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CFU Directors’ Portfolio Update – Fan Engagement & Membership

Posted by Jeff Banks on

Today we continue the update from CFU directors, the latest provided Jeff Banks, whose portfolio includes Membership & Fan Engagement.

 

It’s been a manic few months following the efforts of bringing realistic and attractive season ticket and matchday prices to the table, but the Fan Engagement Working Group have ploughed on looking at various aspects of the matchday experience as well as putting our thoughts in to making the CFU membership more attractive to members.

 

Below, is a list of part of what we’ve been focussing on during the last couple of months:

 

CFU membership new joins / renewals

  • We recently hit the 2018 target and have since passed this too, which is great news. Effectively the number from 12 months ago has doubled.
  • Draw for winner of £20.18 club shop voucher will take place this weekend!
  • We are also going to be looking at further benefits of being a CFU member and also discussing the CFU membership joining fee based on comments and feedback made by members in the Big City Census 2018 and in general.
  • Due to launch in January, a large retailer have offered a generous discount to CFU members, details to follow on this.
  • Buy Clever Stuff have offered CFU members 5% off some ranges and also advised that they will make a further 5% donation to the Squadbuilder fund from purchases made direct from their website.

 

Lifetime Membership

  • We have 10 confirmed paid members. Packs for these have been this week. Our target for this scheme was an initial 10 members, which will hopefully increase to 20 in time. This has raised £10,000 (an obvious calculation there!)
  • CFU membership had a forecasted budget of £20,000 to hit and we are on course to hit this figure.
  • Extra benefits are being looked at on a continuing basis for life members.

 

Matchday Experience – Themes

  • 10th November – Altrincham – Remembrance Weekend. Together with the Community Trust, the pre match routine included attendance from the Veterans and Mercian Regiment, and a impeccably observed period of silence to pay tribute.
  • 1st December – Darlington – Retro Day. whilst we didn’t get a crowd of over 2000, which was disappointing, we still managed an increased attendance based on CFC fixtures played on this week in previous seasons. We also believe that there was definitely a feel good factor around the ground with the theme, along with some great sights of fans in their old Chester tops. Whilst financially it didn’t net the club any profit the fact that season ticket holders were able to take advantage of a £5 discount on purchases in the club shop helped produce great figures for the shop on Retro Day. We will keep the thought of having Retro Day 2 in our minds for next season’s planning. Half Time entertainment went down well too, and thanks to Buy Clever Stuff for their help and prizes donations.
  • 22nd December – Telford – Christmas Theme, with Santa making an appearance of course!
  • We are looking at themes for the rest of the season, and will release those in due course, but we are hoping to have involvement from former players, Junior Blues, as well as the Community Trust.

 

Half Time Entertainment

  • This was introduced for the Altrincham match and as mentioned above the Darlington match, and believe that it went down well and will continue to try and provide an enjoyable experience to all watching.

 

Cestrian 10 (part) Season Ticket

  • Launched Saturday 20th October together with social media marketing and promotional advertising via local press and also a radio advert dedicated to the Cestrian 10 on Dee 106.3 – thanks to Dee for this.
  • We have had more uptake than last season. The initiative now includes Legends Lounge as well as around the ground tickets, and currently offers fans a choice of 10 games from a possible 12. The scheme will end after the Telford match.
  • We are also putting plans together with the Community Trust for remaining unsold Cestrian 10 books.

 

Chester FC fans App

  • Launched in pre-season, this is in full operation and continuing to work well – we are monitoring the output match by match at present, and all feedback is positive.
  • We also have an additional person helping to respond to questions / promote the App.

 

Online Ticketing

  • This was trialled in 2018 for an initial period, however take up was low and would not have been cost effective to continue given the running costs of the platform. FEWG are continuing to look at alternative options for future use.

 

Gazebo

  • Continuing with the Community Trust. We will look to resume CFU membership applications in March at the Gazebo, although other initiatives may well be progressed via the Gazebo in between times.

 

Blues Bar

  • We have kept in dialogue with Dougherty & Allen to ensure that fans are getting the best experience possible in the Blues Bar and kiosks, following the negative feedback received after the first match of the season.

 

Fan Zone (for drinks)

  • This is to be discussed further in January as we want to progress this to enable a Fan Zone to be set up to allow fans to enjoy the matchday experience further. Dialogue continues with the Safety team. An initial conversation has taken place around the possibility of this being introduced.

 

One2One Challenge

  • We are continuing to promote the challenge for members to introduce one new member to CFU.

 

Various Fan Groups

  • Chester Exiles – FEWG have worked with Bern & Jonno to get a personal message out to the Chester Exiles who potentially feel less involved with our fixtures this season given the geographical nature of this season’s fixture list. FEWG want to ensure that the Chester Exiles are made to feel as inclusive as the rest of the supporters.
  • FEWG to liaise more with the Senior Blues in 2019, to ensure that their group is also getting the best matchday experience too.

