Prawn Sandwich Email from Kevin Hall - anyone else had it?

[biscuitman]

Hi Kevin,

Can you tell me why you have chosen that subject name??

What about watching Kitson, Doyle and Lita.

I'm a season ticket holder for Reading.

Can I ask if your marketing is actually targeting Newcastle, Arsenal and Liverpool fans?

This club's pathetic.


Subject: RE: Watch Owen, Fabregas and Torres in Style!
Date: Tue, 16 Oct 2007 10:18:15 +0100
From: KHall@readingfc.co.uk


Hi



Thank you for your email.



The title was chosen to draw attention to the high profile fixtures that we have coming up. Whilst I would expect people to know that Reading players (as you said Kitson, Doyle and Lita) will be playing at Reading, people who are not necessarily season ticket holders may not be aware that we are playing Liverpool, Arsenal etc soon.



Kind regards



Kevin

Sent: 16 October 2007 11:11
To: Kevin Hall
Subject: RE: Watch Owen, Fabregas and Torres in Style!




Hi Kevin,


I appreciate your reply and also what your job involves at Reading.

Obviously we aren't selling out this year as we did last season but I'm just a bit disillusioned with where the club is heading in the future.

There's going to be 8,000 more seats in the future and I just can't see the point of this development at the moment. Whilst the club goes about saying its because the 'locals' don't realise that the games are not sold this season and tickets are available I feel ticket prices aren't helping one bit.

I am sorry for ranting but I would rather actually go back to Division 2 where I felt going to watch Reading home and away was fun and enjoyable.

The Premiership is hyped up with money and corruption and I thought Reading would be different but I feel mugged off as a fan who has followed my local club religiously since being on the terraces at Elm Park.

Best Regards,





Hi



No problem at all. I appreciate everyone has their own opinions and viewpoint and it is important to receive constructive feedback.



The purpose of our email today was more on the hospitality side of things. Now I realise this can also be a sensitive subject among fans but is a vital part of any club’s revenues, Premier League or not.



I am relatively new to my role at the club and began supporting the club because my dad used to take me to Elm Park and I lived locally. I never thought in my wildest dreams we would ever be where we are now as a club. To maintain this momentum is going to take effort and as the club has traditionally had a relatively small supporter base, will mean attracting new fans. This is gradually happening with more kids now proud to wear Reading shirts rather than Man Utd etc which is great to see.



I hear similar opinions to yours about the Premier League, from our fans and those from other clubs and I don’t know if it’s a grass is greener type scenario. Can you honestly say that the last two seasons have been anything other than amazing at the end of the day.



Hopefully we can continue to go forwards and ultimately the club cannot do without local fans who have followed the club through thick and thin.



Kind regards



Kevin

[PieEater]

Good replies from Kevin!

[biscuitman]

Really nice guy, before people slag him off.

His number is all over the website, so why don't people call him up because he's quite a sound bloke. Or people can just slag him off on http://www.royals.org.

[RoyalBlue]

Some people may like to ask themselves what they have done to get themselves on the 'prawn sandwich' list !!!

The extensive club database records every bit of info about you and targets these emails precisely!

I got one of those emails, which rather blows that particular theory out of the water!!

[readingbedding]

Some people may like to ask themselves what they have done to get themselves on the 'prawn sandwich' list !!!

The extensive club database records every bit of info about you and targets these emails precisely!

I got one of those emails, which rather blows that particular theory out of the water!! :wink:

So did I, but from someone else...

[Wycombe Royal]

This explains the empty seats in the South West corner of the Upper West sas that is where the £125 hospitality seats are!

Schards won't believe you..........

Why not? He believed it when it was mentioned on the other thread, as did I. And I will repeat what I put there, if the club are holding back a number of tickets purely to try and wangle £125 out of a supporter, then it's a disgrace. From what everyone else seems to be telling us, they could sell those seats a thousand times over if they were sold at the Upper West prices.

It was only a little bit of sarcasm.......

[West Stand Man]

Thank god he is in the marketing department and not you lot!

If there was a risk that all the tickets would sell without this type of advertising then he'd not be pushing them. They won't, so he is right to do this.

I can't believe the double standards that some of you have. We have multiple threads about how other clubs have all the star players, yet when the club comments on the visiting stars you are affronted. The fact is that the 'yet to be committed' future supporter knows more about the stars of Arsenal et al that he/she does about Doyle, Kitson etc and so it makes perfect sense to market their visit.

Will any of the CH visitors deprive an loyal fans of a seat? I think not, as few of them want to spend £125+ rather than enjoying the game from the main body of the stadium.

So, if you don't want to take up the offer of a CH lace in lieu of your normal seat (and you can offset the cost against your ST if you ask), just delete the offending email/text and get a life.

[Behindu]

Good responses from Kevin, especially given the nature of the emails sent to him....

[Para Handy]

Good responses from Kevin, especially given the nature of the emails sent to him....

