Valley Express £££££££££

leftbehind

I know its a great deal for anyone travelling up.

Surely with the high fuel costs we are losing more and more money from this.

Im sure that people who come on the VE can not moan at a £1-2 increase, it would still be cheaper than any other means of transport to get to the Valley.

that way the club wont be so out of pocket

As in the words of the wise one


DISCUSS

Henry Irving

[cite]Posted By: leftbehind[/cite]I know its a great deal for anyone travelling up.

Surely with the high fuel costs we are losing more and more money from this.

No, actually.

[cite]Posted By: leftbehind[/cite]I

Im sure that people who come on the VE can not moan at a £1-2 increase, it would still be cheaper than any other means of transport to get to the Valley.

Agree and I would strongly suspect that, given fuel increases, that prices would be reviewed before next season.

pete_tong1

Maybe the club could beg the president of venezuela for some oil.

WhenIwasLittleBoy

Maybe the club should get some good marketing and sales people in

Henry Irving

[cite]Posted By: WhenIwasLittleBoy[/cite]Maybe the club should get some good marketing and sales people in

They already have.

Have you contacted them yet about your company sponsoring the Hampshire coach?

WhenIwasLittleBoy

I whispered you henry and put forward a proposal in which you failed to respond to, as for the sales team, they need a good to appreciate they have a strong brand to sell and have to use that to there advantage, money walks out that door every day on a daily basis

Salad

I thought I read it was increasing from £5 to £6 next season, but £5 per game if you get a "season ticket" for it.

Henry Irving

[cite]Posted By: WhenIwasLittleBoy[/cite]I whispered you henry and put forward a proposal in which you failed to respond to, as for the sales team, they need a good to appreciate they have a strong brand to sell and have to use that to there advantage, money walks out that door every day on a daily basis

Sorry, never saw any whipser after I gave you the contact details of the people to contact regarding sponsoring the Hampshire coach and you said you had 20 ideas that could be used across the coaches. Never heard what the ideas where.


I think when you make statements like

They need a good to appreciate they have a strong brand to sell"

and

"money walks out that door every day on a daily basis"

You just make yourself look silly. Not only is it nonsensical it is based on nothing at all. Where is the evidence for that?

At bit like your "build another floor and triple turnover" statement it's what you would like to think is the case not fact.

DA9

[cite]Posted By: Salad[/cite]I thought I read it was increasing from £5 to £6 next season, but £5 per game if you get a "season ticket" for it.

£5/£6/£7, whatever it will be, if I had a coach to take m from say Folkestone to and from the Valley at that price I would not complain, even if it were hiked to £8-£9, still a bargain IMO

AFKABartram

If you click on Whispered Comments and Whispered Discussions on the left hand panel, you will see the history of what you have sent, and received.

Airman Brown

It was recently announced that the basic fare will rise next season from £5 to £6. Although the rising cost of fuel has had an impact, it is only part of the coach companies' costs, which also include wages and financing charges, and in fact hire charges are rising much more slowly than the cost of fuel. However, we had absorbed increases in 2005, 2006 and 2007, so we needed to play catch-up this year.

If fares were increased to £8/£9 it's likely many passengers would get together and drive or, much worse, not come at all, meaning the club forfeited their ticket revenue. After all, £9 might be good value for one person from Folkestone against the petrol costs but £36 for a family of four won't have the same appeal.

We are better off selling the coach out at £6 than we would be running it half empty at £9 - not only do we get more fare revenue but we sell more tickets.

WhenIwasLittleBoy

[quote][cite]Posted By: Henry Irving[/cite][quote][cite]Posted By: WhenIwasLittleBoy[/cite]I whispered you henry and put forward a proposal in which you failed to respond to, as for the sales team, they need a good to appreciate they have a strong brand to sell and have to use that to there advantage, money walks out that door every day on a daily basis[/quote]

Sorry, never saw any whipser after I gave you the contact details of the people to contact regarding sponsoring the Hampshire coach and you said you had 20 ideas that could be used across the coaches. Never heard what the ideas where.


I think when you make statements like

They need a good to appreciate they have a strong brand to sell"

and

"money walks out that door every day on a daily basis"

You just make yourself look silly. Not only is it nonsensical it is based on nothing at all. Where is the evidence for that?

At bit like your "build another floor and triple turnover" statement it's what you would like to think is the case not fact.[/quote] Henry how have i made myself look silly?

The club does have a brand and they can generate more revenue for the club if they get the merchandising right. Money is constantly walking out the door as the sales team and marketing team could do more to find out what fans want, create more incentives, work on the local and regional companies, i pride myself on the sales background i have come from, i took over a directory some 5 years in which has seen an up turn in sales by 47% and increased registered redearship by 78%. I hardly feel that is someone who doesnt know what they are talking about when it comes to generating sales regardless of the industry you are in.

