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Post by mickeythemaestro on Jul 25, 2024 12:10:08 GMT
Some fair points raised there. Stoke needs something to kick start meaningful regeneration. That's obvious to anyone. Maybe a spon new events arena isn't it. But maybe it is. Yes it would probably ruin The Vic as a venue but times move on. That venue could be re purposed for alternative use as part of an overall vision. It doesn't need to be demolished. As you say its historic. A modern events arena with decent accessibility and parking would most definitely drag in punters from South of Manchester and North of Birmingham depending on what it was showing. The European Champions League of futsal is being put on in manchester next month. And it's being held at manchester velodrome. Which is alright for kids to play at but not really for top level futsal players. A massively growing sport that some smart people will begin tapping into I'm quite sure. An arena can a lot be more than just a music destination. Combat sports are growing massively, same with darts, snooker events etc etc Yes we have manchester and Birmingham on our doorstep but they aren't the be all and end all. Manchester traffic wise is a total pain in the arse and the parking is getting worse week by week as the council go anti car crazy. They shut the inner ring road here last weekend for cleaning. Absolute genius idea by some plum at the council. Bet the visiting tourists in cars heading to gigs were delighted. And Birmingham to me has never been a place I want or like going to. I live in Manchester and would happily go to events in Stoke. I tend to every other weekend during the season 😆 but aye I'm a Stoke fan. Either way Stoke needs a spark. Something that will tickle the imagination of investors to make them say I want to be a part of that. I don't play x-box etc but I can imagine a stadium or arena fitted out to accommodate live events based around that sort of thing would be popular and we're ideally located. As you said earlier, why not a Bet365 Arena. You've just highlighted it yourself....a bit of vision and out of the "X" box thinking. Become a venue for some of the growing more minor events. I'm sure some of the UK based ufc style cage fighting events would love a decent 10k seat arena to give them a venue. Cage Warriors etc. And who knows, we get a local lad who makes it to the top at the sport and we get the UFC rolling into town. Manchester has had 2 UFC champions, one a current champion fighting in Manchester this very weekend. There is always such a lack of ambition with regards to Stoke from the very people who are charged with steering our fate. Things need to change. We need ambition instead of shrugging our shoulders and just accepting our fate.
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Post by thehartshillbadger on Jul 25, 2024 12:12:23 GMT
Are we talking about arenas again? Esports would be popular, how about that MMA stuff?
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Post by Eggybread on Jul 25, 2024 12:25:02 GMT
Minimum wage in Manchester is the same as in Stoke ? Minimum wage and the living wage are the same throughout the country. Whats that got to do with anything? The average wage in Manchester is £37,500 in Stoke it is £32,500. Absolutely nothing to do with minimum wage.
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Post by Squeekster on Jul 25, 2024 12:29:57 GMT
Minimum wage and the living wage are the same throughout the country. Whats that got to do with anything? The average wage in Manchester is £37,500 in Stoke it is £32,500. Absolutely nothing to do with minimum wage. Nothing, just pointing out the fact.
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Post by Eggybread on Jul 25, 2024 12:50:48 GMT
Whats that got to do with anything? The average wage in Manchester is £37,500 in Stoke it is £32,500. Absolutely nothing to do with minimum wage. Nothing, just pointing out the fact. ![:D](//storage.proboards.com/800541/images/kwfoKwtHI0jglJZ4qZf6.gif)
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Post by milton58 on Jul 25, 2024 13:04:36 GMT
How long before this thread becomes political.. everything on EE board ends up the same lately
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Post by desman2 on Jul 25, 2024 13:05:00 GMT
Maybe re introduce the old rail services to the city centre from various areas around the city and Newcastle. All you've got at present are buses and your car.
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Post by mickeythemaestro on Jul 25, 2024 13:12:09 GMT
Maybe re introduce the old rail services to the city centre from various areas around the city and Newcastle. All you've got at present are buses and your car. Bloody Richard Beeching 🙄
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Post by JoeinOz on Jul 25, 2024 13:56:18 GMT
Maybe re introduce the old rail services to the city centre from various areas around the city and Newcastle. All you've got at present are buses and your car. The dire public transport is a huge factor. As far as nightlife goes it's a huge problem. There's precious few buses after 7.30.
