Club look to improve further by eradicating empty seats
Ivan Toney hailed by fans at the Brentford stadium. Picture: Brentford FC
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February 24, 2023
For the second season in a row Brentford has been ranked as the best place in the country to watch a Premier League game.
The Bees topped a survey, which had 31,000 responses from across the league, on multiple metrics measuring the matchday experience, with the club outperforming the divisional average on nearly every off-field measure.
There were a number of measures on which Brentford had the best ratings in the Premier League, including the quality of staff on matchdays, how clean the Gtech Community Stadium is, and how family-friendly the matchday experience is.
As well as that, nine out of 10 Brentford respondents feel the club makes a significant impact in the local community, and the same number feel that the work in the community is an important part of the culture and philosophy of the club.
Nearly three quarters of Brentford fans involved in the survey agree that the fans are at the heart of major decisions that the club make, with over 90 per cent feeling valued as a Bees supporter.
The club is not resting on its laurels and is looking to further improve the atmosphere in the ground. Season ticket prices are being frozen for the 2023/24 when the club looks certain to be still in the top division if not competing in Europe but fans may lose the right to automatically renew if they don’t turn up for games.
The club has had a problem with empty seats because some fans of other London clubs have been purchasing season tickets to be able to watch Premier League games when their own team is not playing.
From next season, when a match is missed, the ticket-holder will receive a 'yellow card' and a culmination of four of these will result in losing the right to renew the season ticket in March 2024 for the 2024/25 football season. Fans can transfer their season tickets to other supporters to attend the match in their place and avoid the warnings. If the ticket is listed on the official ticket exchange platform before 10 am on the day of the match and does not sell, the holder will also dodge the so-called yellow card. The club has changed ticketing partner which means that seats made available on the exchange are less likely to go to non-Brentford fans.
The season ticket attendance scheme, called Every Seat Counts was developed in partnership with the Brentford Independent Association of Supporters (BIAS).
BIAS issued a statement saying, "We are delighted that Brentford Football Club has announced a price freeze on season tickets for the 2023/24 season. This is another victory for BIAS and for Brentford fans in general.
"Our number one priority is to ensure that the Club upholds owner Matthew Benham’s long-stated commitment to affordable football. We reinforced this point multiple times in our meetings with the club and are delighted they have listened to us."
Brentford chief executive Jon Varney said, “We are delighted that we have ranked highest for the matchday fan experience for a second year in a row.
“If anything, these results are an even bigger achievement than last year, given we are now in our second season in the Premier League.
“We benefitted last season from it being our first season back in the top flight so I’m even prouder that we’ve been able to build on that and improve our scores.
“Togetherness is a core value at Brentford and it’s been a team effort across every department. Our staff continue to work so hard, and I want to thank them all for contributing to this.
“The Gtech Community Stadium now feels like home, which has been helped by some great performances by the team on the pitch, but also the Bees fans showing their support in the stands, week in, week out.”
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