| 'You're Not Fit To Wear The Shirt...' 17:31 - Jan 21 with 24235 views | dalemark |
There is a very real danger that we are rotten from the bottom leading upwards within the club. The current playing squad are at risk of undermining the board & fan effort of the past 2 years.
Lack of effort, lack of commitment, lack of leadership... Quigley sarcastically clapping and nodding at the away fans at full time, players running and hiding...
After 100 years in the football league, after a 2 year fight to save the club, after the unification of a fanbase to remain fan-led, today we stare onto the abyss.
At the behest of Tony Pockney last Saturday, I sent an email to him on Monday with feedback and ideas for the club.
Almost one week later, I haven't even received a courtesy 'thanks for your email' response. If the ideas are rubbish, or not welcome, that is fine - but to not even get a simple reply raises questions about motivation and drive that need answering.
I never intended to make this email public, but for the sake of transparency, this is what was sent:
"Tony,
Following on from our conversation on Saturday Tony, I wanted to get in touch about some concerns / feedback / ideas for the retail and commercial side of the club. I take no pleasure in highlighting concerns, particularly following the unbelievable work the board did to safeguard the club from Morton House (which will never be forgotten), but at a time when we are losing £20K per week it is incredibly frustrating to see so many missed opportunities to increase commercial performance — the vast majority of the ideas I will outline below cost nothing other than existing wages, and just require some commercial acumen and forward / joined up thinking. I had a conversation with Simon over LinkedIn on the 2nd December 2021 offering voluntary support or consultancy for the retail / commercial side of the business, as I have ~15 years experience leading retail and omnichannel transformation and performance programmes, but didn’t hear back after the initial messages. That offer still stands today — I want to help.
There are lots of instances that I am aware of where sponsors, potential sponsors and corporate hospitality guests have had difficulty getting in touch with the commercial team. When they have managed to do so, the response has been underwhelming with false promises, long SLAs and generally a lethargic attitude. A few of them very much feel like once the club has their money they are no longer valued, and that is a dangerous position to be in. We need to quickly build relationships with small, medium and large businesses in the Rochdale Borough that have been allowed to lapse. Its frustrating that a smaller sports club in the town (Hornets) seem much more adept at doing this than we are, particularly given the size of our commercial team at present. Rochdale as a town is lucky to have a professional football team — its our job to help people understand that and build relationships so they want to be part of our journey.
Idea #1 — Add value to existing sponsors. Do this by updating all player imagery (social media / scoreboard) with images of their player sponsors (these have recently been added to substitutions which is a huge step forward)... at Barrow they read out the names of sponsors over the tannoy when announcing the squad and substitutions etc. This is a free and easy way to add value to sponsors at zero extra cost, and would help them reach people who may not pay much attention to the scoreboard. Give every single player sponsor a feature on our social media channels — ‘Friends of the club February’ or something similar. Tag them in where we have their profiles, thank them for their support and give a brief piece about what they do. This would add so much value to the businesses we have as sponsors and foster so much goodwill. Most importantly, tell them we are doing it! Let them know how much additional value we are giving them at no extra cost — at a tough time for the club, we appreciate their support.
Idea #2 — Have a huge drive on reengaging with existing and lapsed sponsors. Ask them in a consistent format (survey or similar) how they are REALLY finding their relationship with the club, and don’t be afraid of constructive feedback. Find out what they love about dealing with us, and canvas their opinions on how we could add value to them ahead of them sponsoring again next season. Use this insight to drive our commercial offering in 2023 and beyond… if we are to remain fan led, that needs to permeate throughout the club. Sponsorships should be sponsor led. Executive packages should be people led. Retail should be demand and customer led… you get the idea. If we get this right now, we have time to shape sponsorship for 2023/24 and beyond. As a thank you for their time and feedback, offer them a couple of free tickets for an upcoming match. Have the commercial team on hand to meet them and have a chat with them face to face on the day — this would be so much more powerful than a relationship based on emails or phone calls.
Idea #3 — Leverage remaining sponsorship opportunities for this season. It was great to see the sponsorship angle with Danny Lloyd, but that quickly lapsed back to normal when we signed Eastwood back. There was no mention of sponsorship on his welcome article — a missed opportunity. Lets look at selling sponsorship for injury time - £50 per match or £500 for the rest of the season. It would cost nothing to add an image onto the scoreboard, and they would be guaranteed to have their business name read out twice per game. Contact lapsed player sponsors and ask if they would be interested in a discounted rate for the rest of the season. Lets start building up an active and engaged sponsorship database ahead of next season — warm leads if you will. I don’t know whether we have an active pipeline software or CRM, but if we don’t then free alternatives are available.