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Post by Staffsoatcake on Jul 25, 2024 14:32:12 GMT
How long before this thread becomes political.. everything on EE board ends up the same lately We need a Lets he nice thread,anyone who isnt,can fuck off up the Vale.😋
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Post by JoeinOz on Jul 25, 2024 15:29:35 GMT
How long before this thread becomes political.. everything on EE board ends up the same lately Well the point I make about crap public transport is deeply political. Sorry 😁
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Post by mtrstudent on Jul 25, 2024 15:37:38 GMT
Maybe re introduce the old rail services to the city centre from various areas around the city and Newcastle. All you've got at present are buses and your car. The dire public transport is a huge factor. As far as nightlife goes it's a huge problem. There's precious few buses after 7.30. Taxi prices made me skip loads of nights out when I was younger. It could more than double the price of a night.
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Post by JoeinOz on Jul 25, 2024 15:39:49 GMT
The dire public transport is a huge factor. As far as nightlife goes it's a huge problem. There's precious few buses after 7.30. Taxi prices made me skip loads of nights out when I was younger. It could more than double the price of a night. Absolutely. It's a serious blight on the city for so many reasons.
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Post by tommycarlsberg on Jul 25, 2024 15:50:00 GMT
It doesn't really though because anyone in Cheshire is going to Manchester and anyone in South Staffordshire is going to Birmingham. It's just the way it is. The live booking team here at work tell me all the time they struggle to shift tickets at Vic Hall and Regent, so what good is a 10,000 seat arena going to do apart from kill those already impressive and historical buildings? All Stoke/Hanley needs to do is serve the people it's already got. We have a big enough population who are willing to go out and spend their money in shops, pubs, restaurants. It doesn't need to compete with other cities it just needs to evolve for it's own people to use. I don't doubt the logic of what you say tommy - but I'm curious to know what has changed in the last 40 years* -- given what you say about the team at work finding it hard to sell tickets for those two venues. Look at this listing for Iron Maiden's UK tour in 1983 ( I pick them cos they're one of my faves and their tour lists were a who's who of middle-size theatres/halls back in the day): MAY Mon 2 Hull, UKCity Hall Tue 3 Preston, UKGuildhall Thu 5 Oxford, UKNew Theatre Fri 6 Leicester, UKDe Montfort Hall Sat 7 Southampton, UKGaumont Hall Sun 8 Ipswich, UKGaumont Hall Tue 10 Nottingham, UKGaumont Hall Wed 11 Bradford, UKSaint George's Hall Thu 12 Glasgow, UKApollo Theatre Fri 13 Edinburgh, UKPlayhouse Theatre Sun 15 Cardiff, UKSaint David's Hall Mon 16 Sheffield, UKCity Hall Tue 17 Newcastle, UKCity Hall Wed 18 Hanley, UKVictoria Hall Fri 20 Bristol, UKColston Hall Sat 21 Birmingham, UKOdeon Sun 22 Birmingham, UKOdeon Mon 23 Manchester, UKApollo Theatre Wed 25 Hammersmith, London, UKOdeon Thu 26 Hammersmith, London, UKOdeon Fri 27 Hammersmith, London, UKOdeon Sat 28 Hammersmith, London, UKOdeon - Not only did they play Hanley, but still did 2 nights at Brum's Odeon down the road. (The following year they played the Viccy Hall AND 2 nights up the road at the Manc Apollo - so demand was there). Do bands not play this scale of venue on a tour any more - or has something changed that means Hanley is overlooked by promoters now? - Remember back in those days, we had our own promoter in the Potteries - Mike Lloyd - were they better at promoting the venue to tour bookers? I don't live in the area any more, I'm just curious to know what has changed if anything, that means S-o-T can't support even a decent 2,000 seat venue. What level of band does the Vic attract nowadays? * *** me, I'm old. Well artists eventually want to make the transition from theatres to arenas, which is indicative of earnings and popularity I guess. A tour like the one you've quoted there would never happen now because we have purpose built arenas, as it looks like Iron Maiden would have been popular enough to fill them in 1983 but instead had to do multiple nights at the same venue, or multiple locations, to reach their full audience - indeed, they do now sell out all the main arenas. Touring has definitely changed today compared to even 15 years ago when I was a teenager. I would regularly see popular bands of the time like Courteeners, Bloc Party, The Wombats from the top of my head. www.atgtickets.com/venues/victoria-hall/ - There are no acts of that standing playing the Victoria Hall