The mini KC.....I work with a rovers fan who knows everything about both teams but never goes,am having a discussion about their ground...he says midget Hudgeall and the consortium own the ground but I thought it was Gaingroup or whatever own it.

It is owned by the council iirc and they pay a peppercorn rent.

Wasn't Gaingroup something to do with the council?.....that will do me for now to shut him up

[url=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Craven_Park_%28Hull%29Some detail in Wiki[/url

Rovers lease Craven Park from Kingston Community Development who in turn lease it from Hull City Council.

so in a nutshell, they dont own it lol

It was originally something to do with a consortium run by don robinson iirc, not sure who it is now but pretty certain hudge has no part of it.
different scenario to your set up tho, we do have all the up keep, development an subsequently also havd the ability to make money from events and catering.

u maybe correct but we are still hull Kingston rovers not sharks not r.l or hull or f.c we haven't changed our name 8 times and we have never been bought out by Gateshead thunder that my friend is a fact

This is his next nugget he has just dropped on me

Thin and ice spring to mind, I'm afraid.

Craven park was owned by a dog racing company for many years if that helps!

So, they've took out huge loans and paid for a new stand for a stadium they don't own?

Cracking bit of business. That's like me building a conservatory on next doors house.

Too right there no better off then us and we rent the KC, they've got the cost of running repairs & mini kc is worth nothing till its time to sell its like owning any property or land, not worth out till you sell it on...& who would buy that dump.

Craven park does not exist

No better off then you? We have a 99 year lease which costs us around 20k a year. This increases in a year as that's when we have to start paying the council a mortgage fee for the North stand. But yourselves pay 600k rent for the KC stadium a massive difference of 580k per year. Yes you don't have any upkeep costs but on the other hand we earn every penny from ground sponsorship and naming rights, ticket sales and events. The only thing we don't earn 100% of is the profits from catering and that's only because we have an events company running the catering rather then run it ourselves.

Many people do renovations to properties they only rent. I wouldn't personally but when you have a 99 year lease on a property and knowing the renovations will eventually make you money and increase the profile of the club then we'd have been stupid not to make the renovations we have.

How come you run at such a loss then? One of the worst in SL, but you get good crowds & you haven't pumped loafs into youth, so what's happening with all the money?

Our crowds are average whilst we've nearly always operated at a full salary cap. Still it's an Interesting question, Paying over the odds for average players due to the profile of the club not been able to attract these average players for less money has probably created a hindrance. Lack of hospitality options maybe another. Also year on year we've increased the facilities at the club which I'm guessing costs money.
You also mention the youth side, Our facilities aren't as impressive but we still have 9 full time academy lads running on the same Assa accreditation as yourselves. This cost money and isn't cheap
This off season we've knocked out the old medical rooms and dressing room and rebuilt them bigger and better due to having the extra room now the admin facilities are in the North stand, This all costs money.
I'm hoping the North stand changes the trend of losing money that and takes us onto a new level. We've increased season pass sales by 10% when most clubs are posting a down trend so thats a start. Guess we'll see in a years time.

Double post, see below.

Oh I've made a right old Horlicks of that. Meant to edit and quoted.

to be fair to rovers they didn't start any substantial ground improvements until the 99 year lease was finalised in 2005. they did the pitch, east stand and now the north stand. the north stand is a bit of a gamble but rovers are hoping they can increase the amount of both home and away supporters with the better facilities. i'm not convinced by the away support increasing too much, as the facilities at the kc haven't resulted in huge increases in away supporters for us. the exception may be the derby as a lot of hull fans didn't like being housed in immingham to watch it as we all know and stayed away, and there may be a bit of 1st season curiosity from the other club's fans. rovers are looking at quite a few bums on seats to help pay for this development, and these will need to be new bums and not just bums moving from other parts of the ground. (that's enough bums for one post)

It does to me and most people.

Put this post on the "Pride of East Hull" forum and you'll not need to make the excuse at the end.

That's a poor analogy, caravans don't have conservatories.

They're not normally painted bright blue either.

I still have my doubts as to whether they will give us the North Stand for the derby or indeed what price they will charge to go in there.

Stiil think we will be in Zeebrugge!

Well considering they are selling season passes in the north, it will be a mixed bag in the north.