2025 Attendance Thread

[Damien]

Seems like we have our first sellout of 2025 a month before the season starts:

 

[Eddie]

Great to see, who’d have imagined that a few years back. 

[Worzel]

11 hours ago, Damien said:

Seems like we have our first sellout of 2025 a month before the season starts:

 

Yeah I’ve just bought a table in the restaurant this week so I can bring some friends with us who aren’t members, no other way of getting tickets.

We’ve added 1,000 seats for this season and already sold them out as memberships… the club need to find a way to raise asset finance for a proper extension of the seated part of the stadium, as my group shows for this match with more than 90% of the capacity pre-sold for the season Rovers are now in the tricky position of making it hard to bring new people in. Nice problem to have, but it is still a problem. 

[langpark]

10 minutes ago, Worzel said:

Yeah I’ve just bought a table in the restaurant this week so I can bring some friends with us who aren’t members, no other way of getting tickets.

We’ve added 1,000 seats for this season and already sold them out as memberships… the club need to find a way to raise asset finance for a proper extension of the seated part of the stadium, as my group shows for this match with more than 90% of the capacity pre-sold for the season Rovers are now in the tricky position of making it hard to bring new people in. Nice problem to have, but it is still a problem. 

I have been thinking, for a while now, that the club really should pull out all stops to get the capacity up to 15k.  Surely it is an investment that will pay off long-term.  It bothers me that the club's potential future growth is being limited by this (and I am not even a KR fan).

[Worzel]

11 minutes ago, langpark said:

I have been thinking, for a while now, that the club really should pull out all stops to get the capacity up to 15k.  Surely it is an investment that will pay off long-term.  It bothers me that the club's potential future growth is being limited by this (and I am not even a KR fan).

Yeah the next thing on the slate is to extend the East Stand terrace, hopefully at the end of next season, but all that will do is add another 1,500 standing spaces (but only a net +500 capacity as that's where the new temporary seats are). That alone though will cost £1.5m because UK building costs have doubled since Brexit and Covid. 

To replace the main (West) stand and add maybe 1,500 extra seats to it you're looking at £12m plus, which is a hell of a lot of money. It's what we need to do, would give us a 13,000 ground which is probably about right, but unless there's an angle where somebody else pays for part of it (some sort of public services spin) then I don't really think any British rugby league side can do that sort of project today.

Leeds fans don't know how lucky they are with Caddick and Hetherington biting the bullet at Headingley when they did, incredible foresight - they've set their ground up for the next 30 years and that build would probably be unaffordable to do now. 

[langpark]

£12 million is indeed a lot.  (I was ready to say "what about the extra ticket revenue it will bring in?" but the reality is, after crunching a few numbers, I realise it would take decades to get a return on the investment - and that is using optimistic calculations too)

Is there any way of getting local govt. to partially fund it?

[Eddie]

2 hours ago, langpark said:

I have been thinking, for a while now, that the club really should pull out all stops to get the capacity up to 15k.  Surely it is an investment that will pay off long-term.  It bothers me that the club's potential future growth is being limited by this (and I am not even a KR fan).

There is merit in having a ground slightly too small rather than too big. If tickets are limited people buy season tickets and other fans want to go to games and are pleased to get one, if there is always loads of availability people are less likely to buy STs and can pick and choose their games. I’m certain that’s why most Norwich City games are still sold out, even though on pitch performances aren’t great. 

[Worzel]

1 hour ago, langpark said:

£12 million is indeed a lot.  (I was ready to say "what about the extra ticket revenue it will bring in?" but the reality is, after crunching a few numbers, I realise it would take decades to get a return on the investment - and that is using optimistic calculations too)

Is there any way of getting local govt. to partially fund it?

I don't think so. The club has the exclusive option on 13 acres around the stadium, the plan is to submit plans for a commercial and residential development there (this Spring apparently), and use any income from that to finance further club facilities. But don't think that will stretch to a project of that size, it'll more likely fund a new on-site training centre. By way of a benchmark Wakefield's new stand cost £9m procured 2 years ago, and that (whilst brilliant) is quite limited with only one restaurant (not boxes) and not as many seats as we'd need. So guess I'll just keep buying lottery tickets!  

Most likely scenario if this season plays out well is to stick some unroofed temporary seats at the south end for the away fans, which would release 1,000 seats in the new North stand for home fans.   

