Have Suns fans already turned off of AFL?

[PAFC_1870]

I don't think their crowds will ever pickup.

They will go down and down. Not enough give 2 shits about footy up there, let alone any other sport. GWS will be similar too, but not as bad...

 

[PumpyChowdown]

People need to remember and realise that the Gold Coast isn't Melbourne or Adelaide or Perth.

Those three cities have over 100 years of going to the AFL. It's in their blood. It's not a concious decision. Round 1, you just go. Not to mention the absolute blanket media coverage and hype that goes along with it. I travelled down for the Blues Tigers game and it's amazing how the whole of Melbourne is absorbed by round 1 and footy in general.

AFL has been on the Coast for just 12 months. It's not a given that everyone will attend the game just because it's on. Not only that, but there is a myriad of other codes vying for attention. And also there is also a tonne of other stuff that Gold Coasters might prefer to be doing - be it surfing/hitting the beach, fishing, kids sports days etc.

But it boils down to culture and culture doesn't happen overnight. Everyone needs to chill out a bit and put the long term glasses on.

 

[Ron The Bear]

AFL has been on the Coast for just 12 months.

Appreciate your explanation of the difference in cultures, but the above is not quite true.

Gold Coast crowds for Brisbane 1987-92, other games 2006-09, and the Suns (W = wins by home team):

Year Ma W   Avg   Max   Min
---------------------------
1987 11 3  8965 17795  4859
1988 10 4 12425 16727  8736
1989 11 6 10944 18198  5134
1990 11 4  8887 12339  6628
1991  7 1  7399  9735  4721
1992 11 3  6499 13053  3059
---------------------------
2006  2 - 10287 12315  8258
2007  3 2 11319 11647 11133
2008  3 2  8506 10037  6354
2009  3 1 10193 11174  9112
---------------------------
2011  8 - 18167 23302 14945
2012  1 - 12790 12790 12790

The argument peddled for establishing the Suns has been that the demographic has changed in the years since Bears attendances declined. Do you think local culture is more receptive to footy than in the days of the Bears?

 

[Slattery_20]

Anecdotally (been up the last 4 years during footy season) Aussie rules isn't *that* far behind League. Have a feeling Brisbane or Cairns would be different, both having established League sides.


They'd be happy with a 12-15k crowd for the first 10 years. Took Brisbane a full decade to pass 13k average crowds, Sydney 9 years and both had plenty of 8-10k years.

 

[PumpyChowdown]

The argument peddled for establishing the Suns has been that the demographic has changed in the years since Bears attendances declined. Do you think local culture is more receptive to footy than in the days of the Bears?

Good question.

Whilst the population has certainly grown rapidly, there still is no culture of attending football, whether it's NRL, AFL or Soccer. To answer your question, I don't believe Coasties are more receptive to footy than in the '80's.

That can and should be remedied over time though. Metricon is a very good stadium and very family friendly. There is a lot of activities and promotions on during game day for the kids. Get the kids and you've got the whole family.

That being said though, the Gold Coast is an extremely big place. I think a lot of southerners see it as a little, compact strip of beach. That misconception couldn't be further from the truth. The Gold Coast covers an area of 1,400 square kilometres. It is a massive place. It had GOD AWFUL public transport. It is a city designed and built for cars. Getting to games is a pain in the bum. Hopefully, over time, the public transport infrastructure will be bought up to speed. With the Commonwealth Games in 2016, one would hope so.

When a local resident can simply jump onto a train or bus and rock up to Metricon from anywhere, crowds will climb. Transport is okay now, but could be much better.

There's really a lot of factors that go into GC crowd numbers and there is no one "magic bullet", but as I stated before, it's a long term thing. Rome wasn't built in a day...

 

[basashi]

A premium membership this year cost me $550! Compare that with any other club membership and it is by far the worst. For a similar price, you could buy an AFL membership in Melbourne. For this cost you get nothing more than entry and seating on the wing for all home games (doesn't include pre-season!).

It might be more pricey than the Vic clubs but it is a steal compared to the WA clubs

 

[Iva Bigun]

I don't think their crowds will ever pickup.

They will go down and down. Not enough give 2 shits about footy up there, let alone any other sport. GWS will be similar too, but not as bad...