presently. For context it's a 1600 seat venue. These days if they're booking a tour for an exciting artist of the level of the artists I mentioned, they'd go your big cities and venues like, Manchester Apollo, Nottingham Rock City, Wolverhampton Civic Halls, Hammersmith Apollo. All of which are 3,000 plus. If they sold those dates out and thought they could sell more, it wouldn't make sense to add a Stoke Victoria Hall date, you'd take your chances at selling out another night at the sexier venues in Manchester and London because people will ultimately travel to these destinations. You wouldn't risk selling 1000 tickets at Victoria Hall, when 500 of them would travel and help you fill out the more prestigious venue. You see 'extra date added' next to the top venues all the time. If you go from this kind of top capacity theatre tour to arenas (look at a band like Fontaines DC now for an example), then you suddenly need to sell 10,000 more tickets per show, maybe more. Again, if you want to sell tickets in Birmingham, Liverpool and Manchester arenas, you need all the smaller cities around them (like Stoke) to feed into those audiences. So my point is, building an arena in Stoke and suddenly expecting bands/artists to start including the bet365 arena on their tours just won't happen. What is actually hindering Stoke, similar to the six towns/city centre debate, is we seem to have two really excellent theatres within 100 yards of each other, which sort of do the same thing. If there was a way they could magically merge into a 2,000 - 3,000 capacity theatre then maybe you can start competing with the likes of Wolverhampton Civic Hall and be included on these tours. My own experience leans more towards the comedy world and if you look across the calendars of the two theatres, they are still able to book top acts. This is due to comedians generally needing to do much more densely packed tours than musicians. Although if you look at the acts that have played and are playing this year, the likes of Frank Skinner, Jimmy Carr, they are truly household names that will sell anywhere. My colleagues who I mentioned are more averse to taking risks with more up and coming acts in Stoke. They ask me why they don't sell being from Stoke myself, so there isn't an answer for you there. I think perhaps the average wage argument might come in to play there, who knows? Tickets are expensive these days. Funnily enough, I posted this about a month ago but a younger comedy act who did actually recently play Vic Hall told me how shocked they were at how run down the city was, so maybe there is something in that. All of that is of course tailored to music and live comedy/theatre world, and reading some of the comments on here I do think an arena being built with the intention of hosting the more niche events could potentially be an excellent idea, so maybe I am wrong to dismiss an arena. I just don't see one disrupting the music and live comedy spaces.
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Post by JoeinOz on Jul 25, 2024 16:02:47 GMT
I don't doubt the logic of what you say tommy - but I'm curious to know what has changed in the last 40 years* -- given what you say about the team at work finding it hard to sell tickets for those two venues. Look at this listing for Iron Maiden's UK tour in 1983 ( I pick them cos they're one of my faves and their tour lists were a who's who of middle-size theatres/halls back in the day): MAY Mon 2 Hull, UKCity Hall Tue 3 Preston, UKGuildhall Thu 5 Oxford, UKNew Theatre Fri 6 Leicester, UKDe Montfort Hall Sat 7 Southampton, UKGaumont Hall Sun 8 Ipswich, UKGaumont Hall Tue 10 Nottingham, UKGaumont Hall Wed 11 Bradford, UKSaint George's Hall Thu 12 Glasgow, UKApollo Theatre Fri 13 Edinburgh, UKPlayhouse Theatre Sun 15 Cardiff, UKSaint David's Hall Mon 16 Sheffield, UKCity Hall Tue 17 Newcastle, UKCity Hall Wed 18 Hanley, UKVictoria Hall Fri 20 Bristol, UKColston Hall Sat 21 Birmingham, UKOdeon Sun 22 Birmingham, UKOdeon Mon 23 Manchester, UKApollo Theatre Wed 25 Hammersmith, London, UKOdeon Thu 26 Hammersmith, London, UKOdeon Fri 27 Hammersmith, London, UKOdeon Sat 28 Hammersmith, London, UKOdeon - Not only did they play Hanley, but still did 2 nights at Brum's Odeon down the road. (The following year they played the Viccy Hall AND 2 nights up the road at the Manc Apollo - so demand was there). Do bands not play this scale of venue on a tour any more - or has something changed that means Hanley is overlooked by promoters now? - Remember back in those days, we had our own promoter in the Potteries - Mike Lloyd - were they better at promoting the venue to tour bookers? I don't live in the area any more, I'm just curious to know what has changed if anything, that means S-o-T can't support even a decent 2,000 seat