#1 [url]

Oct 24 07 4:10 PM

Impsforever wrote:

It's an interesting question. How do you represent the interests of fans who won't join the Trust? Since representation requires almost by definition organisation, then you'd have to set up another fans' organisation, but what would stop that being just a copy of the Trust as it currently stands?


Why another organisation? Why not offer an associate directorship to someone to represent the majority of voiceless supporters? You could organise all this outside of the Trust and it would certainly prove that the club was "open" to all.

6 years on and at the moment where are the tangible benefits of the Trust having a major say in the way the club operates?


5 play-offs and balanced books? Not bad considering where we started from. Goal 2010 - at least on paper a plan to modernise the Club and aspire to have a professional infrastructure? A better Youth policy? Growing our own. Improved commercial operations? Allowing better income streams.

[/quote]

We got promotion under Reames. Plans on paper aren't always worth what they are printed on. Is there any point in having a championship standard facility if we are mid table Blue Square in a years time?
Youth policy - for every Hobbs and Loach we had a Huckerby, Carbon or even Ben Dixon. Nothing too different there.

Now, I'm not saying these are all down to the Trust's involvement, but it would be hard to decide who was responsible for improvements in any case. I do think we should not as supporters underestimate how far we've come.


Perhaps.

Having said that, the next step up - promotion and consolidation - still looks beyond us, and that will naturally be the question of the next few years.


At the moment just staying in this poxy league is the priority, and everything else should be on hold.


Ticket prices are too high for all clubs in this divisions, to be honest. As to customer service, there are some bad stories, but also some good ones. I've always had pretty good service myself.


I've had good service from certain sections such as merchandising, Jill Fox is always very helpful, but elsewhere not so. I'm sure you have heard my "stop wasting my time" story from a few years back after simply enquiring about using the venue.


Standing still compared to the shambles of five years ago when we didn't even have a proper set of accounts at the Club? I have to disagree with that, I'm afraid. See my points above.


We were in a shambles down to some poxy accounting and the ITV money going tits up. And if we are one of the two relegated at the end of the season then we are seriously going backwards. Talk off 2010 should end right now and not restart until we sort out this mess and make sure we are still in this poxy league in a years time.


I dislike both "consumer" and "customer". "Supporter" will do just fine for me, but I take some of your point.


Are you a supporter of WH Smiths? Would you miss WH Smiths if it was gone? A lot of people miss Woolworths in the Waterside Centre. I'm sure people missed Maidstone United, Accrington Stanley and the original Telford too.