[Worzel]

5 minutes ago, Eddie said:

There is merit in having a ground slightly too small rather than too big. If tickets are limited people buy season tickets and other fans want to go to games and are pleased to get one, if there is always loads of availability people are less likely to buy STs and can pick and choose their games. I’m certain that’s why most Norwich City games are still sold out, even though on pitch performances aren’t great. 

Yes there's a lot of truth in this, but ideally you'd have 20% free for churn to get the new kids in. If we actually win something (cue laughter from Hull fans  ) there is still more growth headroom I think. 

[Eddie]

2 hours ago, langpark said:

£12 million is indeed a lot.  (I was ready to say "what about the extra ticket revenue it will bring in?" but the reality is, after crunching a few numbers, I realise it would take decades to get a return on the investment - and that is using optimistic calculations too)

Is there any way of getting local govt. to partially fund it?

Very unlikely, the economic climate here is as poor as it’s been in my lifetime and there aren’t any signs that it might improve soon. 

[Eddie]

Anyone know any attendances from the early rounds of the challenge cup? 

[Hopping Mad]

3 hours ago, Eddie said:

Anyone know any attendances from the early rounds of the challenge cup? 

1,252 Dewsbury Moor-Dewsbury. It was announced, shortly before the end.

[sweaty craiq]

On 22/01/2025 at 15:24, Worzel said:

I don't think so. The club has the exclusive option on 13 acres around the stadium, the plan is to submit plans for a commercial and residential development there (this Spring apparently), and use any income from that to finance further club facilities. But don't think that will stretch to a project of that size, it'll more likely fund a new on-site training centre. By way of a benchmark Wakefield's new stand cost £9m procured 2 years ago, and that (whilst brilliant) is quite limited with only one restaurant (not boxes) and not as many seats as we'd need. So guess I'll just keep buying lottery tickets!  

Most likely scenario if this season plays out well is to stick some unroofed temporary seats at the south end for the away fans, which would release 1,000 seats in the new North stand for home fans.   

As an away fan being stuck below sea level 5 miles from play without a roof, I would be asking my club to put KR fans outside in the car park on scaffolding

[Worzel]

1 hour ago, sweaty craiq said:

As an away fan being stuck below sea level 5 miles from play without a roof, I would be asking my club to put KR fans outside in the car park on scaffolding

The temporary seats at the South End go right next to the pitch these days, the old Rotterdam terrace is part-covered by a 3G pitch and part-covered by “clapped out burger vans”, as the FC fans call them

You’ll still get swept away by gale force winds and driving rain though!! 

[langpark]

 

 

[sweaty craiq]

12 hours ago, Worzel said:

The temporary seats at the South End go right next to the pitch these days, the old Rotterdam terrace is part-covered by a 3G pitch and part-covered by “clapped out burger vans”, as the FC fans call them

You’ll still get swept away by gale force winds and driving rain though!! 

Local scaffolding companies are submitting bids as I type

[langpark]

Hull KR should speak to this guy regarding their stadium expansion.

https://www.facebook.com/reel/947238314166039

[Damien]

 

 

[Archie Gordon]

24 minutes ago, Damien said:

 

 

That seems really strong, still 2 weeks away.

[gingerjon]

Apparently, it's impossible to sell tickets for Thursdays.

That's a genuinely impressive start to the year.

[Eddie]

23 minutes ago, gingerjon said:

Apparently, it's impossible to sell tickets for Thursdays.

That's a genuinely impressive start to the year.

To be fair an opening day local derby isn’t your average Thursday night. Would be good if they can get 20k in. 

[Worzel]

Hull KR temporary stand being built this week, not complete yet and roof not on until next week, but one step at a time eh…

 

[langpark]

Silly question, but what's stopping Hull KR just leaving this 'temporary' stand there forever?

[langpark]

Great news for the Hurricanes, who seem to be a club on the rise! Does anybody know how many they sold last year? 

 

 

[whatmichaelsays]

3 minutes ago, langpark said:

Silly question, but what's stopping Hull KR just leaving this 'temporary' stand there forever?

Planning permission and a safety certificate. 

It's not impossible to get around - Gillingham FC seem to have had a "temporary" stand up at one end since the late 90s and most of the stands at Silverstone are "temporary". But I suspect there becomes a point where the cost of maintaining a lot of scaffolding becomes more hassle than it's worth.