venue. What level of band does the Vic attract nowadays? * *** me, I'm old. Well artists eventually want to make the transition from theatres to arenas, which is indicative of earnings and popularity I guess. A tour like the one you've quoted there would never happen now because we have purpose built arenas, as it looks like Iron Maiden would have been popular enough to fill them in 1983 but instead had to do multiple nights at the same venue, or multiple locations, to reach their full audience - indeed, they do now sell out all the main arenas. Touring has definitely changed today compared to even 15 years ago when I was a teenager. I would regularly see popular bands of the time like Courteeners, Bloc Party, The Wombats from the top of my head. www.atgtickets.com/venues/victoria-hall/ - There are no acts of that standing playing the Victoria Hall presently. For context it's a 1600 seat venue. These days if they're booking a tour for an exciting artist of the level of the artists I mentioned, they'd go your big cities and venues like, Manchester Apollo, Nottingham Rock City, Wolverhampton Civic Halls, Hammersmith Apollo. All of which are 3,000 plus. If they sold those dates out and thought they could sell more, it wouldn't make sense to add a Stoke Victoria Hall date, you'd take your chances at selling out another night at the sexier venues in Manchester and London because people will ultimately travel to these destinations. You wouldn't risk selling 1000 tickets at Victoria Hall, when 500 of them would travel and help you fill out the more prestigious venue. You see 'extra date added' next to the top venues all the time. If you go from this kind of top capacity theatre tour to arenas (look at a band like Fontaines DC now for an example), then you suddenly need to sell 10,000 more tickets per show, maybe more. Again, if you want to sell tickets in Birmingham, Liverpool and Manchester arenas, you need all the smaller cities around them (like Stoke) to feed into those audiences. So my point is, building an arena in Stoke and suddenly expecting bands/artists to start including the bet365 arena on their tours just won't happen. What is actually hindering Stoke, similar to the six towns/city centre debate, is we seem to have two really excellent theatres within 100 yards of each other, which sort of do the same thing. If there was a way they could magically merge into a 2,000 - 3,000 capacity theatre then maybe you can start competing with the likes of Wolverhampton Civic Hall and be included on these tours. My own experience leans more towards the comedy world and if you look across the calendars of the two theatres, they are still able to book top acts. This is due to comedians generally needing to do much more densely packed tours than musicians. Although if you look at the acts that have played and are playing this year, the likes of Frank Skinner, Jimmy Carr, they are truly household names that will sell anywhere. My colleagues who I mentioned are more averse to taking risks with more up and coming acts in Stoke. They ask me why they don't sell being from Stoke myself, so there isn't an answer for you there. I think perhaps the average wage argument might come in to play there, who knows? Tickets are expensive these days. Funnily enough, I posted this about a month ago but a younger comedy act who did actually recently play Vic Hall told me how shocked they were at how run down the city was, so maybe there is something in that. All of that is of course tailored to music and and live comedy/theatre world, and reading some of the comments on here I do think an arena being built with the intention of hosting the more niche events could actually be potentially be an excellent idea, so maybe actually I am wrong to dismiss an arena. I just don't see one disrupting the music and live comedy spaces. By 1983 Maiden were arena sized. But they loved doing the smaller venues. Bruce Dicko said so whenever they played at the Vicky Hall.
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Post by knype on Jul 25, 2024 16:03:51 GMT
Minimum wage and the living wage are the same throughout the country. Whats that got to do with anything? The average wage in Manchester is £37,500 in Stoke it is £32,500. Absolutely nothing to do with minimum wage. Because the majority of people will be on the living or minimum wage.
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Post by knype on Jul 25, 2024 16:04:44 GMT
How long before this thread becomes political.. everything on EE board ends up the same lately It's already being primed for that way
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Post by noustie on Jul 25, 2024 16:04:58 GMT
I thought this was going be about a new pub opening. I thought the Queens in Basford was relocating and re-opening.
