Setting the Standard: Redeveloping RSC Links with the Club

[Frankie]

Another splendid article in the STS series - this time from Tannochside Bear who discusses the existing flawed links between the club and RSCs and how these can be improved.

BEGINS

As part of the 'Setting the Standard' series of articles, I would like to discuss the role of Rangers Supporters Clubs (RSCs) in today’s game, the links between them and the club, and how we can get the best working relationship between them.

At the moment, all official RSCs are registered at Ibrox through the Worldwide Alliance (WWA), with claims of over 600 registered clubs and a membership of 30,000 supporters. From within this comes the Rangers Supporters Assembly, with 10 elected representatives taken from the Worldwide Alliance.

There is also the Rangers Supporters Association, the much longer-standing organisation which used to distribute tickets to RSCs for matches both at Ibrox and away from home. Sadly, this has diminished much in recent years, forcing it to sell their headquarters within the Wee Rangers Club to pay off it’s debts and now has only around 20 member clubs.

RSCs take many shapes and forms throughout the world. From the many Glasgow based clubs with decades of history behind them and a million stories of follow following, to the many overseas RSC’s that show games in clubs and pubs for exiled Bears all over the world. I personally have been a member of a Glasgow based RSC for 20 years, 10 of which as part of their committee, so I really believe in the value of the RSC and have some experience of how they are run.

RSCs in this country are mainly run with one primary function: to arrange travel and tickets for Rangers supporters to follow the team. The club’s contact with RSCs throughout the course of the season almost entirely consists of ticketing issues. Most RSCs will know very little about the WWA, when it has meetings in its area, who are the area representatives, and what it is there to do for them. Outside the UK, they are mostly social, a gathering of supporters to watch the game together at all hours of the day and night.

We all know that the current situation does very little for either party. It gives virtually nothing to the RSCs and the club gets virtually nothing back from them.

The club certainly undervalues the power of the RSCs to influence fan thinking. Not only does the club have to do more for RSCs, but the reverse is also true. The best example of this was when the club was under fire in the Spring of 2007 for “The Billy Boys”. The club desperately wanted the fans to stop singing it after UEFA effectively outlawed the song. The club tried everything it could to get the fans to stop. Finally they appealed to a couple of the well known RSC chairmen to see if they could do anything. After a hastily arranged meeting of representatives of over 60 RSCs held in April 2007 in the Wee Rangers Club, an agreement was reached to get members of RSCs to “self-police” in this area. A policy that was worked extremely well and continues to work to this day.

So what changes can we make in order to set the standard in this area?

There are 3 questions that I want to look at in this topic.

1. What can the club do for the RSCs?

Issue a membership card for all members of an RSC. The card gives them a small discount in the club shop, (online for overseas members) stadium tours, etc. Not too much that it costs a fortune, more a token gesture to make them feel part of the family.

Use the club’s buying power to have deals in place with certain companies to give RSCs some good deals. Perhaps with a clothing manufacturer to give the best prices on RSC polo shirts and flags. Individual RSCs all go off and get their own polo shirts done. Let the club be part of it. The club will make a small commission, and the RSCs all get a good deal.

Give RSCs the option to seat their members together at Ibrox. This will of course help the atmosphere at Ibrox as well as binding the RSCs more together as a group.

Negotiate strongly with other SPL clubs for a larger allocation for matches. It appears we do not actually want more tickets for games as it is too much bother for us to deal with them for not much reward. This is not the standard we should be setting. We must put the interests of our fans first. Without them there is nothing. I am quite sure Kilmarnock and Motherwell for example would love to give us more tickets, even share a stand in order to get more fans to the game. For shared stands, the Rangers section would be all family tickets.

2. What can the RSCs do for the club in return?

If the RSCs knew that they were getting a fair deal on tickets and that the club were right behind them, they would be far more interested in putting something back.

RSCs are well trained in running successful fundraisers. From race nights to sportsman’s dinners to sponsored football matches to just selling scratchcards and much more. The truth is they have to just to survive. I am quite sure that most RSCs would happily run a fundraiser every season with the proceeds being split between their own club funds and the Rangers Youth Development programme, or the museum fund. The club would provide a signed shirt and ball for a raffle at the event, and where possible a player, former player or coach in attendance, this could be a real source of income throughout the year.

RSCs are already the club’s best selling tools. Already, many RSCs are agents in the club lotto, raising large sums of money every week. This could easily be expanded upon if the RSCs thought the club were really looking after them and making them feel part of the club.

3. Who is going to do all the work?

We need a new organisation who will look after the interests of the RSCs. It would be self-funding from membership dues collected from the RSCs. I would split them into two categories. Ticketing RSCs and non-ticketing RSCs. This means that the RSCs who take tickets every week are treated separately from the RSCs from abroad. The ticketing RSCs would then pay more than the other RSCs. I would suggest ~£4 per member per year for ticketing RSCs and ~£2 for non-ticketing RSCs. The RSCs would be easily able to pass this on to their members with their dues if they knew what they were getting back for it as outlined above. I would also reintroduce the Rangers Rally, which would be supported by the club and a large turnout of players, past and present, would be guaranteed.

The funds raised would pay for the salaries of the staff whose job it would be to run the organisation. It would take quite some organising to make all of the above work, but with the right Rangers-minded people employed, it would become a professional office that would be the contact for any RSC enquiries and would have its separate ticket office for the distribution of RSC tickets. It would have a committee of elected Rangers fans that would be elected by the RSCs themselves in a postal ballot to all RSCs on a one-member one-vote basis. The staff would be answerable to the committee, and the committee answerable to the RSCs at monthly meetings, and all up for re-election annually. A full record of the minutes would be sent to every club every month to keep them involved, and RSCs would be allowed to send in questions in advance of meetings without having to attend personally. A website with all the up to date information, including a private section for RSC organisers to learn of more sensitive information (financials etc) would also form an important part of this.

