Now, 38 years since the last major redevelopment of Goodison, bar an embarrassingly cheap and un-ambitious redevelopment of the Park End in 1994, we once again see a route away from playing in a 20^th century stadium towards a 21^st century stadium collapse around us, leaving us with the prospect of playing in this once world class stadium, still very much stuck in 1960s standards, for another 5 or so years.

I don’t think I need to go into the Kirkby debate in any real detail, the problems are well publicised, we went into a development which broke many planning guidelines and despite the recession and the need for new employment giving the proposal some hope, it was quite predictably rejected, and with it goes 3 years of work and approximately £4million from Everton’s bank account.  Lessons need to be learnt.

I wrote the other week about my views on our options for a new stadium, and I still believe we basically have the choice between finding a partner to help subsidise the move (e.g. Tesco or Liverpool FC), make the stadium as basic as possible (e.g. Kirkby), or sell equity in the stadium (e.g. Kings Dock where the rights for concerts etc. were owned by others).  Of course none of these are particularly ideal, but the financial constraints of the club, whether backed by billionaires or paupers, means we will struggle to build a stadium on our own.

The key issue with me in this Kirkby issue was the poor communication and lack of consultation between the club and fans.  Key questions need to be asked if the fans are ever going to have the stadium they desire.  For example I’d love an old feeling stadium, with external brick work and the feeling that fans are close to the pitch, something like Villa Park or Ibrox, others may want a modern bowl style stadium, something like the Emirates or Stadium Of Light, others may prefer a box style stadium similar to Koln, I only know my preference, and the club have never asked me, so how the club would know what the fans want without speaking to us adequately is beyond me.

Then there are other key questions that need to be asked, like a detailed survey into transport, because questions like “what methods of transport would you be willing to take”, “how long are you willing to spend commuting to the stadium” and a detailed survey of dispersal times is essential in my view.  And questions like what do you expect from your seat (i.e. clear view, steep/low gradient, corporate boxes behind you etc.), what facilities would you like in your stand (more food kiosks, more drink kiosks, more toilets, bookmakers etc.) and what do you want surrounding the ground to enhance your match day experience (plenty of pubs, plenty of parking, an Everton themed area, a giant Tesco superstore etc.).  These are, in my opinion, vitally important questions if you’re to appease your core customer base.  Once these questions have been answered, only then in my opinion should the club look to potential sites and once costs are taken into consideration, come up with a plan that bests suits those requirements in a financially viable way.  Quite simply the club has never done anything like this, nor do I expect any club has ever done anything like this, but we’re Everton, we have a history of setting the trend, so in future I for one would prefer the club asked my input into the stadium as opposed to making the plans then asking me yes or no.

But that’s just one aspect of the Everton business, we go far wider than that.  Behind the stadium, the retail and sponsorship are our most important areas to generate revenue (excluding TV revenues).  

Merchandising

Everton have a long history of woeful merchandising.  Before 1994 I’m lead to believe the club set a budget in the region of just £50,000 per season to buy stock, an obviously pitiful amount.  Under Johnson, as much as it pains me to complement him, he really took us forward in this respect, opening up the purpose built mega store outside Goodison, though choosing to sell Everton lemonade and chocolate there may have been a bit odd.  However we still never had a city centre presence until the current regime.  Everton’s first city centre store was a failure due to a lack of demand and also, in my view, due to location, as they chose a shop which took some 4 or so years to find new tenants once Everton had left.   Of course the infamous JJB deal followed which turned the loss into a guaranteed profit for the club, but JJB’s lack of ambition, plus their insistence on a large commission which lead to the Everton collection opting to sell their fundraising shirts via the street vendors outside Goodison instead, meant the deal ultimately turned out to be frustrating.

However in 2009, after 131 years of dire merchandising, Everton took the surprising decision to give Kitbag, the world’s leading internet sports retailer, a 10 year contract to look after Everton’s retail.  This move was surprising because Everton not only requested Kitbag do what they do best and look after the internet, but they gave a company with no experience in managing an actual store the task of transforming Everton’s stores as well as every other aspect of Everton’s retail over the coming 10 years, and so far it’s been amazingly successful.

Over the summer we saw the re-launch of Everton 1, tied in with previews of the Everton collection and the 1906 FA Cup being exhibited, and managed to attract huge queues for several hours for what is essentially a store that’s been there for 14 years.  The launch of Everton 2 created an event in Liverpool 1, with the name alone giving it national coverage.  The home kit launch saw national coverage attracting big crowds in Liverpool 1 as well as the competition involving cut out Jagielka’s providing sustained publicity for several weeks.  The away kit saw international coverage, which is a feat as many clubs can’t manage national coverage, as the club used an ‘Everton Hakka’ to promote the ‘all black’ kit.  And of course the tone completely changed as Everton opted to do a charity kit in memory of Rhys Jones for the third kit, a kit I personally hope we wear for the derby.  In fact our kit launches have proven so successful that I’m told Chelsea and Manchester United have asked Kitbag to do a launch that could match ours this summer.  It looks like after 131 long years of waiting our merchandising is finally getting to the level we need.

Sponsorship

Our sponsorship on the other hand, in my opinion, still has room for growth.  Let’s face it we’re not overly attractive to sponsors, we don’t have Champions League levels of coverage, our fans aren’t the wealthiest, and how many of us have ever bought something because it’s on a team’s shirt anyway?  But to me that doesn’t mean we can’t make the best with what we’ve got.

Football offers massive exposure if used right, football has more coverage than virtually any other industry.  We have Sky Sports News, a 24/7 channel which gives 90% of its time to football, the back 6 or more pages of most national and regional newspapers and centre pull outs on weekends, national and regional radio channels which dedicate at least an hour to football, talksport for example dedicate far more, the normal channels and news programmes offer segments in the news dedicated to football, there are countless websites, fanzines and magazines and of course the live and highlight coverage of the games, all of this at the club’s disposal for free. 

The most efficient use of this exposure is not simply to stick a sponsor’s name on your shirt or ground and expect people to see it, I think you’ve got to make a spectacle of the sponsorship.  For example, I know it may not seem the most imaginative idea, but what about something like an Everton/Chang beer festival either in and around Goodison or in the city centre, this would work its way into the media and gain coverage of millions and obviously raise the profile of the sponsor and the club, and thus the club’s reputation as a sponsorship partner allowing us to demand more money from sponsors in the future.  Of course the Everton/Chang deal has seen an academy baring that name open in Thailand and the partnership does send the odd envoy to each other, but I feel so much more can be addressed on this front.

But ultimately with sponsorship and merchandising, you’re looking at adding the odd million onto our revenue, it is with the stadium the real future growth lies, and so Mr Elstone, it’s over to you.

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