I think it has just been disclosed that the RU cap has been increased because of their TV deal so that each club gets a £500,000 increase in their cap to £5.7m.

There has been loads of discussion on other threads about structure etc. but what are our people in charge doing when this can happen and even though (as I understand it we have massive TV viewing figures) they can get what is in essence a rise of about minimum £6m and probably up to £10m a season, this is a rise.

What are we doing to get a real deal not a deal that is less than the original 1990's deal?

Until we get a fair deal for what is on offer with viewing figures that are normally above the RU guys the only way is out of existence. It seems to me that everybody NRL and RU are getting massive increases in their TV deals but not us, what is also apparent is that their deals are quite widely circulated whereas who knows what our position is, certainly not the paying fans?

We are being treated as mugs and the RFL hierarchy continue to operate in their own "we are OK so stuff them" world.

It's not down to pure number of viewers, it's down to the value of every individual viewer. Unfortunately, some unemployed, council estate chip gobbling northerner is worth less than a relatively affluent RU or NRL fan.

How much less am I worse then?

A chip eater pays the same subs as anyone else. Regulars Giggs, Ferdinand and Rooney would certainly pull the RL average viewer salary in the right direction.

But marketing firms don't care about the amount of subs you pay. Nor do they care about averaged salaries. It's all about how many fall into specifically designed categories, which can be sold to companies. The higher end the category, the more financial institutions, car manufacturers and blue chip companies are interested, the more they are willing to pay for the advertising space ...

Equally the lower down categories, whilst still attracting advertising space, don't tend to be from such high blue chips, meaning the marketing budget is smaller, so less can be spent, so the advertising space is worth less.

I am merely employing the stereotypes that the advertisers utilise to make a point.

I'll guarantee there's a lot more BMW and Range Rovers etc. on the car park at a Northampton - Bath game than a Cas - Hull KR game though. Jaguar pay more for an advert than Foxy Bingo, and that's why we receive less money, even though we have higher viewership.

The truth hurts, and until we break the shackles of our self-imposed northern post-industrial working class traditions, we'll always be the poor man of English sport.

thats a very simple outlook on things, I doubt the target audience has any baring on it at all. Why are poor peoples shops like Aldi and Lidl the two fastest growing supermarkets? because there's money to be had off poor people. The RFL just don't realise it.

I've just seen and advert for Unions Heineken cup....... a run of the mill lager.....? it wasn't the Pims trophy.

Anyway here's my take on Why union get more:

The RFU is an industrial and provident society owned by over 2,000 member clubs, representing over 2.5 million registered players and forms the largest rugby union society in the world, and one of the largest sports organisations in England. It is based at Twickenham Stadium, London.
Patron Queen Elizabeth II
Chairman Bill Beaumont
President Paul Murphy




And the RFL :
is run by the fat Yorkshire boball on the left......

But how fine grained is the advertisers info?



Soccer has many more fans than RL or RU. Adveritises tartet it due to the numbers watching it. Not because they all live south of Watrord gap.

I'd say third largest brewer in the world and sponsors of the best non-international football tournament in the world, where as SL has Heinz Big Soup. Our key demographics don't hold the value that football and RU do to advertisers.

Partly, and partly because soccer fans in the UK have more money than RL fans.

I feel like I need to clear up that I am not denigrating northern RL fans. I consider myself as someone that stands up for working class rights and believe in taking drastic steps to increase social mobility. But, we earn less per viewer than other sports viewer-wise because our viewers have less spending power than the sports we're comparing ourselves too (in advertisers' eyes at the very least).

That's quite a change of mindset needed for me and others, as previously crude Sky viewing figures, rather than specifically designed category adjusted figures, have generally been held up to show RL in a favourable light against RU. That's presumably snooker and darts down the swanee as well.

Does anyone have any figures for how much of their income Sky Sports derive from subscriptions against advertising income?

Think you have hit the nail on the head there ans isn't his failure to secure decent sponsorship over recent years one of the things IL and his allies are complaining about?

But that Third largest brewer in the world already sponsors a fine Rugby League Stadium the John Smiths stadium, I have enjoyed some Rugby Hospitality at the expense of Heineken International. They also use Salford city stadium as a venue for national conferences. To me it sounds like they would invest more in rugby League if they could, but The RFL don't allow sponsorship of teams or competitions by drinks companies do they so that's why we end up with soup sponsors.

