tier in 3 seasons.

A small revival in the early 70’s brought another drop back to the 4th tier and also having to seek re-election to the Football League, albeit with gates averaging 2069.

Another revival brought First Division football only for the club to be closed down for a short time midway through 1985 and the dreaded fall back to the 4th tier.

Yet another revival from the depths of the 4th tier saw success brought by Terry Yorath only to fail to work on Frank Burrows’s success and slip back into the 4th tier in the mid-90’s.

Another mini revival in 1999 was shortly dispersed back to the 4th tier with average attendances this time of 4963.

Under administration for two years saw the club enter a golden era that brought a new stadium and Premier League football only for the club fail to build on the success despite a takeover and new Board of Directors from the USA.

This for me is the true comparison between two cities, while one other advantage Norwich didn’t have was a top rugby club in the city that enabled those fringe fans in dark days to spend their cash at St. Helens rather than at the Vetch Field. Looking back through the years high rates of unemployment especially during the Toshack era were blamed on the club’s demise but for me the downturn came before the FA Cup run to the s/finals where average gates dropped to 10,368, and where a successful reserve team playing in the Football Combination was dropped in preference to saving cash and a reserve team competing in the Welsh League. Playing in the Football Combination team was restored in the mid-60’s but the damage had been done as far as nurturing quality youngsters were concerned for the first team.

Apologies for the long post but my feeling is complacency and fickleness amongst the residents regarding the football club is not short term but has been inbred in the Town and outlying districts in years prior to its being awarded city status. Whether the blame can be placed at the club's Directors, or a lack of finance, you make your own mind up.

Some important points here.. where have Norwich been in the last 50 years in the league pyramid compared to us !? They have been in a better position getting young people hooked on their local side compared to us where previously of even today our locals pay allegiance to prem giants from the armchair.

 

[Andrew - North Hill]

I think that explains very well why older Swansea supporters may be more fair-weather fans.

When I was in the West Stand for the Sheffield United game, I had a good look around me and (I don't mean this in a insulting way) it was mostly grey hair everywhere. Male and female.

I've noticed it similar in the East too, although perhaps not quite as pronounced.

I've no idea how many of those are STH or in the day sales obviously, but it struck me that our fanbase is, if anything, getting older not younger.

Which is worrying, long term.

 

[AusinIsOurHero]

I held up Norwich as an example of a club that increased average attendances by around 10,000 during their first season back in the Premier League and after increasing ground capacity by 4,000, and pretty much maintained that new level - even when they were relegated to the third tier in 2009-10 (their average attendance that year was 24,756). They did this through a deliberate strategy of engaging supporters, affordable season ticket payment plans, partnership with the city council to make the matchday experience better, targeted campaigns to attract younger supporters and supporter funding initiatives like the Canaries Bond, which raised £5m to fund their academy (I think supporters who invested got their money back - it wasn't a chariable donation). If we can learn anything from the experience of Hull, Portsmouth, Plymouth etc then great.

I don't get why the Council & the Club don't work together on this.
I used to be in the commercial dept. in the Council and there was little or no dialogue between the club (or the Ospreys for that matter) and the Council. You'd think it would have been of mutual benefit to advertise tickets for games, put on park & ride services etc, have the club at live events like the 10k or the Airshow, share databases of schools for kids for a quid etc, but nothing.
Definitely an untapped resource

 

[Colin-swansea]

Good post, Colin. I think that explains very well why older Swansea supporters may be more fair-weather fans. But anyone who is 21 or younger will never remember a time when the Swans were out of the top two divisions or the dubious joys of the Vetch Field. They may remember periods of turgid football, the disappointment of relegation, and the chaos of the change of ownership, but all that history from the 60s to the end of the 90s is just that to them - words on a page. As Dr Winston said, it's the young supporters who are key. I have faith that our owners are smart enough to realise this and will be planning accordingly.

The main point in your reply is that if you link a generation to every 20 years you can see that from 1960 to present day approximately 4 generations have grown up to either follow or walk away to other interests, all through a combination of lack of finance at the club, no direction in the boardroom or a lack of security at the club, unlike at Norwich, where fans continue to don their replica shirts every home game.

 

[Ringwood]

When I was in the West Stand for the Sheffield United game, I had a good look around me and (I don't mean this in a insulting way) it was mostly grey hair everywhere. Male and female.

I've noticed it similar in the East too, although perhaps not quite as pronounced.

I've no idea how many of those are STH or in the day sales obviously, but it struck me that our fanbase is, if anything, getting older not younger.

Which is worrying, long term.

Probably the older generation have more disposable income , less transient and less social distractions

Well that's my excuse