Are the fans getting value for money watching TFC?

[Wombat]

I was a Season Ticket holder from Day 1, but finally pulled the plug and did not renew for this year.

Yesterday was my first BMO visit this season

The GOOD - great seats on the bar-stools along the edge of the pitch, opposite the Main Stand. Only 10 ft away from the players so get to see the skills, power and players talking to each other. TFC played very well throughout the game - can't remember seeing speed and direct play like that very often before. TFC are normally sluggish and slow-moving from the back, without many creative midfielders & forwards, so looks like Ryan Nelson has put together a good team playing a direct attacking style. Earnshaw looks the real-deal - we have never had a true 'goal poacher' in the side before... unluky not to score yesterday, but good for the fans to see a speedy, aggresive striker in the side.

The BAD - seeing the team capitulate at the death AGAIN. Failing to close out games (seems like we did this every F'ckin game last season)... 90th minute goal conceded yesterday, shows the old failings are still there.

The UGLY - why are TFC fans still getting ripped off when buying beer? Contract with Carlsberg is obviously done so in come Budweiser / Labatt. Two cans of Keiths was charged as PREMIUM domestic and BUD charged as REGULAR domestic. I work in the beer industry - both beers are regular product made in Canada & cost the same per case at the Beer Store. MLSE / Labatt are taking us for stupid mugs and jacking up prices with no justification. Keiths is PREMIUM and we deserve to pay $10:50 a can??? - do fuck off.

TFC Fans still getting screwed over by the team and MLSE.... not much has changed at BMO which justifies my decision not to shell out another $1500 on season tickets this year.

Oh.... and crowds of 10-11,000 are half compared to years 1 & 2 when we were packed out every game, so I am not the only one to feel ripped off & unappreciated by the club. We love TFC and the opportunity to see good level soccer in Toronto, but the club has got to connect better with the fans & give us value for our hard earned money.

[69Chevy396]

I was a Season Ticket holder from Day 1, but finally pulled the plug and did not renew for this year.

Yesterday was my first BMO visit this season

The GOOD - great seats on the bar-stools along the edge of the pitch, opposite the Main Stand. Only 10 ft away from the players so get to see the skills, power and players talking to each other. TFC played very well throughout the game - can't remember seeing speed and direct play like that very often before. TFC are normally sluggish and slow-moving from the back, without many creative midfielders & forwards, so looks like Ryan Nelson has put together a good team playing a direct attacking style. Earnshaw looks the real-deal - we have never had a true 'goal poacher' in the side before... unluky not to score yesterday, but good for the fans to see a speedy, aggresive striker in the side.

The BAD - seeing the team capitulate at the death AGAIN. Failing to close out games (seems like we did this every F'ckin game last season)... 90th minute goal conceded yesterday, shows the old failings are still there.

The UGLY - why are TFC fans still getting ripped off when buying beer? Contract with Carlsberg is obviously done so in come Budweiser / Labatt. Two cans of Keiths was charged as PREMIUM domestic and BUD charged as REGULAR domestic. I work in the beer industry - both beers are regular product made in Canada & cost the same per case at the Beer Store. MLSE / Labatt are taking us for stupid mugs and jacking up prices with no justification. Keiths is PREMIUM and we deserve to pay $10:50 a can??? - do fuck off.

TFC Fans still getting screwed over by the team and MLSE.... not much has changed at BMO which justifies my decision not to shell out another $1500 on season tickets this year.

Oh.... and crowds of 10-11,000 are half compared to years 1 & 2 when we were packed out every game, so I am not the only one to feel ripped off & unappreciated by the club. We love TFC and the opportunity to see good level soccer in Toronto, but the club has got to connect better with the fans & give us value for our hard earned money.

Nothing will turn around until a new owner replaces mlse. No secret that they remain the worst sports entertainment business in north america based on winning percentages etc.

[[NBF]]

I watch the games just in case I miss something I might regret not having seen on tv, but I always enjoy watching the Vancouver Whitecaps on tv and I dont mind watching the Montreal Impact either. Whenever I watch TFC, Im always doing something on the side as well just to have something to do and so that I dont fall asleep. L-O-L.

BTW, I'll never forget how awesome it was to see that black cat run across the field and behind Hall. Its engraved in my head. I guess I watch TFC now just to see how badly they are against other teams and to see how badly they let the goals in the net. You can learn so much about the game when you see the good and the bad.

Watching TFC is like learning to drive by watching YouTube videos of "driving fails".

[Daze]

Nothing will turn around until a new owner replaces mlse. No secret that they remain the worst sports entertainment business in north america based on winning percentages etc.

I think that's unfair. It's not like they haven't tried putting the right people in place and i think they're doing a lt better now that they're owned by Rogers & Bell. the jays are spending money and signing high caliber players. The raptors made the Rudy Gay trade and brought in GM of the year. The leafs just made the playoffs. and we hired a proven MLS executive to run our team for the long haul.