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Post by tommycarlsberg on Jul 25, 2024 16:05:11 GMT
Well artists eventually want to make the transition from theatres to arenas, which is indicative of earnings and popularity I guess. A tour like the one you've quoted there would never happen now because we have purpose built arenas, as it looks like Iron Maiden would have been popular enough to fill them in 1983 but instead had to do multiple nights at the same venue, or multiple locations, to reach their full audience - indeed, they do now sell out all the main arenas. Touring has definitely changed today compared to even 15 years ago when I was a teenager. I would regularly see popular bands of the time like Courteeners, Bloc Party, The Wombats from the top of my head. www.atgtickets.com/venues/victoria-hall/ - There are no acts of that standing playing the Victoria Hall presently. For context it's a 1600 seat venue. These days if they're booking a tour for an exciting artist of the level of the artists I mentioned, they'd go your big cities and venues like, Manchester Apollo, Nottingham Rock City, Wolverhampton Civic Halls, Hammersmith Apollo. All of which are 3,000 plus. If they sold those dates out and thought they could sell more, it wouldn't make sense to add a Stoke Victoria Hall date, you'd take your chances at selling out another night at the sexier venues in Manchester and London because people will ultimately travel to these destinations. You wouldn't risk selling 1000 tickets at Victoria Hall, when 500 of them would travel and help you fill out the more prestigious venue. You see 'extra date added' next to the top venues all the time. If you go from this kind of top capacity theatre tour to arenas (look at a band like Fontaines DC now for an example), then you suddenly need to sell 10,000 more tickets per show, maybe more. Again, if you want to sell tickets in Birmingham, Liverpool and Manchester arenas, you need all the smaller cities around them (like Stoke) to feed into those audiences. So my point is, building an arena in Stoke and suddenly expecting bands/artists to start including the bet365 arena on their tours just won't happen. What is actually hindering Stoke, similar to the six towns/city centre debate, is we seem to have two really excellent theatres within 100 yards of each other, which sort of do the same thing. If there was a way they could magically merge into a 2,000 - 3,000 capacity theatre then maybe you can start competing with the likes of Wolverhampton Civic Hall and be included on these tours. My own experience leans more towards the comedy world and if you look across the calendars of the two theatres, they are still able to book top acts. This is due to comedians generally needing to do much more densely packed tours than musicians. Although if you look at the acts that have played and are playing this year, the likes of Frank Skinner, Jimmy Carr, they are truly household names that will sell anywhere. My colleagues who I mentioned are more averse to taking risks with more up and coming acts in Stoke. They ask me why they don't sell being from Stoke myself, so there isn't an answer for you there. I think perhaps the average wage argument might come in to play there, who knows? Tickets are expensive these days. Funnily enough, I posted this about a month ago but a younger comedy act who did actually recently play Vic Hall told me how shocked they were at how run down the city was, so maybe there is something in that. All of that is of course tailored to music and and live comedy/theatre world, and reading some of the comments on here I do think an arena being built with the intention of hosting the more niche events could actually be potentially be an excellent idea, so maybe actually I am wrong to dismiss an arena. I just don't see one disrupting the music and live comedy spaces. By 1983 Maiden were arena sized. But they loved doing the smaller venues. Bruce Dicko said so whenever they played at the Vicky Hall. Yer I know that’s what I said
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Post by milton58 on Jul 25, 2024 16:33:45 GMT
The dire public transport is a huge factor. As far as nightlife goes it's a huge problem. There's precious few buses after 7.30. Taxi prices made me skip loads of nights out when I was younger. It could more than double the price of a night. taxi companies just take the piss out of us on late night outs they exploit us knowing we just want to get home a normal £8 fair turns into £30 plus on a night out....they do the same after home games as well....got a taxi from longton to bet365 £7...flagged one down after the game to get into stoke wanted £20 just a piss take
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Post by thehartshillbadger on Jul 25, 2024 16:42:18 GMT
Taxi prices made me skip loads of nights out when I was younger. It could more than double the price of a night. taxi companies just take the piss out of us on late night outs they exploit us knowing we just want to get home a normal £8 fair turns into £30 plus on a night out....they do the same after home games as well....got a taxi from longton to bet365 £7...flagged one down after the game to get into stoke wanted £20 just a piss take Get the Uber app, their prices do fluctuate but 95% of the time they’re pretty standard price. In my experience anyway, and they’re really quick. Only problem is not everywhere has an Uber service such as Nantwich and Congleton