WhenIwasLittleBoy

Henry just one more question, as some who voted for you, what did you actually do and achieve in those two years you sat on the board, apart from give us Dowie,JFH<FAye and relegation

DA9

[cite]Posted By: Airman Brown[/cite]It was recently announced that the basic fare will rise next season from £5 to £6. Although the rising cost of fuel has had an impact, it is only part of the coach companies' costs, which also include wages and financing charges, and in fact hire charges are rising much more slowly than the cost of fuel. However, we had absorbed increases in 2005, 2006 and 2007, so we needed to play catch-up this year.

If fares were increased to £8/£9 it's likely many passengers would get together and drive or, much worse, not come at all, meaning the club forfeited their ticket revenue. After all, £9 might be good value for one person from Folkestone against the petrol costs but £36 for a family of four won't have the same appeal.

We are better off selling the coach out at £6 than we would be running it half empty at £9 - not only do we get more fare revenue but we sell more tickets.

Fair points regards family cost, but if I were an individual travelling in from far flung borders of Kent, Sussex or Hampshire, it is still great value, compared to driving your own car, trains or national express who dont do door to door.

Henry Irving

[cite]Posted By: WhenIwasLittleBoy[/cite]Henry just one more question, as some who voted for you, what did you actually do and achieve in those two years you sat on the board, apart from give us Dowie,JFH<FAye and relegation

Read the bloggs

Henry Irving

[cite]Posted By: WhenIwasLittleBoy[/cite]

[cite]Posted By: Henry Irving[/cite]

[cite]Posted By: WhenIwasLittleBoy[/cite]I whispered you henry and put forward a proposal in which you failed to respond to, as for the sales team, they need a good to appreciate they have a strong brand to sell and have to use that to there advantage, money walks out that door every day on a daily basis

Sorry, never saw any whipser after I gave you the contact details of the people to contact regarding sponsoring the Hampshire coach and you said you had 20 ideas that could be used across the coaches. Never heard what the ideas where.


I think when you make statements like

They need a good to appreciate they have a strong brand to sell"

and

"money walks out that door every day on a daily basis"

You just make yourself look silly. Not only is it nonsensical it is based on nothing at all. Where is the evidence for that?

At bit like your "build another floor and triple turnover" statement it's what you would like to think is the case not fact.

Henry how have i made myself look silly?

The club does have a brand and they can generate more revenue for the club if they get the merchandising right. Money is constantly walking out the door as the sales team and marketing team could do more to find out what fans want, create more incentives, work on the local and regional companies, i pride myself on the sales background i have come from, i took over a directory some 5 years in which has seen an up turn in sales by 47% and increased registered redearship by 78%. I hardly feel that is someone who doesnt know what they are talking about when it comes to generating sales regardless of the industry you are in.

But how do you know what is and isn't being done? How do you know there is no research? How is it that Charlton constantly scores very high in survey's on football clubs for the way they deal with customers and market to them if they know nothing.

You keep saying ""money walks out that door every day on a daily basis"" (which if you read it again does sound silly) etc but you've not given one concrete example of how that is, how you know that and how it can be prevented.

All very good to throw around a few marketing terms like "incentives" and say work on local and regional companies but you have no idea of the level of activity or the number of local and national companies that have been contacted.

Are our Commercial team perfect? Far from it. Are they the bunch of no nothing idiots with no experience or track record that you like to imply? No way. Just off the top of my head I would say that the free ST offer is a fantastic and innovative incentive. Valley Express is a great way of getting customers in, the Community Scheme pays huge dividends in terms of profile and funding and the deal with JD sports has lots of potential spin offs in terms of retail outlets, ticket sales, local promotions and was right up there at the top of the CCC in terms of income. And I'm not marketing expert. I


Maybe you should use the emails I gave you and make contact with the commercial people at the Valley. You say you've got great ideas so put them to the test in the real world.

The proposal you did make (about replacing free season tickets with free away travel) was totally slated on here by other fans. Not a huge success but at least you found out what the customer might think. That doesn't mean the other 19 ideas are no good so give them a go.

Senpai

I've never used the Valley Express. I live in East Kent so it seems value for money. Can anyone tell me whether it's reliable and whether the banter on the coach is a good laugh?

Rock Spectacle

Yes, it's huge value for money and again this isn't propaganda. My young nephew came up from Margate last season and we knew he could be safe as houses on the coach and his Mum had nothing at all to worry about having popped him on it. Mrs C and I got the train back from said seaside town a little while ago on a Saturday and it was akin to the vomit express from Charing Cross on a Friday. You're with nice people, the youngsters get no grief so in answer to the question, yes, why not use it? Beats the engineering work!