Idea #4 — Have an agreed process for updating the social media headers and fixture board at 15:01 on every matchday. Until 10am this morning we were still advertising Colchester (H) as our next game on social media. It’s a 2 minute job, and just creates a more seamless experience for the occasional attendee. The next fixture should be showing as people walk out at full time, and should be showing to anybody who checks social media during the current game. As part of this, we could be making better use of the billboard on Sandy Lane / Wilbutts Lane. It is still advertising season tickets that went off sale 4 months ago. One graphic showing all upcoming matches that month could be put up as soon as the last game of the current month has finished. This is the only idea I’m proposing that costs actual money, and we could even offer that out for sponsorship — get a company to pay for the print and install and give them a prominent space on the billboard.
Idea #5 — Work smarter not harder with our retail offering. As of now, I literally cannot go onto the club shop website and buy a Dale pen, a Dale mug, a Dale notebook, a Dale water bottle. I appreciate your point about minimum order quantities, but for the items I just mentioned they will not expire. The Hendo merchandise became available a whole month after he broke the record…. If we were thinking commercially, as soon as he was two goals away they should’ve been ordered and in the stock room. The minute he broke the record there should have been tweets ready to go advertising them… how many people would’ve gone to the shop immediately after the Salford game to get a piece of memorabilia there and then whilst the feel good factor was still around? Missed opportunity.
We could be advertising relevant products on every single article on the website. Hartlepool travel? Link to the coat sale we have on because its going to be cold. Fitness in the community programme? Link to fitness wear that we have, as the target demographic may not have sportswear already. Player interviews? Link to autograph books and pens. It is so simple, and it should be easy to track click through & success rates. Fans of the club are a captive audience, but they may never go onto the shop website as it is currently so poor. Link something from there that is relevant to an article they’ve taken the time to read and I’d expect a decent uplift.
Idea #6 — Following on from Idea 5, I’d be interested to know if we have explored ‘direct from supplier’ stockists. If ordering minimum quantities is a challenge and we rarely break even on items, de-risk it by taking a smaller profit from items that are dispatched by the manufacturer. It saves us sitting on stock, and even if we just take 20%, 20% of something is better than the current 100% of nothing. If we are not in the financial position to take risks on lines, lets look at getting the whole online shop running in the same fashion as the personalised section. The recent kit survey was a fantastic idea — we could do similar for our retail offering to shape what we want to do in future… I’ve attached a really simple draft as a starting point.
These are some really simple ideas which, as I outlined at the start, require no funding but do require passion, forward thinking and a joined up departmental approach from the people we employ to deliver on our commercial and retail performance goals. They are in the main simple, free and measurable. You know as well as I do that historically the club has been slated for poor commercial offerings and departments working in silo. Building on the good work you guys have done in terms of accountability and reporting, there is a huge opportunity to make a sizeable and noticeable difference across these areas of the club. I’d be happy to come and have a face to face conversation with you to work through the above in more detail, and discuss more aspirational future ideas such as targeted advertising and endless aisle through our online offering, at a time that is convenient. There is a groundswell of pride amongst the fanbase, and a real willingness from people to help. I’m proud to support a fan owned / fan led club, as are others… we all have skin in the game and a reason to make this work.
Let me know if you have any questions on any of the above, if you want to meet to discuss in further detail, or if I can help out in any way at all."
[Post edited 21 Jan 2023 17:33]
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| 'You're Not Fit To Wear The Shirt...' on 16:54 - Feb 1 with 3263 views | 442Dale |
| 'You're Not Fit To Wear The Shirt...' on 22:19 - Jan 21 by 442Dale |
https://www.daletrust.co.uk/2023/01/10891/
<<“It was discussed at the Shareholders AGM a couple of months ago that the Club were looking into working closer with the fanbase, by offering positions that supporters could volunteer for. The Club stated that they were very close to finishing the details behind this scheme and it will be launched at some stage in January.
Action: Club to publish details of the Voluntary Scheme in January.”>>
Let’s not be unfair here, the club do engage with the Trust and fans and that is deserving of credit. It’s more that there should be a constant desire to do better and welcome the constructive criticism and ideas. The frustrations you have had are a good example of this. There’s no consistency and visible process. Whether this will change in the next ten days when details of the Voluntary Scheme are released, is something that will have to be assessed.
Worth noting in there that the club have followed through on engaging with fans on kits. Proof that going through the Trust and having a known process with regards to reporting on meetings and having defined timelines can work.
