2021 Western Bulldogs Membership Thread

[Grantysghost]

Re: 2021 Western Bulldogs Membership Thread

Yeah I’d love to see a breakdown in membership types and the actual money received. I’ve seen clubs like the bombers advertising $1 memberships. I’ve also seen something similar to a buy 1 get 1 free. Then there are pet memberships etc. These figures are a bit meaningless without further insight. I know crowd numbers are a bit hard to read right now but we’ve had numbers similar to the saints and dees yet their membership numbers are well beyond ours. It doesn’t add up.

Agree though that we should be growing at a fairly high clip. Perhaps after our first genuine good season since the flag we’ll see a large jump next year.

Agree but these same mechanisms are available to us right? So are our numbers inflated and the situation is worse?

[Bornadog]

Re: 2021 Western Bulldogs Membership Thread

Agree but these same mechanisms are available to us right? So are our numbers inflated and the situation is worse?

Membership should only include a full home membership and none of this pet membership, or three game membership etc.

[Grantysghost]

Re: 2021 Western Bulldogs Membership Thread

I think our issue is the affordability. Many of our members being working class, just can't afford to give up dollars for membership when they live from week to week. No doubt there are many people out there who follow the club. We saw that in 2016 when the biggest GF parade in Melbourne turned out.

Hopefully the kids keep following the club and go on and take out a membership as they grow older and start earning an income.

All of my nieces and nephews love the Bulldogs. However their dad is bombers, so so are they. They enjoy telling me how many flags they’ve won compared to the dogs despite the fact none of them have ever seen a finals win (parents brainwashing !).

It’s like a virus !

[Grantysghost]

Re: 2021 Western Bulldogs Membership Thread

That definitely deserves some recognition from the club. Obviously it's a contribution to the overall success of the club and you (and all members) do it out of love but that sort of outlay needs to get a return.

I also think a lot of the club membership numbers are bunk. No way Essendon has that many paid up members, and I'd question GWS, GC, Saints and Melbourne's numbers too.

I seriously don’t want anything I’m surprised by myself that I posted that tbh. I do it because I like the player sponsors package and I’m lucky enough to be able to finance it (just). But the last two years have pretty much been a donation and apart from now being besties with Dale Morris (dm me for his number ...! I joke I joke ) it’s been pretty lax....so I figured even a framed certificate saying you stuck with us or a limited edition shirt or something I don’t know anything... would have been nice.

[comrade]

Re: 2021 Western Bulldogs Membership Thread

All of my nieces and nephews love the Bulldogs. However their dad is bombers, so so are they. They enjoy telling me how many flags they’ve won compared to the dogs despite the fact none of them have ever seen a finals win (parents brainwashing !).

It’s like a virus !

That is hilarious.

[bulldogsthru&thru]

Re: 2021 Western Bulldogs Membership Thread

Agree but these same mechanisms are available to us right? So are our numbers inflated and the situation is worse?

I haven’t seen many offers like this from us but of course that doesn’t mean they don’t exist

[Prince Imperial]

Re: 2021 Western Bulldogs Membership Thread

It used to be that memberships that involved a minimum spend of $50 were only counted by the AFL in its audit; however now there is no minimum spend as reported by the Advertiser:

https://www.adelaidenow.com.au/sport/afl/teams/port-adelaide/fan-power-port-adelaide-sets-a-new-membership-record-but-will-they-overtake-the-crows-as-the-biggest-team-in-town/news-story/d6064f2442dd00fab36db3447610f34e

AFL audited member criteria

* Member can be either non-game access or game access

* Must be fulfilled with a membership pack and member benefits

* The member must provide contact data

* No minimum spend

Given Covid and their on-field performances, other clubs (e.g. North, GWS, GC, Carlton, Essendon etc) are obviously giving away heaps of free memberships to bolster their totals.

It's frustrating because this makes them more relatively attractive to sponsors than us but in doing so they are incurring increased costs related to membership packs.

It's a dilemma for the club but I reckon net revenue from memberships and overall profitability are the most important things for the club to focus on.

[Happy Days]

Re: 2021 Western Bulldogs Membership Thread

So we simply say we have 107k members and send out 60,000 empty envelopes like Richmond do probably.

[bulldogsthru&thru]

Re: 2021 Western Bulldogs Membership Thread

So we simply say we have 107k members and send out 60,000 empty envelopes like Richmond do probably.

This is pretty much what I suspect is going on. It builds the hype train too. People see the big figure and want to jump on board. This is the side of things we might be missing out on by doing the sensible thing and focusing on actual cash flow. The saints for example are not doing very well in this department which you’d find strange given their bumper membership numbers.

[Scraggers]

Re: 2021 Western Bulldogs Membership Thread

Looking at the West Australian memberships ... Fremantle Dockers have 50,342 members and West Coast Eagles have 106,422. Breaking this down, Perth stadium has a capacity of 60,150 for an AFL match and 4,500 of these are corporate/sponsor memberships. There are also stadium members and Bankwest members (much more expensive experience), plus there has to be certain allocation for away members and general public seating. This means that the average Joe member is capped at 49,000. (ish)

Some of the dockers 50k members hold Bankwest membership ... big bucks for the West Australian Football Commission (who own both the Eagles' and the Dockers' licenses). This also means that the Dockers are not at stadium capacity for 'Joe' seats. My wife and my daughter (13yo) are both Docker members. This memberships costs us $790 for both for 11 home games seats. This is the lowest membership for seated members. They can go up above $900 each for an adult ... depends where you want to sit.

The Eagles on the other hand have 106K members. Considering the conditions are the same, only 49k of these can have seated membership (excluding the Bankwest Members) this means roughly 50k Eagles members are not full (seated) members. The Eagles have a member classification called "In The Wings" member. Memberships are $55 per person (plus $5 for any additional member) or $70 for households ... whereas an Eagles 11 reserve seat starts at $410 and goes to $850. Every "In The Wings" member receives a membership pack ... stickers/lanyards etc and is entitled to priority placement for two games a year (seats that are sold back to the Eagles for the round by seated members). Lets say the membership pack costs the Eagles $7 to purchase and distribute; this means for the $5 membership the club makes $2.

The WAFC is definitely sitting on a cash-cow right now ... no wonder Demetriou want to buy the licenses from WAFC !!

[Axe Man]

Re: 2021 Western Bulldogs Membership Thread

Anyone else get a text today about a live pre-game YouTube Q&A with Chris Grant for +10 year members on Sunday?

[Bulldog4life]

Re: 2021 Western Bulldogs Membership Thread

Anyone else get a text today about a live pre-game YouTube Q&A with Chris Grant for +10 year members on Sunday?

Not me Axe Man.

[Grantysghost]

Re: 2021 Western Bulldogs Membership Thread

Anyone else get a text today about a live pre-game YouTube Q&A with Chris Grant for +10 year members on Sunday?

Yes I got it.

[I'm Not Bitter Anymore!]

Re: 2021 Western Bulldogs Membership Thread

I had a phone call from Hayden Crozier yesterday thanking me for being a member

[Axe Man]

Re: 2021 Western Bulldogs Membership Thread

I had a phone call from Hayden Crozier yesterday thanking me for being a member

Nice! I saw they have a video of Libba calling a member up on the website.