Things haven't fallen as well as everyone would have hoped but those are all positive signs of progression. Something that there never was while the Teachers owned MLSE. Give it time. It'll get better.

[T-boy]

The beer prices are fairly regular, like in all sports and music venues where you can't bring in outside food or drink (Amphitheatre, hell even Wonderland charge insane prices for the same food that would be half the price outside the park). It's just one of those things. If you have a monopoly over sales, and there is demand, you can charge as much as you like!

Personally, I never buy beer at BMO, I just can't justify $10 for a poured can of beer that you can buy at the store for a couple of bucks, maybe even less!

[ag futbol]

I think that's unfair. It's not like they haven't tried putting the right people in place and i think they're doing a lt better now that they're owned by Rogers & Bell. the jays are spending money and signing high caliber players. The raptors made the Rudy Gay trade and brought in GM of the year. The leafs just made the playoffs. and we hired a proven MLS executive to run our team for the long haul.

Some of this is encouraging, but a lot of it is simply very small successes we would hope would be the start of better trends.

Take the leafs making the playoffs for example. That's good, but more importantly they have a young team and are likely to continue to build and make runs to the post season. For an organization like the leafs, the big picture is that it should be talking about consistently being an elite team and not just finishing in the top half. So hopefully they are on the road to that. For the raptors trading for Rudy Gay was an extremely high-risk high-reward transaction. It's another anchor of a contract that will be extremely hard to move if he doesn't play well. And we replaced the guy who just pulled the trigger on that deal a few months back, seems like a head scratcher to me. Uriji is promising and he just cleaned house today, which was necessary. Anyway, you add it all up and under the new ownership things look better than under the old but there's really still no sustained success to speak of. So I'm not particularly willing to give them much credit.

[ensco]

I put this in the game thread earlier today:

God it looked empty for a Saturday in June. The whole "Year 1 pricing" thing is backfiring, because, as everyone knew, the whole year is a write-off, and the tickets (outside of the cheapest seats) are not worth it.

The team should have given this year's seats to last years SSHs for free.

Most of the seats still cost way too much. I think spending $20 or less on a ticket is fine. But 3/4 of the seats at BMO are $30-50 on an SSH basis, 25% more game by game.

I think Anselmi and Beirne need to be out of the business office, before the marketing mistakes of the past can be addressed.

[Daze]

I put this in the game thread earlier today:

God it looked empty for a Saturday in June. The whole "Year 1 pricing" thing is backfiring, because, as everyone knew, the whole year is a write-off, and the tickets (outside of the cheapest seats) are not worth it.

The team should have given this year's seats to last years SSHs for free.

Most of the seats still cost way too much. I think spending $20 or less on a ticket is fine. But 3/4 of the seats at BMO are $30-50 on an SSH basis, 25% more game by game.

I think Anselmi and Beirne need to be out of the business office, before the marketing mistakes of the best can really be addressed.

I think a quite a bit of the stadium being more empty than usual had to do with the weather being predicted to be far worse than it was.

[gate7]

wow...how many excuses for a shitty product can one bare? Makes me feel depressed to be such a pushover as a SSH..

[Mark in Ottawa]

Value for Money really is a personal measurement isn't it. Being a supporter "from away" makes the measurement a little different for me.

Did I get good Value for Money those first few years when I had a "ransom pack"?? I would have to say yes for the new experiences, game day excitement and all of the great acquaintances I made through the Red Patch Boys.

As the product suffered on the field and the supporters found it tougher and tougher to sustain momentum that value measurement suffered along with it. After the time I personally allotted to the "5 year plan" ran out without sustained improvement I dropped my partial pack of tickets but continue to attend a handful of games each year (albeit some of those being TFC games in Montreal as it is a shorter road trip for me).

I still enjoy my time with my old friends while making new ones through the RPB. I spend very little money at BMO field and certainly none on over priced alcohol. I buy tickets from other RPB at cost or have even resorted to getting some via AirMiles.
I have also used AirMiles to get VIA rail vouchers and those paired with Internet Special train rates mean I spend little going to see TFC compared to what I used to.

So in short ... times change ... you adapt ... and if you feel that you are not getting value for money you look for other methods to decrease the cash outlay or to change your gameday experience to feel that you are getting better value for the $$ you do spend. I am still a TFC supporter and will remain a member of the RPB as well as the 75 Mile Bastards and who knows ... someday soon I may get rewarded for supporting TFC in a feel good sort of way.