It’s making that the norm in every situation. |
Any updates on this? Possibly mention will be made about reasons for any delay in the Trust February newsletter or it can be chased up by the Trust for further clarification via their website.
Detailed timelines are good and should be adhered to wherever possible and, as there has been over two months since the idea was first raised at the Shareholders AGM, setting “January” as when the the club would “publish details of the Voluntary Scheme” must have been seen as achievable. Events such as transfer windows, ongoing work on looking at investment and day to day club business would presumably have been factored in when this was agreed. |  |
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| 'You're Not Fit To Wear The Shirt...' on 19:40 - Feb 1 with 3031 views | Sandyman |
Dale Trust February Newsletter has just landed in the inbox. On 1st February. |  | | |
| 'You're Not Fit To Wear The Shirt...' on 20:09 - Feb 1 with 2960 views | blackdogblue |
| 'You're Not Fit To Wear The Shirt...' on 19:40 - Feb 1 by Sandyman |
Dale Trust February Newsletter has just landed in the inbox. On 1st February. |
Not mine just checked.. have raised this with the trust & they said all would be sorted 🤨
Fortunately the kids (as I call them) & Mrs BDB are members so I can access it…
After slagging off negative comments from “social media” I presume a dig at this board..
I stopped reading after this gem…
On the brighter side, you may already have heard that the Club has recently secured a contract to utilise the training facility at Platt Lane Sports Complex. This ideal, cost-effective facility comprises a variety of top-quality pitches, a fully equipped gym, catering, and conference rooms for meetings with players post training. This is the type of facility sought for so long to provide the much-needed environment, not only to improve squad performance, but also provide an additional vital ingredient in the overall benefit package to assist in attracting future playing staff.
Already heard, are they taking the mick… what outlet was that on? Defo not Twitter.. was it a secret 🤷â€â™‚ï¸
# not impressed .. [Post edited 1 Feb 2023 20:24]
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| 'You're Not Fit To Wear The Shirt...' on 20:33 - Feb 1 with 2872 views | 442Dale |
Interesting info on the training ground, something that should be shared with all supporters via the club’s website.
Not sure what is ever achieved by mentioning how some fans comment online. If they go too far and are abusive that is never acceptable, but on here we are usually very good at self policing and will call each other out. Other social media? It’s not great at times, but that’s at every club. Don’t think any sensible fan had doubts about the club were trying to improve the squad and it’s to their credit that’s happened over the last week, they deservedly received praise for the additions.
Not confined to the subject of making the team better, but sometimes constructive criticism is as vital to supporting the club as offering support for everything that is happening.
No update on the Volunteer Scheme, though now the action point date has not been met there may be something separate to follow before the end of the week. | |
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| 'You're Not Fit To Wear The Shirt...' on 20:46 - Feb 1 with 2810 views | blackdogblue |
| 'You're Not Fit To Wear The Shirt...' on 20:33 - Feb 1 by 442Dale |
Interesting info on the training ground, something that should be shared with all supporters via the club’s website.
Not sure what is ever achieved by mentioning how some fans comment online. If they go too far and are abusive that is never acceptable, but on here we are usually very good at self policing and will call each other out. Other social media? It’s not great at times, but that’s at every club. Don’t think any sensible fan had doubts about the club were trying to improve the squad and it’s to their credit that’s happened over the last week, they deservedly received praise for the additions.
Not confined to the subject of making the team better, but sometimes constructive criticism is as vital to supporting the club as offering support for everything that is happening.
No update on the Volunteer Scheme, though now the action point date has not been met there may be something separate to follow before the end of the week. |
Think this needs a separate thread … | |
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| 'You're Not Fit To Wear The Shirt...' on 20:48 - Feb 1 with 2790 views | fitzochris |
| 'You're Not Fit To Wear The Shirt...' on 20:33 - Feb 1 by 442Dale |
Interesting info on the training ground, something that should be shared with all supporters via the club’s website.
Not sure what is ever achieved by mentioning how some fans comment online. If they go too far and are abusive that is never acceptable, but on here we are usually very good at self policing and will call each other out. Other social media? It’s not great at times, but that’s at every club. Don’t think any sensible fan had doubts about the club were trying to improve the squad and it’s to their credit that’s happened over the last week, they deservedly received praise for the additions.
Not confined to the subject of making the team better, but sometimes constructive criticism is as vital to supporting the club as offering support for everything that is happening.
No update on the Volunteer Scheme, though now the action point date has not been met there may be something separate to follow before the end of the week. |
Yes, I’ve been critical of events on the pitch this season and some off it too. Doesn’t mean I support the club any less. In fact, you have to be pretty arsed about something to be motivated to air your opinion, especially when you know it might not be universally received.
