Letters and tickets
A new column highlighting the highs and lows of the Wrexham FC public relations machine:
Several things to applaud this time. First, have you ever arrived at the Racecourse and realised you’ve forgotten your season ticket? Well, I experienced this strange and annoying sensation on Boxing Day (and not for the first time). I quickly remembered though that the club do a lovely little deal with incompetent, forgetful season-ticket holders: you present yourself at the ticket office, pay your money, get a ticket for the game…and then, next time you remember your season ticket, you go to the ticket office again, give in the appropriate yellow bit - and WFC refunds you the tenner you left with them temporarily. A truly fantastic device which I would like to salute unreservedly. Do other clubs operate such cunning fan-friendly schemes? Second, the Year 2000 WFC calendar. Red Passion paid £300 to sponsor the JUNE page (pin-up boy: Danny W) and as a nice little extra we will receive 20 FREE copies of the calendar to distribute as we so wish. Good deal, I’d say. (And, by the way, we’re going to distribute our freebies to sterling RP salespeople, contributors and local schools).
Third, this magazine has often berated the horrible scurge of “unacknowledged letters”. Recently RP wrote to the club with five specific queries…and almost by return of post we received a full and comprehensive reply. Brilliant PR. However…we’re still missing replies to ONE extremely constructive letter about ‘ways to increase home attendances’; ONE letter asking for clarification about PGS facilities; ONE letter about WFC and disabled supporters; and ONE letter about the curious case of a fan in the Kop getting stopped from taking photos of the game by a slightly over-aggressive steward (you know, a bit like the way the Stasi used to operate in Communist East Germany). Anyway, we’re still waiting…
Bricks! I am (not very) delighted to say that I am one of a very unlucky group of 23 fans whose PGS bricks have still not appeared, yet, in the wall of the stand. Allan Thomas has confirmed this to me. An administrative error somewhere - but not at WFC - has caused the problem. Out of 1,694 applications for bricks 23 were ‘not processed’. Not bad, I suppose, but I’m still feeling very unlucky. On a different matter I think it’s a bit disappointing that the club sends so many letters second class. Red Passion has received several quite important letters second class. Surely correspondents and sponsors deserve slightly better than this - or is the club really that short of money? And finally, the thorny subject of the Racecourse switchboard. In Issue 13 I criticised the ridiculous situation whereby any Reds fan phoning up for ticket details got (in Week A) a very off-putting message about the Japan-Samoa rugby international…and (in Week B) a very off-putting message about the Wales-Switzerland soccer international. On both occasions there was no opportunity granted to callers to enquire about Wrexham FC matchday tickets. Well, recently I had the pleasure/misfortune (delete as appropriate) to telephone Bournemouth FC - a club of about the same size as WFC. I was greeted by one of those horrible corporate answerphones (“Press 1 for ticket information, Press 2 for the club shop, Press 3 for the School of Excellence…etc etc”) I had to endure lots of “Please hold on” music and a succession of answerphone messages. One one level, Bournemouth seem to be taking the switchboard issue seriously; on another - the ‘end result’ level - the succession of recorded messages and answerphone messages is even more frustrating than the WFC ‘service’.
Peter Davies
If you have any WFC PR ‘highs’ or ‘lows’ you’d like us to publicise please get in touch.