Giant Merchandising Fail

I live in Tokyo and hadn't been back for a while. My kids are evertonians and were looking forward to seeing Everton shirts around the city center... didn't see any and my eldest even got a pound given to him in Matthew Street by a drink-sodden Evertonian. Is this just a summer thing? Or are we shriveling?

Damian - I'm not sure any of that is Everton-specific. Customer service is almost universally crap, in my experience, whether it's ringing British Telecom, liaising with my bank or shopping. Stressed, overworked and unqualified staff struggle to deal with demand; meanwhile, well-paid executives make further cuts to maximise profits. Personally, I used to be up for a revolution, but I can't be bothered any more.

No surprise with this I'm afraid Damian. Everton FC seem to have a blind spot to marketing themselves properly in their own city.

Only possible slight mitigation is that Dave Biggar has left and I haven't seen a replacement named. Perhaps a rudderless ship in the Commercial dept., although many would say we have been permanently rudderless in that area for a long time now.

I ordered a shirt for myself and my daughter online and they turned on time on July 17 so they aren't a total shambles, just a bit of one!

I can understand the frustration but who is it that is actually responsible for the amount of stock available surely it has to be others from outside the club? But I don't know how our whole retail operation works it seems that nobody is responsible for stock and all the money is spent on pure marketing.

Like an Ice-cream van with all the flavours under the sun available on the posters covering his van but when you queue up to make your choice he only has orange lollies and nothing else.

I agree Karl, I think the club does take the city for granted, but put it into context with squad going to Thailand and the massive advertisement with Baines and Messi on I think it was a skyscraper.

More effort is put overseas to advertise mainly because we are skint and Chang have stumped up all the cash; however, if you go outside Merseyside, the club's a non-entity as kids are walking around in Chelsea, Man Utd, Man City and Liverpool kits up and down the country while we never get out of first gear.

I just think the promotion of the club (through kits and merchandise) although not a complete shambles does need addressing as these kids are our next-gen supporters.

Damian, the Everton hoardings around Thailand were put up for the World Cup, not our visit. There was a distinct lack of presence for the team and Chang at the match, even outside the ground you could only buy Leo.

I also went to see the Giants as part of my weekend home and whilst was quietly impressed by the number of people in EFC kits I saw.

I was also amazed by the number of kits with no Chang sponsorship on them. Particularly on the yellow & blue 3rd kit

To me, Eric, it looked like we were in Thailand to make up the numbers!

Leicester wore the blue and adorned it with adverts for the match sponsor. Our team looked like they were in mourning – and played like it.

Can't think Chang were anymore impressed with their marketing opportunity than we were with our 2nd/3rd string team.

Kit Bag give EFC ٠million a year; EFC sit back to count the money and don't give a toss how many kits are sold. No-one at the club can do anything about it – not even Kenwright. I think the deal expires in 2019 but not sure about that.

Maybe I am wrong about everything but the club have never stated why you can't buy an Everton shirt anywhere else in Britain or the world for that matter. I hope someone on ToffeeWeb can correct me if I am wrong.

Its over ١million a year over 10 years plus they have revolutionised our product range, built Everton 2 & refurbed at least twice and our marketing & merchandising operation is FAR superior to that of 5 years ago with many advances made behind the scenes. What are their costs? They have all the risk selling to a customer base with little or no established history of buying in sufficient numbers and virtually nothing in terms of customer relationship information. There are no costs to Everton. In hindsight in business terms that is still adecent return when you consider where we where at that time in terms of retail. We are still owed a Park End building though as I recall!

10 years ago while ManU & others were making millions we made losses. Over-ordering was part of that and I suspect Kitbag order 'on demand' to prevent that happening hence the reliance on website sales where delivery times can be extended. Ordering 1000 kits in various sizes for one (non-football) weekend is probably not a good idea.
5 years ago we made a choice on whether to bring merchandising back in house or outsource to one of the world leaders, and I think we made the right choice.

In 5 years time we will finally have a retail operation on a (technical) par with our neighbours. It seems a long way away and of course it is, but this is a long term investment in our future. One acid test is 'what then'? If Kitbag own everything we are tied to them and our return will not be as good as perhaps it might. I would hope we own the customer data gathered & many of the systems in place so we can move to other suppliers if needed? Maybe.

Cheers, Thomas, for the details of the Kitbag deal, the only thing that bothers me is that we would have to tender the merchandise out again. When the Kitbag deal eventually runs out, in my experience their will be no-one with the slightest inkling how to maintain our share of the market from inside the club.

From what the other posters say is that we just sit back, count the money and let Kitbag get on with the job seems ludicrous. Someone should be keeping and eye on the business side and liaise with Kitbag because we are definitely missing opportunities to promote our brand.