I would point out that the Roar, Firebirds and the Reds won there comps last year making SEQ the most successful sporting area in the country.

 

[1873 United]

I think if 12K is the smallest crowd the suns get all season, then they are kicking goals. This is a new frontier in respect to footy, although the Koalas played there for 5 minutes in the late 80's, the game has been dormant for a long time.

One thing the AFL could look to do to assist with crowds on the coast, is to move all local footy to Sundays when the suns are on a saturady afternoon. This in turn will allow the playing public to attend the match as well.

 

[Tex_21]

Anecdotally (been up the last 4 years during footy season) Aussie rules isn't *that* far behind League. Have a feeling Brisbane or Cairns would be different, both having established League sides.

There is no top flight football team in Cairns - the Cowboys play in Townsville.

 

[Blessed]

We are just back from the gold Coast - it is all Rugby League not AFL.

 

[blaze036]

We are just back from the gold Coast - it is all Rugby League not AFL.

Blessed we know ur a rugby league troll, ur opinion has no relevence here.

 

[NTRabbit]

I will make a complaint here though, and expect it to play a factor as to why there are so few signed up members: A premium membership this year cost me $550! Compare that with any other club membership and it is by far the worst.

Sorry, but it is not the worst.

It's already been demonstrated in another thread that Premium membership costs more with West Coast, Fremantle, Port Adelaide, and can cost more with the most expensive seats with Adelaide.

You may not like how much your premium membership costs, but stop peddling that it's the most expensive going around when it is not.

 

[basashi]

Why would an Adelaide game cause a low crowd? Don't Adelaide and West Coast pull bigger interstate numbers than anyone else?

 

[NTRabbit]

Why would an Adelaide game cause a low crowd? Don't Adelaide and West Coast pull bigger interstate numbers than anyone else?

In Melbourne and Sydney yes, not so sure about Gold Coast. There are a lot of SA expats floating around the country, but they leave Adelaide to find work - and there's more of that in Melbourne and Sydney (and the mines) than there is in SE Queensland.

 

[fairdinkum]

I'm happy to put my hand up and say I was one of the Gold Coast naysayers back in 2007 when the AFL announced they would create a brand new club from scratch. I didn't think the AFL could deliver a stadium of Metricon's quality, let alone one with the financial windfalls that stadium now offers. I also didn't appreciate that Aussie Rules truly is far more prevalent up in SEQ than Rugby League is in Melbourne.

Time will tell whether or not GWS proves to be a quagmire or a masterstroke, but just how much time and how decisively it can be judged will not be known for a long time, I suspect. Therefore I will reserve judgement on that aspect of AFL expansion.

But I am right behind the Gold Coast front. I will never forget how the powers that be at AFL House, certain media parties and a few other vested interests tried to sebreptitiously kill off my club in order to sell the carcass to a Gold Coast-based consortium, but it would be foolish of me to allow that episode to taint my views about the Gold Coast standalone franchise.

Not only do I hope the GC succeeds long-term, but I genuinely believe they will, and in time we will look back at pigheaded Demetriou and his cabal of Melbourne Uni-educated polo playing lackeys as men who, despite their obvious and many flaws as administrators, were bold visionaries who took our sport further than many (myself included) thought possible into 'enemy' territory.

 

[dagriggstar]

Considering

WB pulled 24K
The Ess/NM game pulled 43K (Half it because it's two vic teams playing = 21.5K)

13K isn't all that bad. As has been mentioned RL is 11K average, Soccer isn't even on the map.

 

[Demonoid]

Good question.

Whilst the population has certainly grown rapidly, there still is no culture of attending football, whether it's NRL, AFL or Soccer. To answer your question, I don't believe Coasties are more receptive to footy than in the '80's.

That can and should be remedied over time though. Metricon is a very good stadium and very family friendly. There is a lot of activities and promotions on during game day for the kids. Get the kids and you've got the whole family.

That being said though, the Gold Coast is an extremely big place. I think a lot of southerners see it as a little, compact strip of beach. That misconception couldn't be further from the truth. The Gold Coast covers an area of 1,400 square kilometres. It is a massive place. It had GOD AWFUL public transport. It is a city designed and built for cars. Getting to games is a pain in the bum. Hopefully, over time, the public transport infrastructure will be bought up to speed. With the Commonwealth Games in 2016, one would hope so.

