Football News - Charlton Athletic's Community Scheme

The Purist Goes Into The Valley

Oonagh McGirr.

Oonagh McGirr

"Affinity" is a word that, if used at all, would appear to be taken for granted in the marketing corridors of your average English professional club these days. But affinity is the holy grail for the business development strategy of Charlton Athletic, and they are justly reaping the rewards, along with a few envious glances into the bargain.

The Purist decided to take a first-hand look at the facilities the south London club's community department offers to a whole demographic of its own: visiting students. And affinity is a big word down there, a stone's throw as it is from the origins of Woolwich Arsenal... and whatever happened to them?

The modern-day Gunners, along with fellow Premiership Goliaths Chelsa and Tottenham, may be missing a trick or two, according to Oonagh McGirr, who decided one day in 2003 that the students of English as a foreign language under her pastoral care deserved a look at football beyond the shiny televised product.

McGirr takes up the story: "I just set about getting some tickets and found no encouragement from the 'bigger' clubs, either being directed automatically to credit card booking lines or simply given the message: 'We're full'."

Based, funnily enough, in serious Arsenal territory on Holloway Road, Oonagh is a senior EFL lecturer at London Metropolitan University... yet obtaining this professional's perspective requires her to take off her Charlton hat - figuratively speaking, of course. She'll also don a Real Madrid hat now and again, a legacy of a stint living in the Spanish capital, and it's not too tough to guess which national football team she follows, either, which all makes for some enjoyable digressions. She is nonetheless justifiably proud of an association that, conveniently in her case, was triggered by the deaf ears of London's big-time clubs to her offer of a ready-made source of curious punters.

"What I found was that Charlton have this 'pick up the phone' approach to marketing, as opposed to a 'join the queue' approach," McGirr, whose campus is home to 27,000 - with the biggest foreign intake, at 41 per cent - in the country, continued. They do their homework, too, a fact impossible to miss when you meet Ian Cartwright, who is responsible for the programme at the Charlton Athletic end. Their international supporters club, boasting members from over 40 countries, was already up and running when Oonagh made contact and she found him happy to discuss not just discount membership, but a lot more besides.

The club also had African and Spanish initiatives on the go, but, as Cartwright pointed out, "This is different. We have visited Africa, have a presence at Campo Amor in Spain and are very active, as you'd expect, locally, but those things are linked more to the social responsibility, the coaching and the football in the community side of things.

"With Oonagh's programme there's a bums-on-seats element," was Cartwright's refreshingly candid explanation."We see it as common sense to give visiting students a unique experience on the day. We know it builds an affinity from the feedback we get, and it dovetails with the way we look after Scandinavian visitors, for example, which as a market currently represents £100k [150k in euros] a year to us. There's a growing band of travel operators vying for the right to buy blocks of 50 or so season tickets because they know our guests will get a lounge pass, buffet, mobile souvenir shop and be well looked after here at The Valley."

Hot on the heels of Cartwright's participation in an exhausting international Flag Parade, in association with Greenwich Council - longstanding educational partners since their u-turn allowed the club to return home after sojourns at Selhurst and Upton Parks a decade ago - it was a strange time to visit the Valley. We talked at the end of a week that saw manager Alan Curbishley booed and the public address announcer sacked... this in a centenary campaign just 20 short years after the company that owned the club was wound up. Now in their sixth Premiership season, a recent feud with Gillingham barely resolved and a new feud with Crystal Palace hopefully defused after the Tannoy jibes referred to above, can this really be The Valley, home of the progressive, fan-friendly Addicks?

"Unethical", "underhand" and "poor behaviour" were the verbal arrows fired at the Charlton camp from Gills chairman Paul Scally, charges laughed off not just by chief executive Peter Varney, who, with Curbishley has presided over the club's miraculous top-flight consolidation, but Cartwright too, in his role as business development manager.