As for Thailand, then I despair at the lack of promotion from the home of our sponsors and I believe we need someone with good business acumen from inside the club as ideas cost nothing and a little forward thinking won't go amiss. I just hope that in the next give years we will see Everton kits in shops to rival our competitors.

As anybody knows who has been on any of the clubs pre-season tours, the marketing is non-existent! The club doesn't realize there's a massive market for shirts and memorabilia.

I went (under duress) to Red Bulls vs Arsenal on Saturday and was amazed to see all the stores inside the stadium turned over to Arsenal... They had their new Puma shirts and the lines were incredible. It's not just about the money but about creating a presence here in the USA!

I had a similar problem last year. I have two sons (six and four) who are mad about Everton and wanted a kit. We live in Lancashire so not miles away. However, I went to the Everton shop online to buy two kits with names on etc. They were all sold out with no idea of when they would be getting any more in my sons' sizes. I rang the club shop and got the same response. I knew about the kitbag deal but went to various sport shops anyway. We found Liverpool, Man U, City, Spurs, Arsenal, Newcastle and various Lancashire clubs kits. Not only are Everton losing out on money, they are losing out on supporters from outside Liverpool. I posted about this at the time.

Phil #332, well it was King Powers birthday and as they were footing the bill as well it's not surprising that their team were the home side. It's also not their fault we chose black as our away kit is it?

The Thais I was sitting with thought the lack of Chang advertising was because the game was televised and alcohol ads are not allowed on Thai telly.

I agree Damian. I can only guess that part of our huge 'Other expenses' budget spent every year (㿀 million +) there are payments for work going on between Kitbag & the club including direct access to our own customer databases.

I am in favour of this part of our efforts being outsourced to an expert provider. We should concentrate on football rather than non-matchday retail until we have the facilities or profit margin to do otherwise. If I understand it correctly most big clubs do that?

I had a similar situation last year when I tried to purchase the away kit for my son for Christmas. I was told that his size was out of stock and unbelievably they would not be getting anymore stock. I wrote to the club who passed my letter to kitbag. Here is their response:

I'm writing to with regards to your email to Everton Football Club dated 13th January 2014. My name is Mike Needham and I work for Kitbag Ltd who are Everton's retail partner.

Firstly, may I apologise for the inconvenience that the lack of stock caused you and your son? I'm disappointed that we were unable to help with your product selection on this occasion.

Unfortunately, when we purchased the stock of this item (as well as the Home version) we completely underestimated the demand for this product and we were left with the situation where we sold out very quickly. This situation was made more difficult by the long lead times required for the manufacture of these types of products and the planned changeover of Club crest for the 2014/15 season.

I realise that this may be little comfort for you in your particular situation but we have taken steps in conjunction with the kit manufacturer to ensure that we have significantly increased the quantity that we have ordered for kits in these sizes and similar for the 2014/15 season.

Apologies once again but if you do have any further comments or questions then please do not hesitate to contact me directly.

With Kind Regards,

Mike

Mike Needham
Account Manager
Email: m.needham@kitbag.com

Obviously, nothing has changed. The merchandising of everton products is pathetic.

It could be worse - see Oldham's latest situation....

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/football/28522535

Oldham Athletic: Photocall off with new strip still to arrive

Oldham have had to cancel a planned photocall - because they have no strip.

The League One club are waiting for home and away strips from new suppliers Sports Direct and have been playing pre-season games in training gear.

Oldham are also without a club shop, although a new store is being built in the club's as yet unfinished new stand.

A club spokesman said they would unveil a new away strip on Thursday with the home kit to be revealed on 7 August, two days before the season kicks off.

Oldham signed a seven-figure sponsorship deal with Sports Direct in the summer.

As part of the deal the firm are to open a new store at SportsDirect.com Park and supporters have been told they will be able to order the new kits, when they are available, online or from local Sports Direct stores.

A spokesman said: "We look forward to unveiling our new kit and seeing the fans wearing it."

We should be sending these posts to the club really, I wonder if we will ever change

I have a theory on why Everton are useless at retail, as any money made from merchandise will create a massive headache for Bill. Expectation.

Bill likes Everton to be becalmed.

Signing things over to Kitbag means decisions taken by people with no understanding of our Club.

You dread to think what would happen if we are ever truly successful again.

Karl, unfortunately the same can be said about the reasons we signed over the Kitbag deal and the other outsourcing.

Whatever the reason for the kitbag deal it is a poor do if a club like Everton cannot merchandise and promote themselves properly.