I do honestly believe its down to the RFL's ability to go and find sponsors rather than professional company directors looking at the demographics of northern people and saying "its not worth sponsoring RL as its fans have no money and any they do have they spend in bingo halls and chip shops".

If it isn't down to the RFL's inability to do its job properly why have Wire been able to Acquire Emirates as a sponsor yet still no sponsor for Superleague.......?

I would also firmly believe Rugby union would never have a sponsor that didn't portray the sport in a less than "premium" light and if Bet Fred offered more than Aviva they would say no thanks.....

Quote ="Finfin"That's quite a change of mindset needed for me and others, as previously crude Sky viewing figures, rather than specifically designed category adjusted figures, have generally been held up to show RL in a favourable light against RU. That's presumably snooker and darts down the swanee as well. Does anyone have any figures for how much of their income Sky Sports derive from subscriptions against advertising income?'" I'd imagine true revenue breakdowns will be hard to find. The basic summary: corporate.sky.com/media/key_facts_and_figures Revenue of £7,200,000,000 off of 10 million customers. Whilst it's difficult to say I'd imagine it'd work out 1:2 subscription: advertising on those figures. Sky will generally know each one of its customers educational background, profession, and probably some correlated data on shopping habits, as well as watching habits. The detail can include as much detail as whether or not you own a pet, how many children, whether your married etc (all actually quite frightening when you stop to think about it.) all built to profile their watchers so they can sell the advertising space (a dog food company won't want to advertise when no pet owners are watching) It's the classic example of do you sell 1 for £100 or 10 for £10 - I think the common belief is it's better for the former (less work to maintain contracts etc) which is why higher, more affluent, category's are more catered for more readily.

Quote ="Finfin"That's quite a change of mindset needed for me and others, as previously crude Sky viewing figures, rather than specifically designed category adjusted figures, have generally been held up to show RL in a favourable light against RU. That's presumably snooker and darts down the swanee as well. Does anyone have any figures for how much of their income Sky Sports derive from subscriptions against advertising income?'" I'd imagine true revenue breakdowns will be hard to find. The basic summary: corporate.sky.com/media/key_facts_and_figures Revenue of £7,200,000,000 off of 10 million customers. Whilst it's difficult to say I'd imagine it'd work out 1:2 subscription: advertising on those figures. Sky will generally know each one of its customers educational background, profession, and probably some correlated data on shopping habits, as well as watching habits. The detail can include as much detail as whether or not you own a pet, how many children, whether your married etc (all actually quite frightening when you stop to think about it.) all built to profile their watchers so they can sell the advertising space (a dog food company won't want to advertise when no pet owners are watching) It's the classic example of do you sell 1 for £100 or 10 for £10 - I think the common belief is it's better for the former (less work to maintain contracts etc) which is why higher, more affluent, category's are more catered for more readily.

I think that Suzy raises some important points here. But it's too easy to make generalisations about viewers. Taking Dave's point. How do they know the profile?

For example - I'm a graduate as are the other three members of my family all of whom watch Wigan regularly. I wouldn't mind betting that most of the posters on here are also graduates, which puts us all firmly in the middle class categories that advertisers are interested in. The chip eating stereotype that Suzy alluded to is just that a stereotype and whilst there may be an element of truth in it, it is lazy and misses the demography by a mile.

The World Cup illustrated that Rugby League can be a national game watched by thousands of people from across all strata of society. When I went to Wemley and Cardiff to watch England I was surrounded by people from well outside the 'heartland'.

The failure to promote the game to big business lies at the door of the RFL. They have a magnificent product, as proved by the World Cup and Super League Grand Final. They need to do a better job. Personally I would give Sally Bolton the top job and move the 'Fat Controller' aside.

Slightly off topic, but I wonder how many on here knew that Sally Bolton was once on the "board" at Wigan. I think she held the position of Chief Exec back in the early 2000's.

Chip eating stereotypes aside, the fact remains that the lower socio-economic classes are largely concentrated in the north (and the south west), and thus the advertising revenue available is adjusted accordingly. There will be pockets of affluence (Wilmslow, Alderley Edge for eg), but it's not libellous to marry the M62 corridor to some pretty poor boroughs.

In any case, weren't we supposed to be getting an announcement of new sponsors on the back of Friday's meeting?