Yeah, and can I just point out that his name is Kevin Hall not Ball as those foaming at the mouth seem to believe.

[Dirk Gently]

Just shows that no matter what the club does, someone will find a way to criticise them about it.

[gh7901]

I got the email as well and while I appreciate that he is just trying to do his job, my first thought was how unprofessional it was to mass mail all member card holders (?) and from his personal email address at that.

But fair play to the guy for replying to emails. We all moan at times that we only ever receive generic replies from companies (including RFC) so its refreshing to see someone whos willing to talk personally with people, even when hes obviously got no chance of a sale, like the emails above

I still think this idea was fairly flawed though, sending these emails to STH's isnt going to get you much interest I wouldnt imagine. Advertising to people who are not STH's and perhaps members who have not been to game in a long time would be a better idea.

[Dirk Gently]

I still think this idea was fairly flawed though, sending these emails to STH's isnt going to get you much interest I wouldnt imagine. Advertising to people who are not STH's and perhaps members who have not been to game in a long time would be a better idea.

But surely the STHs are quite likely to be the best people to go and sell these seats for the club?

So telling them about this, and giving them the information which might attract non-RFC fans to this, can only be a good move.

[paultheroyal]

Biscuit Man - as soon as you wrote about preferring us to go back down to division 2 (league 2) you lost all credibility and RFC have probably framed your email and having a right laugh at it.

Agree with Dirk and Silver.

[Para Handy]

I got the email as well and while I appreciate that he is just trying to do his job, my first thought was how unprofessional it was to mass mail all member card holders (?) and from his personal email address at that.

I got it as well and I can't see what the fuss is about. So, the club are trying to sell some hospitality tickets. Whilst, I agree that season ticket holders are probably not prime targets for this, I also guess that they are the people that the club will have email addresses for, in the main.

What's unprofessional about mailing from his work address? I can't see how an email address at readingfc.co.uk could be construed as a personal email address. In fact, it's allowed everyone to rant at the bloke. Next time it will be from a non-monitored address.

[biscuitman]

Division 2 (League one)

What can I say to that. I enjoyed away trips more then than this year and last.

[paultheroyal]

Division 2 (League one)

What can I say to that. I enjoyed away trips more then than this year and last.

Simple - follow Wycombe Wanderers.

[PurpleTurtle]

Thank god he is in the marketing department and not you lot!

So, if you don't want to take up the offer of a CH lace in lieu of your normal seat (and you can offset the cost against your ST if you ask), just delete the offending email/text and get a life.

Are you sure about that? Really?

I do have a life thanks, and also have a degree in Business & Marketing and 15 years experience in that field with successful blue chip companies.
At no time during any of my experience have I written to my customers suggesting that my competitor's "product" is better than my own. This is how I interpret his email, no more, no less.

HTH.

For your information, I'm annoyed that the only place the club has my email address from - my season ticket - has been used to treat me as what is known in HNA parlance as 'a plastic'. In my own reply I have suggested he might 'develop the business' a bit more by making it possible to buy and drink a pint within half time. It doesn't take a genius to work out their staffing levels, yet there are constantly unacceptable queues.

If they think they will sell all Corp Hosp seats at £125 a pop given the current run of form they are sadly deluded. The fickle Reading public won't bite on that worm, I absolutely guarantee you.

I appreciate the sentiment of sell-out=more money in coffers=better players=more long-term success for Reading (allegedly) but feel they have shot themselves in the foot on this one by alienating their core customers with season tickets.

Finally, as a point of detail, should they really be advertising specific players as a draw? If Benitez's rotation policy is anything to go by you have a 50/50 chance of seeing Torres. If he doesn't make the bench, do I get my 125 quid back?

[Coppelled Streets]

Credit to the club for trying to get bums on seats though. It might be a good idea, it might be a bad idea, but they're trying!

[Man Friday]

Agree with PurpleTurtle but I do appreciate Kevin responding and sypathise with several of his points.

[RoyalBlue]

I got the email as well and while I appreciate that he is just trying to do his job, my first thought was how unprofessional it was to mass mail all member card holders (?) and from his personal email address at that.

I too was very surprised that he chose to use his personal email rather than a generic marketing@reading.fc.co.uk type address. Naive or refreshingly open/honest? Either way, I hope he's got a good spam filter!

Fairplay to him, though, for the manner in which he has responded to the the emails that got sent back to him.

I still think this idea was fairly flawed though, sending these emails to STH's isnt going to get you much interest I wouldnt imagine. Advertising to people who are not STH's and perhaps members who have not been to game in a long time would be a better idea.

But surely the STHs are quite likely to be the best people to go and sell these seats for the club?

So telling them about this, and giving them the information which might attract non-RFC fans to this, can only be a good move.

If that really was the intent, then surely it would be better to address the email to those STHs and word its content along those lines. Instead it appears a scattergun approach has been adopted that is about as accurate and effective as the average US missile!