[james]

The early years were great. Stadium was full, atmosphere was great. However today people are bored of watching a borring team play, it is even worse to watch them play on TV. When a good team comes to play Toronto, they look like they actually lower down to Toronto's level of playing making the game even worse. increase tickets sales also killed many fans, many will probably never come back. The strict security rules and regulations also pissed off many Supports in the South End. Many of them left and will also never be back.

Only things that can bring back atmosphere to what it once was is having a winning team for once, low ticket prices, possibly new owners other then MLSE, maybe more friendship between supporter groups and head office/stadium security, or maybe a big renovation of BMO field (some other new MLS stadiums are much nicer), or even by lowering beer prices (very unlikely).

[Shakes McQueen]

If you don't care as much about good football and winning, and are just there for the experience? Sure

If you do? Clearly you are not.

Even if you agree with the ultimate direction the team is taking, it doesn't make seeing losses and late draws every week any more bang for your buck. You just have to calculate how much "being a fan" weighs in on your own version of "being entertained". It's different for everyone.

- Scott

[james]

I was a Season Ticket holder from Day 1, but finally pulled the plug and did not renew for this year.

Yesterday was my first BMO visit this season

The GOOD - great seats on the bar-stools along the edge of the pitch, opposite the Main Stand. Only 10 ft away from the players so get to see the skills, power and players talking to each other. TFC played very well throughout the game - can't remember seeing speed and direct play like that very often before. TFC are normally sluggish and slow-moving from the back, without many creative midfielders & forwards, so looks like Ryan Nelson has put together a good team playing a direct attacking style. Earnshaw looks the real-deal - we have never had a true 'goal poacher' in the side before... unluky not to score yesterday, but good for the fans to see a speedy, aggresive striker in the side.

The BAD - seeing the team capitulate at the death AGAIN. Failing to close out games (seems like we did this every F'ckin game last season)... 90th minute goal conceded yesterday, shows the old failings are still there.

The UGLY - why are TFC fans still getting ripped off when buying beer? Contract with Carlsberg is obviously done so in come Budweiser / Labatt. Two cans of Keiths was charged as PREMIUM domestic and BUD charged as REGULAR domestic. I work in the beer industry - both beers are regular product made in Canada & cost the same per case at the Beer Store. MLSE / Labatt are taking us for stupid mugs and jacking up prices with no justification. Keiths is PREMIUM and we deserve to pay $10:50 a can??? - do fuck off.

TFC Fans still getting screwed over by the team and MLSE.... not much has changed at BMO which justifies my decision not to shell out another $1500 on season tickets this year.

Oh.... and crowds of 10-11,000 are half compared to years 1 & 2 when we were packed out every game, so I am not the only one to feel ripped off & unappreciated by the club. We love TFC and the opportunity to see good level soccer in Toronto, but the club has got to connect better with the fans & give us value for our hard earned money.

Keith's premium...hahaha. What makes it premium? It is made in Canada, it is a big major mass produced beer. Taste no different then the many other big name beers. Fact it is also called an IPA?? it tastes like neither English IPA style nor the more recent popular American style IPA or west coast IPA that is often made by craft brewery's. Keith's IPA taste more like your basic lager with not much taste in it. There new hop series in an improvement, but not great. Anyways no one should be paying a premium for this beer.

[Yagbod]

$1500 ?!? Thats most of the problem right there. Unless you are buying 7 and a half seats...

Also, of course we are being ripped off.

[Fort York Redcoat]

Yeah I got to say if you don't like paying those prices move to a cheaper section. It's not going to get any cheaper than year one but at the same time they will continuously need to justify any price increase (probably making the playoffs) I'll still like to revisit a league wide price comparison at the end of the year.

MLSE has new ownership. Ignoring that seems a touch ignorant. I'll stand with the outlook that the new ownership has everything to prove but to keep using MLSE as a continued reason for change seems naive. Also I suspect that if someone were to pie in the sky buy our TFC they couldn't afford the name and may have to change it, and possibly a stadium. That would be disappointing for me.

[brad]

Yeah I got to say if you don't like paying those prices move to a cheaper section. It's not going to get any cheaper than year one but at the same time they will continuously need to justify any price increase (probably making the playoffs) I'll still like to revisit a league wide price comparison at the end of the year.

I'm curious what pricing will look like for next year. Barring an amazing change of fortunes on the pitch, I can't see how they can increase prices from the current year one pricing without alienating a lot more SSH's

[Leedsoronto]

The $29 seats are good for us, can't say there are any bad seats in the house TBH.

If no seats available or i am working that day then the couch is free for TV games.

Either way you gotta say its addictive watching now as we wait for the first win in a while. I feel it's the game that I miss thru work that will be the 2nd one we win this season !!!!!!

[MartinUtd]

I was a season ticket holder from year 1 -5, year 6 I spent the money on a trip to LA and Seattle and this year...