"Our community programme has been commended both domestically and internationally for the work it does to improve people's lives," said Varney. "In the last year we have embarked on a project in a deprived township in South Africa - we are not doing that because we expect them to catch a bus to The Valley."

A spat arising from Charlton's impressive inroads into the county of Kent, the destination for many a south London migrant, is not about to knock the business strategy off-course. No apologies are forthcoming for spreading the word, and supporter-on-the-board Sue Townend was even the face of one project aimed at catering to football fans in Thanet... in deepest Kent.

For all the talk of "competing in the sector of leisure pursuits" and "matchday experiences", CAFC can boast a mission statement to shame their peers. The history of supporters on boards, however, has been known to sink to the spectacle of sitting out entire meetings... until the subject of which pies to sell at half-time is discussed. The cynical might say it's no more than lip service, or good PR, Ian?

"We take pride in listening to fans and the fact that you are running a multimillion pound business doesn't mean everything has to change," observed Cartwright.

"We're not the first club to have a fan on the board but the difference, we feel, is that we've 16 fans on the board, really, they just also happen to have more financial resources than usual in common!

"If there's a target when it comes to attracting foreign students, it's simply to grow the project. There's nothing like a fixed amount of revenue we are aiming for." Being able to sell a great tradition and a story along with the shirts must help.

"The romance the story of the club offers is indeed a useful tool," he admits. From 1947 FA Cup winner Sam Bartram to "Superclive" Mendonca's 1998 promotion heroics; Eddie Firmani to Derek Hales, Defoe to Di Canio, Don Welsh to Rob Lee or Paul Walsh to Colin Walsh, some famous names accompany the achievements of supporters prepared to form a political party in order to keep their identity and their ground. "We offer a unique story and a unique part of London as opposed to complacently sticking visitors in front of a row of replica shirts. That's where the affinity really comes in."

The players themselves are vital to Cartwright's efforts bearing fruit. So how happy are they to make themselves available for ambassadorial duty? "There's nothing like the cooperation of a player for that WOW! factor," Cartwright agreed.

"El Khalej, who sadly left in the summer of 2003, was one of the most eager we've had, but every player has been happy to get involved so far... it's in their contracts, after all!" Talel El Karkouri, Khalej's Moroccan compatriot, has since picked up the ambassadorial baton, though hopes for an Iranian fanbase were dashed as Karim Bagheri's stint turned out to last less than a single season.

"The South Africans were the only ones we've targeted specifically, and the sight of Mark Fish and Shaun Bartlett, who are as big as Beckham at home, walking into this suite and putting a smile on their fans' faces justified that decision all on its own."

Patrick Vieira's Senegal-based Diambars Institute may indicate the future for individual player investment and 'giving something back', but in the meantime Charlton's Scandinavian profile can only flourish with the presence of the likes of Dennis Romedahl, Hermann Hreidarsson and Jonatan Johansson, following in the footsteps of one-time European Footballer of the Year Allan Simonsen in that illustrious roll-call of former players.

As if to illustrate that punters in far-flung territories don't need to be patronised by a player bearing a similar name, Charlton's Canadian branch is flourishing. However, the huge influx of foreign players has brought with it one major perceived dilemma: that of team selection.

Japanese students enjoy their night out at Charlton.

In Cartwright's experience, does any pressure come to bear on the manager should specific televised games mean a particular national audience is there to exploit? "Like Li Tie, from China, you mean?" Yes, that kind of thing! "I have to say Manchester City's Sun Jihai has impressed me far more, but Li Tie is a different matter. Whenever I've seen him pull on an Everton shirt... no, Alan Curbishley would never stand for that approach and although TV money is vital, there is no need for him to, anyway, with the way we promote the club overseas."

So should you find yourself studying in London consider contacting Charlton for a warm welcome - if not the overblown Champions League ambience. They're hardly neighbours from hell, and, to quote one satisfied customer: "it's much better than Spurs".

Charlton Athletic Official Site