I think it's fair to say that if Wiganers ran the game from top to bottom we would all be better off. What's Maurice up to these days?

I'm sorry but that is NOT fact.

Lower socio economic classes can be found all over the country. What about parts Scotland/parts of Wales/the Midlands/The north east etc. , as well as Inner London (some of the poorest boroughs in the M62 corridor like Knowsley hardly play any RL at all - confusing isn' it?)

The 'pockets of affluence' extend to all big cities in the north (Manchester/Liverpool/Leeds/Bradford/Hull) larger towns (too numerous to mention) as well as parts of West Lancashire/North Yorkshire. Then there's seaside towns like Blackpool/Lytham/Southport. Not to mention places like Parbold/Crosten/Rufford.

There are plenty of affluent people in the north to target (not just in Cheshire), many of whom watch football and pack grounds out all over the north paying a lot more than RL clubs charge.

I would argue that there are plenty of people from all socio-economic groups that RL can appeal to and the failure to find sponsorship lies at the RFL door.

So, who is he??

Not getting into an argument, but: yes it is.
A couple of years ago. the bottom 10 regions by wealth (earned wage) were Knowsley, Blackburn, Middlesborough, Dundee, Sunderland, Leicester, Caerphilly, Stoke, Blackpool & Hull.
It's a generalisation, but a broadly accurate one that outside the London commuter belt wages and social classification are (at least perceived to be) lower.

I think that the point that we are argueing about is whether RL as a sport can be marketed succesfully in the north. Would it be fair to say that you think (because of what you have stated) that it can't, whereas I would argue that there are plenty of people in the north from all socio-economic groups to market the game to - just as football does.

Quote ="Magic Superbeetle"I'd imagine true revenue breakdowns will be hard to find. The basic summary: corporate.sky.com/media/key_facts_and_figures Revenue of £7,200,000,000 off of 10 million customers. Whilst it's difficult to say I'd imagine it'd work out 1:2 subscription: advertising on those figures. Sky will generally know each one of its customers educational background, profession, and probably some correlated data on shopping habits, as well as watching habits. The detail can include as much detail as whether or not you own a pet, how many children, whether your married etc (all actually quite frightening when you stop to think about it.) all built to profile their watchers so they can sell the advertising space (a dog food company won't want to advertise when no pet owners are watching) It's the classic example of do you sell 1 for £100 or 10 for £10 - I think the common belief is it's better for the former (less work to maintain contracts etc) which is why higher, more affluent, category's are more catered for more readily.'" Yes your assumptions are frightening. I'm very tempted to write to Sky with a Subject Access Request asking to see what information they have on me.

Quote ="Magic Superbeetle"I'd imagine true revenue breakdowns will be hard to find. The basic summary: corporate.sky.com/media/key_facts_and_figures Revenue of £7,200,000,000 off of 10 million customers. Whilst it's difficult to say I'd imagine it'd work out 1:2 subscription: advertising on those figures. Sky will generally know each one of its customers educational background, profession, and probably some correlated data on shopping habits, as well as watching habits. The detail can include as much detail as whether or not you own a pet, how many children, whether your married etc (all actually quite frightening when you stop to think about it.) all built to profile their watchers so they can sell the advertising space (a dog food company won't want to advertise when no pet owners are watching) It's the classic example of do you sell 1 for £100 or 10 for £10 - I think the common belief is it's better for the former (less work to maintain contracts etc) which is why higher, more affluent, category's are more catered for more readily.'" Yes your assumptions are frightening. I'm very tempted to write to Sky with a Subject Access Request asking to see what information they have on me.

I would argue that advertising split, if the 10m subs are accurate they would average £60 a month to generate that revenue, so if you half it then 50/50 would be worst case imo
RL has been weak because it has been divided and has poor leaders, but if 100,000 had sky subs for RL alone then that's about £70m pa - so how do end up with what we do?
We represent fantastic value to sky and hopefully BT may see this and force the correct rates to be paid

I can tell you how if you like

your profile won't be kept with a name so they can deny any specific requests - just they'll be able to say x% of our customers do this that or the other (depending on who they're selling to)

(Did an internship (well 2 weeks before I couldn't stand it anymore) with channel 5 doing exactly this - no there aren't enough showers in the world to make me feel clean again)