I feel my $60 for MLSlive was very well spent. Despite the draw, I thoroughly enjoyed watching the game last night

[TOBOR !]

Am I getting value for my money ? well, yes. I stopped going to games and haven't bought any new tat.

Come to think of it I haven't even watched the last few matches on the telly - I just come on the boards - so if I place a value on time spent I'm starting to come out ahead.

[Voodooman]

I think that's unfair. It's not like they haven't tried putting the right people in place and i think they're doing a lt better now that they're owned by Rogers & Bell. the jays are spending money and signing high caliber players. The raptors made the Rudy Gay trade and brought in GM of the year. The leafs just made the playoffs. and we hired a proven MLS executive to run our team for the long haul.

Things haven't fallen as well as everyone would have hoped but those are all positive signs of progression. Something that there never was while the Teachers owned MLSE. Give it time. It'll get better.

The Jays aren't under MLSE.


And to answer the OP, I had a great time socializing with friends going to games, and meeting some people, and jumping around singing chants few years ago was always a blast. So am I getting my money's worth with the soccer....no way, I would rather watch my level games (CSL), which I actually find more exciting, but for the atmosphere of the fans, maybe half as much.

[Carts]

Beer will never be cheap at a Toronto venue - that's something we just have to live with, and make the choice 'buy or not buy'...

Ticket prices are still too high in certain parts of the stadium. You can actually see it by going to Ticketmaster & using the interactive map - there's a few sections that have almost all tickets available. The corps don't mind paying high prices for the middle of the stadium, but the ones just off the middle - way over-priced for the product, the amenities, and it shows in the sales. That is something that should be rectified...

[ManUtd4ever]

It's not about value for the money for me. My seasons tickets cost approximately $200, which is an inconsequential expense, and to put in perspective, is comparable to the cost of attending one Leaf game. My issue is that I have been finding it increasingly difficult to motivate myself to attend games this season, and I would feel the same way even if my seasons tickets were free. I'll get excited about this team again when we are competitive, but until then, it's going to be a real grind.

[Corpand]

I learned long ago not to buy chit from BMO because it always dampens my game-day experience. Very embarrassing how they are still milking the leftover fans (dare I say the true fans, not those who will come back once we start winning) who clearly form the crux of this club and it's fan support.

Cut us some slack, I need to drink because the result on the pitch is so piss poor.

Yet to answer your question, it depends on whaty you're looking for? Good sport? Entertainment? The social element?
I still love this team, get behind whatever players are brought in. I still find it enjoyable because it definitely beats watching on TV. I enjoy watching tactics in motion over the full field.

[spark]

I think a quite a bit of the stadium being more empty than usual had to do with the weather being predicted to be far worse than it was.

I actually didn't think it was more empty than usual, it looked just about the same to me as it has every home game this year. Super empty during warm ups, half empty at kick off, another surge of people around the 20-25 min mark, getting IMO around 16K, then back to kick off numbers in the final minutes.

One weird thing was section ... 222 I think it was, was pretty full. Maybe they've been selling them cheap so Bitchy doesn't fly up there and take a seat unpaid for!

[Daze]

I actually didn't think it was more empty than usual, it looked just about the same to me as it has every home game this year. Super empty during warm ups, half empty at kick off, another surge of people around the 20-25 min mark, getting IMO around 16K, then back to kick off numbers in the final minutes.

One weird thing was section ... 222 I think it was, was pretty full. Maybe they've been selling them cheap so Bitchy doesn't fly up there and take a seat unpaid for!

the FO offers a lot of group packages to youth teams and puts a lot of them there. I think they're might have been 4 youth teams plus the parents there yesterday.

[Daze]

The Jays aren't under MLSE.

We're still owned by the same people.

[Voodooman]

the FO offers a lot of group packages to youth teams and puts a lot of them there. I think they're might have been 4 youth teams plus the parents there yesterday.

Honestly, don't see why more teams don't do this. If they can't fill the seats, just give it to the teams or groups. Can't forget when we hosted under 21(??) world cup in Canada few years ago, and there would be games in a massive stadium like Edmonton's Commonwealth, where it looked like nobody decided to show up to the game. That actually ended up being headlines for other countries.

[brad]

Cost of beer has nothing to do with value for money as a SSH IMHO. The quality of the team is what matters.

If we were the best team in the league, playing exciting, entertaining football, would you still deem your tickets to not be good value because the beer is too expensive?

[fiji_blue]

MLSE needs to lower their profit projectoins to level of thier poor performance (We should get paid to watch)...

[jabbronies]

MLSE needs to lower their profit projectoins to level of thier poor performance (We should get paid to watch)...

MLSE should change their name. I'm thinking MLJE - Maple Leaf Jokes and Entertainment..cos there is nothing sports related happening with them - just jokes. Then maybe we'll see the value in what we are being charged for.