I think one thing anyone should know about Rochdale AFC is that, although comparatively small, it does not have a passive fan base. Rarely will we just shrug our shoulders. As long as criticism is delivered the right way, it should never be dismissed, nor should those holding those views. [Post edited 1 Feb 2023 20:50]
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| 'You're Not Fit To Wear The Shirt...' on 20:54 - Feb 1 with 2752 views | 442Dale |
| 'You're Not Fit To Wear The Shirt...' on 20:48 - Feb 1 by fitzochris |
Yes, I’ve been critical of events on the pitch this season and some off it too. Doesn’t mean I support the club any less. In fact, you have to be pretty arsed about something to be motivated to air your opinion, especially when you know it might not be universally received.
I think one thing anyone should know about Rochdale AFC is that, although comparatively small, it does not have a passive fan base. Rarely will we just shrug our shoulders. As long as criticism is delivered the right way, it should never be dismissed, nor should those holding those views. [Post edited 1 Feb 2023 20:50]
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Yep. It’s bloody hard work* at times to put the effort to try and look at how things can be better!
As you say, that sort of commitment which exists right across our supporter base is indeed unique and one reason we’ve got through the last couple of years. We can’t now start picking and choosing what we want to hear. Put the abuse and rants to one side, take on board everything else.
*no need to mention how hard working. Ever. | |
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| 'You're Not Fit To Wear The Shirt...' on 21:00 - Feb 1 with 2722 views | dalemark |
| 'You're Not Fit To Wear The Shirt...' on 20:48 - Feb 1 by fitzochris |
Yes, I’ve been critical of events on the pitch this season and some off it too. Doesn’t mean I support the club any less. In fact, you have to be pretty arsed about something to be motivated to air your opinion, especially when you know it might not be universally received.
I think one thing anyone should know about Rochdale AFC is that, although comparatively small, it does not have a passive fan base. Rarely will we just shrug our shoulders. As long as criticism is delivered the right way, it should never be dismissed, nor should those holding those views. [Post edited 1 Feb 2023 20:50]
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Although a 'non-passive' fan base is a huge asset, there will come a point where people with even the best intentions hit a point of apathy.
Plenty of fans have offered constructive feedback on different aspects of the club - I don't think anybody that didn't care would go to the effort of even typing those ideas up. The club will be worse off in the long run if it doesn't engage.
The lack of communication about the new training facility (bar a throwaway sentence in a Bentley interview, especially following rumours about the acrimonious exit of the old place) is one example where communication could be better... finding out it appears to be permanent via the Trust email probably isn't the best way of getting the message out there - how would I know about it if I wasn't in the Trust? The lack of even a holding statement for the 'volunteer army' the club committed to is another example.
The vast majority of this fanbase I believe care about the board succeeding at Dale - but they will only do that by taking us on the journey with them. Fan led. | | | |
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| 'You're Not Fit To Wear The Shirt...' on 21:23 - Feb 1 with 2649 views | fourfourtwo |
The trust newsletters are usually excellent but there does seem to be a bit of a conciliatory “told you so” tone to that one. Especially regarding signings.
The communication from the club is dire, and the fact we’ve not even been told that we now have an agreement at Platt Lane is just another prime example.
The deadline day stuff on our Twitter was pretty poor yesterday and last night. There we plenty of fans staying up late in hope and there were no teases of signings or any of the fun we’ve seen in the past. Our social output is light years behind plenty of other League Two clubs. |  | | |
| 'You're Not Fit To Wear The Shirt...' on 21:28 - Feb 1 with 2609 views | 442Dale |
| 'You're Not Fit To Wear The Shirt...' on 21:23 - Feb 1 by fourfourtwo |
The trust newsletters are usually excellent but there does seem to be a bit of a conciliatory “told you so” tone to that one. Especially regarding signings.
The communication from the club is dire, and the fact we’ve not even been told that we now have an agreement at Platt Lane is just another prime example.