 

Match Posters

  • We are continuing to look at match posters – there are various online posters produced, which are shared across social media. Non online posters are a different kettle of fish, given the costs involved of advertising, although we have tried asking fans to help distribute but this received a low response rate. We are also looking in to the possibility of having an external sign outside the stadium advertising future matches (this in early stages at present).

 

 

Other Items being looked at/discussed:

  • Bus service for matchdays
  • Increasing the number of children at matches
  • 2019 Fans Survey
  • Season Tickets 2019/20 – for discussion later this season

 

 

 

 

So, as you can see lots going on with the Fan Engagement and Membership section headed up by Guy Lister, and we’re always looking for more members, so if you would like to join our working group then please email fewg@chesterfc.com to become involved.

CFU Directors’ Portfolio Update – Fundraising & Governance

Posted by Jeff Banks on

 

Today, we continue the updates from the Director portfolios, with David Williams providing the Fundraising Update and Mark Jones with the Governance Update.

 

Firstly, David Williams, Fundraising Portfolio:

 

Christmas Raffle & Party – Since the Evening with Kevin Ratcliffe in the Summer, the main focus of the Fundraising Working Group has been the Christmas Raffle and Party. We have

  • Sold tickets in pubs
  • Sold tickets at The Forum in the City Centre
  • Sold tickets at MBNA

Furthermore, we would like to thank all the fans who have sold tickets themselves. This is something we need all fans to get involved with as it is one of the income streams that the club relies on.

The draw for which took place last night at the Chester FC Christmas Party at the Upton British Legion. Details of winners will be published in due course.

 

Seals Lottery – Regular publication of the draw results has seen a gradual increase in sales of Seal Lottery tickets, first prize was an impressive £542 last month. The pay out is linked to the number of entrants and we hope to grow this further in the New Year.

 

50-50 Draw – In conjunction with the Fan Engagement Working Group, we have offered half-time fan experiences out on the pitch as consolation prizes in the 50-50 draws. All being well, this will increase ticket sales and make the main cash prize even bigger!

 

eBay – Our eBay auctions have raised circa £1,600 since they begin in February. We wish to thank all who have placed bids – we even had a winner who lives in Shanghai! We hope to offer something relating to the Akwasi Asante debut hat-trick in the near future.

 

 

Mark Jones, Governance Update

 

Health & Safety – The last few months have been very busy on the Health & Safety front with a number of planned regular safety inspections from CWAC, the FA and under the Safety of Sports Ground Act.
Considerable progress has been made on a full review of our health & safety policies, risk assessments and safety certificate renewals.

Safety Certificate – The flooding obviously gave us major headaches with the safety certificate, however we were successful in regaining our safety certificate from CWAC following that difficult period.

Safety Advisory Group – A meeting of the SAG was held on 26th November. One area of discussion was the potential for a separate safety certificate to also enable Chester FC to host events at the stadium not involving football. This could potentially open a number of doors for revenue in the future,

Working Group – The Governance working group has attracted new members and is now meeting on a monthly basis.
Each member of the Governance working group will be working alongside CFU Board members to review and manage risks within their portfolio.

 

 

Tomorrow’s update will be provided Jeff Banks, whose portfolio includes Membership & Fan Engagement.

CFU Directors’ Portfolio Update – Commercial

Posted by Jeff Banks on

2018 has been a year to both forget and remember for Chester fans and owners.

 

It started of course, with the crisis meeting in January that saw CFU members and Blues fans alike come together and raise funds to effectively keep the club going in its hour of need.

 

Changes to the board followed with a desire to put the club back on track, and along with some amazing fundraising efforts we’ve seen the club go from strength to strength especially with the change in management team that saw Bern and Jonno come in after last season finished.

 

The call has gone out for additional bodies on both the board and working groups, to help continue drive the club forward and as we approach Christmas and the tail end of the year, in the absence of a CFU members meeting in December the board of directors wanted to update you with a taste of what they’ve been working on since the last members’ meeting and what is to come in their portfolios, and today we begin with the Chairman, David Harrington-Wright.

 

David listed the following as updates in the Commercial portfolio.

 

Matchday sponsorships – We have almost completely sold out match ball and programme sponsorships which is great news, but there are a few remaining so would encourage anyone wanted to book a matchday package to contact commercial@chesterfc.com straight away to avoid missing out!

 

Ground Boards – We have also several new ground boards in place which was always the aim, to bring new companies and sponsors into the club.

 

Groundsman’s Facilities – We have also contra deals put in place that have brought a top of the range mower for Mike Barrow, which enables vastly improved cutting of the grass and less time required on that side of things.

A contra deal has also been arranged with a company that provide drainage services for the pitch, this being a five year deal saving the club about £3k, but also gives us additional services free of charge too, which naturally is a major positive!

 

Club Shop – We have a new supplier of additional clothing and promotional items for the club shop and online, the first products were two bespoke jackets for the managers, which they can be seen wearing when not on the touchline.

 

End of Season Event – We are currently having meetings and discussion around of an end of season party, with details to follow on this very soon. We do of course have to take into consideration available dates with the planning of the event too.

