I found out last night that our embroidered club shirts are £30 each!!!
This means members pay £120 annual subs and £8 per game match fees. ON top of that, the shirt is an extra £30.
Now I love my club and I proud to wear the Chertsey blue - but these are tough times for some people, and I think that's a bit rich. I'm well aware of the cost of embroidered clothing, and I can see a huge mark-up here. In addition to this, I'm constantly being told the club is comfortably well off. I'm sure I read somewhere that some clubs give you a shirt as part of your membership fees.
What does playing cost other people - or am I out of touch with what other clubs do?
Thought i'd put in an Australian point of view.
Season CostsI'm in Brisbane. It's difficult to find an organised club with fees under 500 (dollars) for a summer season (higher quality cricket is closer to 700 dollars). I think the conversion rate is about half at the moment, so around the 230 - 240 pounds at a minimum. This is total included registration and game fees.
Clothing CostsI'm currently negotiating with a new supplier. We are looking at sub laminated clothing (unlimited club and sponsor logos) for 27 dollars a shirt.
I've not had sub laminated before, but most reports are pretty good. This is with a supplier that provides to professional cricket, NRL (rugby league), AFL (Aussie Rules) and netball teams here in Australia and internationally.
Mark UpI'm just won the agreement of my clubs executive that clothing should have a 0% mark up i.e.
should not be a revenue source for the club.
Putting it this way, a $5 mark up on a shirt taking it from $30 to $35 is enough to make most guys at our club not invest in one. At this mark up you have to sell 100 shirts to the same as get one extra player (my club regularly fields 3-4 Saturday teams each summer, so 35-50 players).
By having the whole club in 'club shirts' does two things, 1. makes you look like a semi professional cricket team/club and 2. greatly improves your chances of attracting new players to your club.
My view, keep your club clothing prices at or below cost (if your club can afford it) and you attract more players which is a much higher revenue source for the club.
Old club shirts - new sponsorsUnfortunately this comes with the territory. One of my old clubs combated this in a few ways:
1. New players to the club had a club playing shirt included/absorbed in their initial registration. This at least got the new players in the most current playing shirt.
2. They negotiated longer term sponsorship deals. This made the club shirt 'valid' for a longer period. While new sponsors means a change in club shirts, the sponsor could agree to invest more upfront, to outfit the club in one hit (or the top grades for example), knowing they wouldn't need to do so in years 2 & 3.
3. Utilised club merchandise as 'rewards'. If a player hit an individual milestone, say 300 wickets for example, and this was you guys running around with more tape on him than shirt to cover logos, his recognition prize would be a new playing shirt. If another guy didn't have, or had a really, really old club cap, this would be their 'reward'.
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Topic: How Much Do You Pay for Your Club Shirt? (Read 6658 times)