Some lessons from the German fan experience

It’s been a busy couple of days out of the office, Thursday lunchtime I departed for Dusseldorf, Germany with Borussia Mönchengladbach vs Köln at Borussia Park on Saturday evening calling my name…

For those unaware, this is one of the fiercest derbies in German football. The Rheine derby as it is known features the two sides who are separated by just 28 miles as the crow flies! Enough talking about the action on the pitch now to take a closer look at what happens off it and what clubs here in the UK can learn from our German counterparts.

Transport 

When it comes to location the stadium is definitely not what you call central, sitting in a rural area 4km from the centre of Mönchengladbach and over a kilometre from the main train station you can see how it could be seen as a logistical nightmare with over 54,000 people in attendance. 

Included with your ticket was a free shuttle bus from the station to a designated area next to the stadium and you could also get free travel on certain trains in and around the region on matchday. 

What could you do?

Talk to local bus or train companies to see if you can come up with an offer on discounted or free travel for ticketholders, Aberdeen FC this season partnered with First to offer a discount on matchday travel when fans show their ticket on the bus. It’s an offer that benefits the fans and the transport provider too! 

Fan Zone 

One of the benefits that Mönchengladbach do have by being out in a rural area with plenty of space available is that they have the opportunity to build their own fan zone outside the ground. 

Large televisions showing coverage from the early games, alcohol and a number of food trucks were all on display to cater for the thousands that had made the early trip to the ground.

What could you do? 

Depending on the amount of space you have you can think about partnering with local food companies, breweries and putting up some TVs if possible to encourage people to head through. Take a look at Nottingham Forest for a good example of what they have on offer, they even invite players from past and present along to meet the fans! 

Alcohol

I wasn’t able to experience one of the key fan experience aspects which is the ability to drink beer at the game as this was classed as a category A fixture meaning that police didn’t believe it was safe for fans to be drinking alcohol during the high-risk fixture.

What could you do?

This probably isn’t something that you can control as a club but again don’t see why we can’t have something like this on offer in Scotland where low-risk games can have alcohol on sale and if it is a big rivalry like the old firm then the police can influence the decision to have it on sale? 

Written by Connor Douglas, Fanbase.

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