 

Next Season – Even though we’re still only midway through this season, we are now planning for next season, talking to all existing sponsors, and of course new sponsors expressing interest in supporting the club.

 

Working group – We are a small working group, so always looking for more people to be part of helping the commercial side, and would encourage anyone interested to contact us via emailing commercial@chesterfc.com and a member of the Group will respond.

 

Tomorrow we’ll have an update from the Fundraising portfolio holder, David Williams, and also the Governance portfolio holder, Mark Jones.

 

Membership Target for 2018 hit!

Posted by Jeff Banks on

City Fans United are delighted to announce that the membership target of 2018 members by the end of the year 2018 has been hit and surpassed with 2 weeks to spare!

 

The Fan Engagement Working Group (FEWG) have confirmed that together with the CFU Junior Blues, we now have over 2018 members!

 

In celebration of this, one City Fans United member will be drawn at random to win a voucher to the value of £20.18 to spend in the club shop, with the draw taking place later this week.

 

The FEWG have also announced that 10 life members have been signed up to the new Life Membership package which was announced earlier this season, and we would like to thank each and every one of the new Life Members who have joined up and confirm that membership packs are being sent out this week.

 

Jeff Banks, director of Fan Engagement was delighted the target number had been hit, “Following the January fans meeting at Chester FC, the FEWG was set up and we set out to achieve a goal of 2018 members by the end of 2018, and that is exactly what has been achieved. Just under 12 months ago we had barely 1000 members so to double that number is brilliant. Naturally we want to increase that number further and would encourage anyone who hasn’t joined yet to do so. We’ll shortly be looking to make being a CFU member even more attractive and are working together with local businesses to provide our members with discounts.”

 

Banks also confirmed that the FEWG were working on a number of themed match days for the New Year following on from the Remembrance and Retro Day themes that took place in November and December respectively, “Our aim is to improve the matchday experience for supporters and we have a Christmas theme for this coming Saturday and have already got a number of planned themes for 2019 that we are also working together with the Community Trust on too, and we hope everyone will take part and enjoy those theme days.”

 

Chester FC Christmas Raffle Draw 2018

Posted by David Williams on

The 2018 Chester FC Christmas Raffle will be drawn on Friday, 21st December during the Chester FC Christmas Party at the Upton British Legion where club legend, Grenville Millington, will be in attendance.

 

If you have ticket stubs – and cash – to get back to the club, please return them to the office as soon as possible, the postal address is:

 

General Office
Chester Swansway Stadium
Bumpers Lane
Chester
CH1 4LT

 

To be included in the draw, tickets need to be at the club by Friday afternoon. They can also be handed to The Fundraising Team at the start of the Christmas Party at the Upton British Legion on Friday, 21st December.

 

Furthermore, you can purchase tickets right up to the day of the draw via this webpage.

 

Tickets for the Christmas Party at Upton British Legion on 21st December, which begins at 7:30 pm, are available from the club office and also on the door on the night.

 

Chester FC Christmas Raffle Prizes 2018

Posted by David Williams on

We are delighted to announce the full list of prizes for the 2018 Christmas Raffle

 

  1. £1,000
  2. £500
  3. £250
  4. Kindle tablet
  5. Blyth Match Ball Sponsorship package
  6. Legend’s Lounge tickets for two people
  7. Darlington Match Ball
  8. Cestrian 10 family tickets
  9. ‘The Card’ Steve Hill book
  10. 7-day passes for Brio leisure https://www.brioleisure.org/
  11. 7-day passes for Brio leisure https://www.brioleisure.org/
  12. Voucher for Old Port Spa https://oldportspa.com/
  13. Venue Cymru voucher https://venuecymru.co.uk/homepage
  14. Breakout Chester voucher for 2-5 people https://breakoutchester.com/
  15. Family ticket to Blue Planet Aquarium https://www.blueplanetaquarium.com/
  16. Meal for two at the Galley https://thegalleyep.com/

 

We would like to express our immense gratitude to all the fans and local businesses who have donated prizes.

 

Tickets for this year’s Christmas Raffle are available from the club’s ticket office during office hours. For those who cannot get to the stadium, requests for tickets to be posted out can be sent to info@chesterfc.com

NB: CFU Members who live more than circa 25 miles from Chester should receive Christmas Raffle tickets in the post by 8th December if they haven’t done so already

 

 

CFU Meeting – Thursday 15 November

Posted by Jeff Banks on

The next City Fans United meeting will take place in the Blues Bar, at the Swansway Chester Stadium, on Thursday 15th November.

 

The meeting that will get underway at 7.30pm, is an informal meeting and so is open to non-members as well as current members.

 

It’s an ideal opportunity to come and hear from the CFU board on latest developments, as well as hopefully hearing from joint managers Bern & Jonno.

 

You can also sign up to CFU membership on the night too, with the membership package an unbeatable £12 per year at present.

 

The intention is also to stream the meeting on our CFU You Tube channel, on the evening itself.