MANAGEMENT COMMITTEE UPDATE

As we head into the final eight games of the 2024/25 season your support is needed as much as ever. You have been absolutely tremendous both home and away this season, bringing passion and noise to show how much you all want the team to succeed.

As a Management Committee we share in a love for Hitchin Town FC and wanting to see the club going from strength to strength both on and off the pitch. We are of course disappointed to have once again found ourselves in a tough relegation battle, but we continue to do everything possible day in day out to look for ways to bring success.

We speak on a near daily basis with Michael and his management team discussing his ideas and plans. Michael, Stephen and Kieron are constantly reviewing, contacting and looking to attract players to strengthen our team as they try to bring the results we would all like to see.

It is clear that the group have dramatically improved performances on the pitch, achieved a positive atmosphere within the squad and grown the connection between the players and the fans. We look forward to continuing to see this turnaround into next season. In the 21 games before Michael took charge we secured 13 points (0.62 PPG). In the 21 games since his appointment we have secured 24 points (1.14 PPG) although we obviously need great consistency and a dramatic improvement in away form!

As things stand, we’re four points from safety with eight games left to play and 24 possible points up for grabs. We know that every single match will feel critical so please make sure you support in the numbers we have seen all season and will the team on to those crucial wins.

I thought this would also be a useful time to reflect on and share some of the challenges of managing a non-league football club.

You will have seen in 2024 we published our strategy for the next four years. Strategy 2024-2028 – Hitchin Town FC. One of our values as part of this strategy is to ensure the club is financially sustainable and we protect it for many more generations. It is imperative that we make decisions on a daily basis to balance competing priorities and our values help to guide the decisions we make.

Every penny that we generate in income for the club goes back into operating the club and we also look to make incremental improvements to facilities that have helped to make the matchday what it is today. The improvements over the last five years at Top Field have led to the fantastic numbers we see coming through the turnstiles every matchday. These attendance increases do obviously help to generate more income for the club; however, they do not suddenly leave us with a huge surplus of funds that we are then able to decide how to spend. This season we have reduced our Season ticket prices to reward our loyal supporters. This has had led to an increase in season ticket holders but only a marginal increase in season ticket revenue. We have also seen an increase in attendance from younger fans over the last two seasons. So some of the additional ticket sales will often be from the lower priced Teen and U13 categories. It is also important to remember that tickets are subject to VAT and so 20% of our ticketing income is paid to HMRC.

The increase in ticket income has helped to contribute the spiraling costs of many items such as utility bills and even seen a big increase in the cost of the paint used to mark the pitch. We also have an increasingly ageing ground to maintain and keep safe and attractive – some of our infrastructure is nearing 100 years old and so keeping this going becomes a bigger challenge every year. Within the last few months alone we have had unexpected bills for areas such as new electrics for the turnstiles and replacement CCTV equipment that have totalled nearly £2000. (This equates to 153 adult match tickets)

We do of course look to invest as much as we can into the playing budget and ensure we are fielding the best team we can every single match. The graph below shows how ticket income and the fantastic contribution from the Supporters Trust compares to the playing budget for the recent seasons:

You can see that even with the significant increases in attendance we are still left with a shortfall to be funded from other income streams just to pay for the playing budget before we then address the rest of the operating costs. We are fortunate to have successfully developed several other income streams, and we continually look for ways to introduce and maximise opportunities for generating income.

Firstly, we see the huge support from you, our fans, whether it’s supporting the various initiatives such as the 50/50, prediction league, achievement sponsorship or individual donations. Then we have our relationships with our commercial partners and sponsors. We have many long-term sponsors as well as new businesses regularly joining as they see the way we look to grow the club. We also have the income from our own commercial operations such as the Canary Club, Club Shop and stadium/pitch hire. We have also worked hard off the pitch to increase the local-level marketability of the club by improving our club merchandise, continued work to forge closer links with the youth and women’s sides and in the community through our work via Hitchin Town Community FC at The Arena.

Over the course of the last three seasons, as a result of both increased club contributions and growing support from the Supporters Trust, we have managed to increase the playing budget by more than 10%.

This isn’t a message to raise concerns about the state of the club finances, if anything its quite the opposite. It’s also not about making excuses. It’s about thanking you for the tremendous contribution you make to helping the club run. We pay all of our bills on time and are well respected for this. This is about ensuring Hitchin Town FC is sustainable and around for us all to enjoy for generations to come. We continue to set the foundations off the pitch to help the club to continue to grow and have a stable platform for the mens and womens teams to compete at the highest levels possible.

I thought it would be useful to highlight the challenges we balance as a club. We always welcome ideas and feedback so feel free to raise them with Andy, Roy, Terry, Mick, Mark David or myself on matchdays or to drop me an email at media@hitchintownfc.club.

BY PAUL SPRAGUE