The deadline day stuff on our Twitter was pretty poor yesterday and last night. There we plenty of fans staying up late in hope and there were no teases of signings or any of the fun we’ve seen in the past. Our social output is light years behind plenty of other League Two clubs. |
I thought the twitter stuff yesterday was quite good! They can only react when given the go ahead and the malarkey and Partridge tweets were clever. | |
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| 'You're Not Fit To Wear The Shirt...' on 21:42 - Feb 1 with 2538 views | fourfourtwo |
| 'You're Not Fit To Wear The Shirt...' on 21:28 - Feb 1 by 442Dale |
I thought the twitter stuff yesterday was quite good! They can only react when given the go ahead and the malarkey and Partridge tweets were clever. |
I think my biggest disappointment was everything going quiet after the new centre half signed. Think quite a few fans went bed disappointed at 11pm and then we announced him at 11.25 or something. I know it’s not a major thing but social interaction is key. | | | |
| 'You're Not Fit To Wear The Shirt...' on 21:56 - Feb 1 with 2501 views | dalemark |
| 'You're Not Fit To Wear The Shirt...' on 21:42 - Feb 1 by fourfourtwo |
I think my biggest disappointment was everything going quiet after the new centre half signed. Think quite a few fans went bed disappointed at 11pm and then we announced him at 11.25 or something. I know it’s not a major thing but social interaction is key. |
To be fair to the club, I'd imagine last night was incredibly frustrating.
I reckon they had stuff planned to announce Brierley going, as well as for the other rumoured incoming, and just had to sit & wait to see if EFL approval came through.
As much as I think our social output could be substantially improved a lot of the time, I'd argue last night was just a weird situation where they couldn't do right for doing wrong. 'Malarkey' & 'Partridge' were certainly a step in the right direction when we had announcements to make. [Post edited 1 Feb 2023 21:58]
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| 'You're Not Fit To Wear The Shirt...' on 08:32 - Feb 2 with 2189 views | fitzochris |
| 'You're Not Fit To Wear The Shirt...' on 21:56 - Feb 1 by dalemark |
To be fair to the club, I'd imagine last night was incredibly frustrating.
I reckon they had stuff planned to announce Brierley going, as well as for the other rumoured incoming, and just had to sit & wait to see if EFL approval came through.
As much as I think our social output could be substantially improved a lot of the time, I'd argue last night was just a weird situation where they couldn't do right for doing wrong. 'Malarkey' & 'Partridge' were certainly a step in the right direction when we had announcements to make. [Post edited 1 Feb 2023 21:58]
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I agree with this. I don’t think the club could have done any different.
Given how last minute a lot of the signings were, the info relayed to supporters was as good as it could have been.
The stuff around Brierley is what I feel is causing the main angst among the support and that being because there is radio silence on this from the club and yet external media and other social media accounts are actively reporting it. Hopefully we will get official word soon.
In terms of the signings themselves, while they all may not be Bentley’s first choices, he’s done well to cover the positions he needed to given the position we’re in. They may not prove to be enough, but at least we rolled the dice and that is to be appreciated. | |
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| 'You're Not Fit To Wear The Shirt...' on 11:38 - Feb 2 with 1895 views | fourfourtwo |
| 'You're Not Fit To Wear The Shirt...' on 08:32 - Feb 2 by fitzochris |
I agree with this. I don’t think the club could have done any different.
Given how last minute a lot of the signings were, the info relayed to supporters was as good as it could have been.
The stuff around Brierley is what I feel is causing the main angst among the support and that being because there is radio silence on this from the club and yet external media and other social media accounts are actively reporting it. Hopefully we will get official word soon.
In terms of the signings themselves, while they all may not be Bentley’s first choices, he’s done well to cover the positions he needed to given the position we’re in. They may not prove to be enough, but at least we rolled the dice and that is to be appreciated. |
Maybe I'm just being harsh, I suppose if the communication was better in other respects I may not judge the Social interaction from the other night as harshly.
Just commented the same on another thread RE Brierley. Its bonkers we've not come out & said anything. An experienced PR person would have a field day whipping the club into shape.
Also agree regarding the players. Just hope the recent losses against all the clubs around us doesn't come back to bite us hard. We're going to have to pull a fair few rabbits out of the hat against supposed better clubs. But to be fair that's always been the Rochdale way hasn't it? Nothing we've ever done or achieved has been easy. | | | |
| 'You're Not Fit To Wear The Shirt...' on 13:56 - Feb 2 with 1684 views | seasidedale |
Do we not have a media person? There recently was someone in this role, what’s happened to Leighanne it’s gone quiet on that front | | | |
| 'You're Not Fit To Wear The Shirt...' on 18:10 - Feb 2 with 1418 views | DaleiLama |
Rhys gets it! It's really not difficult.
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| 'You're Not Fit To Wear The Shirt...' on 19:30 - Feb 2 with 1290 views | Shun |
| 'You're Not Fit To Wear The Shirt...' on 13:56 - Feb 2 by seasidedale |
Do we not have a media person? There recently was someone in this role, what’s happened to Leighanne it’s gone quiet on that front |
Leighanne left a few months ago I believe. |  | | |
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