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Post by hcstokie on Jul 25, 2024 16:49:34 GMT
I don't play x-box etc but I can imagine a stadium or arena fitted out to accommodate live events based around that sort of thing would be popular and we're ideally located. As you said earlier, why not a Bet365 Arena. You've just highlighted it yourself....a bit of vision and out of the "X" box thinking. Become a venue for some of the growing more minor events. I'm sure some of the UK based ufc style cage fighting events would love a decent 10k seat arena to give them a venue. Cage Warriors etc. And who knows, we get a local lad who makes it to the top at the sport and we get the UFC rolling into town. Manchester has had 2 UFC champions, one a current champion fighting in Manchester this very weekend. There is always such a lack of ambition with regards to Stoke from the very people who are charged with steering our fate. Things need to change. We need ambition instead of shrugging our shoulders and just accepting our fate. This is a great post. How many Nathan Heaney headline nights could we have had if we had a 3-5k arena? All of a sudden we’d have become a regular venue for boxing, but that ship has sailed. There needs to be a leap of faith and ambition somewhere. The city will stand still until it takes a calculated risk.
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Post by cdf on Jul 25, 2024 16:57:02 GMT
I don't doubt the logic of what you say tommy - but I'm curious to know what has changed in the last 40 years* -- given what you say about the team at work finding it hard to sell tickets for those two venues. Look at this listing for Iron Maiden's UK tour in 1983 ( I pick them cos they're one of my faves and their tour lists were a who's who of middle-size theatres/halls back in the day): MAY Mon 2 Hull, UKCity Hall Tue 3 Preston, UKGuildhall Thu 5 Oxford, UKNew Theatre Fri 6 Leicester, UKDe Montfort Hall Sat 7 Southampton, UKGaumont Hall Sun 8 Ipswich, UKGaumont Hall Tue 10 Nottingham, UKGaumont Hall Wed 11 Bradford, UKSaint George's Hall Thu 12 Glasgow, UKApollo Theatre Fri 13 Edinburgh, UKPlayhouse Theatre Sun 15 Cardiff, UKSaint David's Hall Mon 16 Sheffield, UKCity Hall Tue 17 Newcastle, UKCity Hall Wed 18 Hanley, UKVictoria Hall Fri 20 Bristol, UKColston Hall Sat 21 Birmingham, UKOdeon Sun 22 Birmingham, UKOdeon Mon 23 Manchester, UKApollo Theatre Wed 25 Hammersmith, London, UKOdeon Thu 26 Hammersmith, London, UKOdeon Fri 27 Hammersmith, London, UKOdeon Sat 28 Hammersmith, London, UKOdeon - Not only did they play Hanley, but still did 2 nights at Brum's Odeon down the road. (The following year they played the Viccy Hall AND 2 nights up the road at the Manc Apollo - so demand was there). Do bands not play this scale of venue on a tour any more - or has something changed that means Hanley is overlooked by promoters now? - Remember back in those days, we had our own promoter in the Potteries - Mike Lloyd - were they better at promoting the venue to tour bookers? I don't live in the area any more, I'm just curious to know what has changed if anything, that means S-o-T can't support even a decent 2,000 seat venue. What level of band does the Vic attract nowadays? * *** me, I'm old. Well artists eventually want to make the transition from theatres to arenas, which is indicative of earnings and popularity I guess. A tour like the one you've quoted there would never happen now because we have purpose built arenas, as it looks like Iron Maiden would have been popular enough to fill them in 1983 but instead had to do multiple nights at the same venue, or multiple locations, to reach their full audience - indeed, they do now sell out all the main arenas. Touring has definitely changed today compared to even 15 years ago when I was a teenager. I would regularly see popular bands of the time like Courteeners, Bloc Party, The Wombats from the top of my head. www.atgtickets.com/venues/victoria-hall/ - There are no acts of that standing playing the Victoria Hall presently. For context it's a 1600 seat venue. These days if they're booking a tour for an exciting artist of the level of the artists I mentioned, they'd go your big cities and venues like, Manchester Apollo, Nottingham Rock City, Wolverhampton Civic Halls, Hammersmith Apollo. All of which are 3,000 plus. If they sold those dates out and thought they could sell more, it wouldn't make sense to add a Stoke Victoria Hall date, you'd take your chances at selling out another night at the sexier venues in Manchester and London because people will ultimately travel to these destinations. You wouldn't risk selling 1000 tickets at Victoria Hall, when 500 of them would travel and help you fill out the more prestigious venue. You see 'extra date added' next to the top venues all the time. If you go from this kind of top capacity theatre tour to arenas (look at a band like Fontaines DC now for an example), then you suddenly need to sell 10,000 more tickets per show, maybe more. Again, if you want to sell tickets in Birmingham, Liverpool and Manchester arenas, you need all the smaller cities around them (like Stoke) to feed into those audiences. So my point is, building an arena in Stoke and suddenly expecting bands/artists to start including the bet365 arena on their tours just won't happen. What is actually hindering Stoke, similar to the six towns/city centre debate, is we seem to have two really excellent theatres within 100 yards of each other, which sort of do the same thing. If there was a way they could magically merge into a 2,000 - 