To summarise, the RSCs are such an important part of our club, our history, our heritage. Most Rangers supporters have used one at one time or another. Most have probably been to a function run by one of them. Most will have seen the banners with the RSC club names on them in various places all over the world. Personally, there is nothing better than seeing the convoy of RSCs thundering out of Dundee or Aberdeen after an important victory.

The club should be embracing this collective of (in my biased opinion) the most passionate supporters anywhere in world football, and by working together making things the best they possibly can be for the ultimate benefit of Rangers Football Club.

[Frankie]

Speaking from someone who has never been a member of a RSC, I'm glad TB has taken the time to detail part of it's operations.

Certainly the problems above once again show the club's marked retreat from working meaningfully with supporters. Not just gloryhunters who'll disappear as soon as we lose a title or three but fans with decades of matches and investment behind them.

That is an absolute disgrace. As such it is vital a new organisation (or at least a full and open Assembly revamp) is undertaken to represent supporters. I'd prefer RSC operations were contained within that (as opposed to further - or maintaining - group splintering) but I can understand why it's imperative the history of the Association is preserved.

The club must redevelop links with the supporters. RSCs should be the first port of call given their experience and wide-ranging influence.

FYI, I do believe the Association are currently examining their own organisation in order to make improvements and modernise. Hopefully that may attract more RSCs back to that umbrella while increase the say they have at the Assembly table.

[davie1689]

great article m8

i feel another thing should be added

the club should start giving some allocations to the smaller run RSC

at present we are a small club of around 17 bears with about half of those wanting to attend all away games

we have to beg and borrow of other RSC for away tickets

[Bluepeter9]

At last a reasonable article wth well reasoned arguments and suggested solutions. I like the idea of a RSC 'Loyalty' (sic) card and I am sure there is buying power there. Where I still see difficulty is in the fans meeting the club concept - thats OK for admin (like tickets / loyalty schemes / Rallies etc.) but where it seems to fail is when we try to tell the club what to do re: PR / Players / Songs etc. The club has to take a moderate / legal approach to all the 'fan' issues - but what we seem to get is the more 'vocal' wanting to go for these positions and often the more vocal are the more extreme.

[Bluedell]

Where I still see difficulty is in the fans meeting the club concept - thats OK for admin (like tickets / loyalty schemes / Rallies etc.) but where it seems to fail is when we try to tell the club what to do re: PR / Players / Songs etc. The club has to take a moderate / legal approach to all the 'fan' issues - but what we seem to get is the more 'vocal' wanting to go for these positions and often the more vocal are the more extreme.

But it can be used to get the club's message across. The club are very poor at communicating with the fans, and if they can get their message across to well respected RSC heads then this can lead to more initiatives similar to the self-policing one introduced the season before last. That's far more effective than initatives like the Wee Blue Book (but I guess that wasn't aimed at the fans).

[Bluedell]

At last a reasonable article wth well reasoned arguments and suggested solutions.

And I don't see the need for the implied criticism of the other "Setting the Standard" articles, which have all been outstanding, in my opinion.

[Frankie]

At last a reasonable article wth well reasoned arguments and suggested solutions. I like the idea of a RSC 'Loyalty' (sic) card and I am sure there is buying power there. Where I still see difficulty is in the fans meeting the club concept - thats OK for admin (like tickets / loyalty schemes / Rallies etc.) but where it seems to fail is when we try to tell the club what to do re: PR / Players / Songs etc. The club has to take a moderate / legal approach to all the 'fan' issues - but what we seem to get is the more 'vocal' wanting to go for these positions and often the more vocal are the more extreme.

I'm surprised you think this is the only STS article with reasoned arguments and solutions? All have such a positive slant which is exactly the reason for the project.

In addition, just because supporters want to meet with the club doesn't mean anyone wants to tell it what to do. We only want to give our opinion in an open environment where upon the club would then be entitled to disagree/agree and give full explanations for their position.

That would be much better than the status quo where many fans feel isolated from the club resulting in petty arguments via the media.

[Frankie]

I should note that the chairman himself talked about bringing back the Rangers Rally forums 2 or 3 years ago at an AGM.

I think this would be a great idea. He, Smith or Bain wouldn't necessarily need to attend but an open forum with other club staff to debate various issues would certainly be interesting.

[TannochsideBear]

At last a reasonable article wth well reasoned arguments and suggested solutions. I like the idea of a RSC 'Loyalty' (sic) card and I am sure there is buying power there. Where I still see difficulty is in the fans meeting the club concept - thats OK for admin (like tickets / loyalty schemes / Rallies etc.) but where it seems to fail is when we try to tell the club what to do re: PR / Players / Songs etc. The club has to take a moderate / legal approach to all the 'fan' issues - but what we seem to get is the more 'vocal' wanting to go for these positions and often the more vocal are the more extreme.

Thanks for the compliment but I would suggest the other articles in the series so far have also made great suggestions and have all come from a positive viewpoint.

As I am sure you are aware, I am very much disillusioned with the direction our Chairman is taking our club, and his actions in recent years, but for this series those objections are left behind to try to come up with something better than what we have currently, from a constructive point of view.

Any meetings suggested from the RSC's position would only be to discuss the things in which the RSC's and the club are working together on. It would have absolutely nothing to do with media/pr/team selections etc. There are other areas for that to happen. From the illustration above, meetings would be to discuss ticket allocations, fundraising ventures, ringfenced spending of the raised funds on youth development or a museum fund etc.