When a local resident can simply jump onto a train or bus and rock up to Metricon from anywhere, crowds will climb . Transport is okay now, but could be much better.

There's really a lot of factors that go into GC crowd numbers and there is no one "magic bullet", but as I stated before, it's a long term thing. Rome wasn't built in a day...

This is important. If the suns can get better public transportation on top of an expanded metricon stadium as a result of the comm games, they'd be doing very well. Public transport is key, no matter if its the MCG, the Adelaide Oval or Metricon Stadium.

 

[le dominateur]

We are just back from the gold Coast - it is all Rugby League not AFL.

Yet the Titans gave away 10000 free tickets and still only 14000 turned up.

 

[captainMyCaptain]

In 2007-2009 the titans were getting average crowds in the 20,000 and not needing to give away tickets at all. But from 2010 onwards there fan base has dropped off at an alarming rate to a stage now that they have to give away in the range of 10,000 tickets to get any kind of crowd. Which would suggested that there fan base was never rusted on. And this seems to be the thing with Gold Coast teams the fan base when these teams start off is solid but seems to drop off when things go bad or when the novelty wears off. Hopefully the suns will be the exception to what has happened to every other sporting club that has started and then gone on to fail on the Gold Coast.

 

[blaze036]

In 2007-2009 the titans were getting average crowds in the 20,000 and not needing to give away tickets at all. But from 2010 onwards there fan base has dropped off at an alarming rate to a stage now that they have to give away in the range of 10,000 tickets to get any kind of crowd. Which would suggested that there fan base was never rusted on. And this seems to be the thing with Gold Coast teams the fan base when these teams start off is solid but seems to drop off when things go bad or when the novelty wears off. Hopefully the suns will be the exception to what has happened to every other sporting club that has started and then gone on to fail on the Gold Coast.

The difference between AFL and RL/Soccer is the AFL has the money to keep GC around long enough for it to grow a decent loyal fanbase, which is why it will suceed where others have failed, it all comes down to money and clever admin/marketing.

 

[Professor Knowall]

In...And this seems to be the thing with Gold Coast teams the fan base when these teams start off is solid but seems to drop off when things go bad or when the novelty wears off ...

It appears the Suns are trying a different tact - starting off bad (thereby only attracting fans likely to become 'rusted on' through adversity), then actually becoming good after a few years when the novelty wears off - thus attracting more supporters still (albeit of the bandwagon variety).

 

[Chasing the Dream]

In Melbourne and Sydney yes, not so sure about Gold Coast. There are a lot of SA expats floating around the country, but they leave Adelaide to find work - and there's more of that in Melbourne and Sydney (and the mines) than there is in SE Queensland.

Adelaide games at the GABBA always have a large group of Crows fans. Better than most in fact.

There is even one of the bars that must have a diehard Crows fan at the GABBA as he always decorates the bar in Crows colours for that game. I have never purchased a beer at that bar ever for that reason

 

[mediumsizered]

In 2007-2009 the titans were getting average crowds in the 20,000 and not needing to give away tickets at all. But from 2010 onwards there fan base has dropped off at an alarming rate to a stage now that they have to give away in the range of 10,000 tickets to get any kind of crowd. Which would suggested that there fan base was never rusted on. And this seems to be the thing with Gold Coast teams the fan base when these teams start off is solid but seems to drop off when things go bad or when the novelty wears off. Hopefully the suns will be the exception to what has happened to every other sporting club that has started and then gone on to fail on the Gold Coast.

The Titans put together a playing list that was going to be competitive from the start. This ensured they would be winning games from the get go & therefore this translated into solid attendances. As a result of the age of their list, a number of the original players have retired, whilst those mature players left e.g. Prince, Bailey etc, have their best football behind them & as a result the Titans are struggling to be competitive & their attendances are reflecting that.

In contrast, the Suns list has been compiled with the future in mind, rather than the need to be competitive from the outset. This may affect attendances over the next couple of years, but once their young guns are at the stage of their careers when they consistently play good football, the results will start coming & the attendances will grow accordingly.