3,000 capacity theatre then maybe you can start competing with the likes of Wolverhampton Civic Hall and be included on these tours. My own experience leans more towards the comedy world and if you look across the calendars of the two theatres, they are still able to book top acts. This is due to comedians generally needing to do much more densely packed tours than musicians. Although if you look at the acts that have played and are playing this year, the likes of Frank Skinner, Jimmy Carr, they are truly household names that will sell anywhere. My colleagues who I mentioned are more averse to taking risks with more up and coming acts in Stoke. They ask me why they don't sell being from Stoke myself, so there isn't an answer for you there. I think perhaps the average wage argument might come in to play there, who knows? Tickets are expensive these days. Funnily enough, I posted this about a month ago but a younger comedy act who did actually recently play Vic Hall told me how shocked they were at how run down the city was, so maybe there is something in that. All of that is of course tailored to music and and live comedy/theatre world, and reading some of the comments on here I do think an arena being built with the intention of hosting the more niche events could actually be potentially be an excellent idea, so maybe actually I am wrong to dismiss an arena. I just don't see one disrupting the music and live comedy spaces. Who do you work for?
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Post by thehartshillbadger on Jul 25, 2024 17:00:22 GMT
Well artists eventually want to make the transition from theatres to arenas, which is indicative of earnings and popularity I guess. A tour like the one you've quoted there would never happen now because we have purpose built arenas, as it looks like Iron Maiden would have been popular enough to fill them in 1983 but instead had to do multiple nights at the same venue, or multiple locations, to reach their full audience - indeed, they do now sell out all the main arenas. Touring has definitely changed today compared to even 15 years ago when I was a teenager. I would regularly see popular bands of the time like Courteeners, Bloc Party, The Wombats from the top of my head. www.atgtickets.com/venues/victoria-hall/ - There are no acts of that standing playing the Victoria Hall presently. For context it's a 1600 seat venue. These days if they're booking a tour for an exciting artist of the level of the artists I mentioned, they'd go your big cities and venues like, Manchester Apollo, Nottingham Rock City, Wolverhampton Civic Halls, Hammersmith Apollo. All of which are 3,000 plus. If they sold those dates out and thought they could sell more, it wouldn't make sense to add a Stoke Victoria Hall date, you'd take your chances at selling out another night at the sexier venues in Manchester and London because people will ultimately travel to these destinations. You wouldn't risk selling 1000 tickets at Victoria Hall, when 500 of them would travel and help you fill out the more prestigious venue. You see 'extra date added' next to the top venues all the time. If you go from this kind of top capacity theatre tour to arenas (look at a band like Fontaines DC now for an example), then you suddenly need to sell 10,000 more tickets per show, maybe more. Again, if you want to sell tickets in Birmingham, Liverpool and Manchester arenas, you need all the smaller cities around them (like Stoke) to feed into those audiences. So my point is, building an arena in Stoke and suddenly expecting bands/artists to start including the bet365 arena on their tours just won't happen. What is actually hindering Stoke, similar to the six towns/city centre debate, is we seem to have two really excellent theatres within 100 yards of each other, which sort of do the same thing. If there was a way they could magically merge into a 2,000 - 3,000 capacity theatre then maybe you can start competing with the likes of Wolverhampton Civic Hall and be included on these tours. My own experience leans more towards the comedy world and if you look across the calendars of the two theatres, they are still able to book top acts. This is due to comedians generally needing to do much more densely packed tours than musicians. Although if you look at the acts that have played and are playing this year, the likes of Frank Skinner, Jimmy Carr, they are truly household names that will sell anywhere. My colleagues who I mentioned are more averse to taking risks with more up and coming acts in Stoke. They ask me why they don't sell being from Stoke myself, so there isn't an answer for you there. I think perhaps the average wage argument might come in to play there, who knows? Tickets are expensive these days. Funnily enough, I posted this about a month ago but a younger comedy act who did actually recently play Vic Hall told me how shocked they were at how run down the city was, so maybe there is something in that. All of that is of course tailored to music and and live comedy/theatre world, and reading some of the comments on here I do think an arena being built with the intention of hosting the more niche events could actually be potentially be an excellent idea, so maybe actually I am wrong to dismiss an arena. I just don't see one disrupting the music and live comedy spaces. Who do you work for? Timmy Mallet
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Post by toppercorner on Jul 25, 2024 18:35:47 GMT
i can't help but throw my two pence worth in here.
for what i'm going to say, it's not meant to be personal, or in anyway derogatory as i dearly want the city to do well ...
when people open bars/restaurants/leisure in stoke, by the time it opens, it's already out of date. The decor/ambience of many bars and eateries is so far behind of what is now standard in many cities globally , it's no surprise the youth have gone elsewhere.
the regeneration needs to leap a generation simply to catch up! Theres too many old men with money who's heart is in the right place, but taste levels are a million miles out of sync.
but people will say 'it's fine" and put up with sub standard fare in restaurants, when infact its over priced and under par.
the acceptance of mediocrity and the 'that will do' mentality in the city is what is holding it back.
the council are enthralled to the cancerous st modwen (who market themselves as regeneration 'specialists'), and have destroyed any identity in the city, and replaced the history with buildings that no one wants to open anything exciting next to.
the town planners are building stuff for pensioners, thereby exacerbating the exodus of youth and energy from the city due to poor vision of building 21st housing stock.
The trades in the city are sub-par and cannot finish a sandwich, never mind a job, and leave people with no idea about building work, with visibly inferior work at extortionate prices.
apologies if you're offended, but it's true.
Downward spiral unless some of the people who are trying to get stuff done have a voice instead of the usual suspects with cushy number jobs.
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Post by desman2 on Jul 25, 2024 18:51:50 GMT
I believe that once you have an arena and can book some top performers you will have people travelling into the city from other areas to see it. It's not just locals who would attend.
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Post by thehartshillbadger on Jul 25, 2024 18:55:57 GMT
I believe that once you have an arena and can book some top performers you will have people travelling into the city from other areas to see it. It's not just locals who would attend. There will be no arena and there will be no money spent on Stoke on Trent to improve the lives and prosperity of the area. Forget it
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Post by desman2 on Jul 25, 2024 19:00:35 GMT
I believe that once you have an arena and can book some top performers you will have people travelling into the city from other areas to see it. It's not just locals who would attend. There will be no arena and there will be no money spent on Stoke on Trent to improve the lives and prosperity of the area. Forget it Im in Castle myself and although not perfect is considerably better that what Stoke council get up to.
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Post by thehartshillbadger on Jul 25, 2024 19:08:03 GMT
There will be no arena and there will be no money spent on Stoke on Trent to improve the lives and prosperity of the area. Forget it Im in Castle myself and although not perfect is considerably better that what Stoke council get up to. I’d say that’s fair, I’m on the border of course and it is better but Christ it’s gone so far downhill in the last 10 years. Probably at the same rate as Hanley but it was already better so
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Post by desman2 on Jul 25, 2024 19:15:32 GMT
Im in Castle myself and although not perfect is considerably better that what Stoke council get up to. I’d say that’s fair, I’m on the border of course and it is better but Christ it’s gone so far downhill in the last 10 years. Probably at the same rate as Hanley but it was already better so I talked about that with some colleagues. I remember as a kid that going up Hanley with your mum was a day out. You only went now and again and it was a bit of a treat.
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