My Evertonian neice worked in the LFC shop (hey, a girls gotta work) and went afterwards to Everton 2 with my Ma to buy my lad an Everton top. Her work top was mainly covered but clearly not all as she was subjected to abuse not once but twice by staff who worked there. My Ma confronted them but they were clearly arses.

I think customer service in general as Kev says (at 269) is poor all over but in this case I'd rather she had left my lad disappointed and walked out without purchasing owt.

I'm sure there's a fair few kids whose parents have thought the same with yet another kit fiasco.

Don't even get me started on the wall of LFC shirts in the Bromborough Sports direct and the solitary EFC Hafina top...

According to their WIki page, Kitbag also has the exclusive rights to operate the official online stores of Manchester United, Chelsea, Real Madrid, Barcelona, Celtic, Sunderland, Manchester City, Nottingham Forest, the Football Association/England team, British Lions (rugby), RFU (rugby), Le Tour, Wimbledon, Roland Garros, NBA, NFL, Open Tour and European Golf Store. In addition to these online and retail stores, Kitbag runs the online and offline direct mailings/catalogues, call centre operations, and pick pack and dispatch parcel distribution and warehousing for sports companies.

The CEO is the former Commerical Director of United, so saying these people have no understanding about our club is wide of the mark to say the least. Finally, even with all this wealth of contracts, expertise and solid infrastructure, Kitbag has made a loss for the last three years showing what a tough market this is. I am amazed that people think Everton Football Club should try and go and directly compete with these companies. I would hate to think how much it would cost us put in place a supply chain logistics side of the company, build a warehouse network, finance a distribution network, manage the website and all other aspects of running this type of business. I honestly have no idea why people think this is a priority, compared to putting money into the team?

My own personal view, is that all investment should go into the team. Each PL place is worth more than a million in revenue, investing in this wipes the floor with any revenue generated by distributing football shirts.

Dan I think your missing the point but I agree with you that we have to get things right on the pitch first before we can sell merchandise. However when the premier league started Everton were one of the main players in forming this league, since then our stock has dropped dramatically. Only recently a poll was done about how many fans each club has according internet usage i.e. Facebook, Twitter, etc.
In this league based on the number of fans each club has everton were ranked 8th behind Villa, Spurs, City, Arsenal, Chelsea, Liverpool and United in that order.
Out of this poll you could say Spurs and Villa have a better fan base than us even though they have not been successful in the last thirty years or so. So my point is where have we gone wrong over the years. We have stagnated and other clubs with ideas to push their brand have overtaken us. It's not rocket science to understand merchandise, football shirts with the right promotion and communication can add millions of fans in Asia, China, Australia and Africa. To get back to my original post we miss so many opportunities to promote Everton and if some disagree or not I believe the Giant weekend in the city was one of them.
At the moment we are still blinkered into thinking we have a fantastic world wide fan base and we are only making strides with the fantastic supporters from the states. Arsenal and liverpool are over there now on a massive charm offensive which included laying wreaths at the chigao bombing memorial. All this publicity included with merchandise will generate a bigger fan base. I hope the club has woken up to this fact as I hope we don't shrink any further but turn it around to where we should be and that's at the forefront of the footballing community.

Dan the tier one type supplier chain Kitbag have benefits them not their clients, the warehouses will be shared and not client specific, their call centre jockeys will have screen scripts of how to answer calls dependent on the incoming number so again not client specific, they will be maximising their own profits as they are well entitled too. However, if you are a supply chain provider who give your customer the smallest profit margin returns and seriously underestimate sales you should be fucked right off and replaced. If BK and his board canÂ’t see or refuse to see this they are again missing valuable income streams, if you believe your sales and marketing forecasts are so low then why pay top dollar and align yourself to a company whose own margins make yours negligible?

Another unsurprising fuckup from our steaming pile of Chairman and his useless board

Dan,

Walk into a high street sports shop and you will be able to purchase a team shirt for all the football teams you mention.

All but one clubs shirt.
Guess which one?

Gavin, of course you are 100% correct. They will use the hubs set up by the giants like Cosco, Evergreen etc. But as I am sure you are only too aware, they are able to use these distribution networks at a decent price due to the volume of the goods they move through it. We would have to pay top dollar to distribute our relatively low volume of goods, which doesn't make any business sense in my eyes. Even United, Barca and Real, the biggest sellers of merchandise in the world do not see the added value of performing in house distribution. If they cant get the business case to stack up even on their huge volumes, what chance do we have?

Paul, its a very fair point with exception to Forest and Sunderland, who's shirts I never see in nationwide shops. But if there is profit to be made, why wouldn't shops stock Everton shirts? I ma sure you understand the principles of supply and demand, unless you mean the Everton board have told shops to specifically not stock Everton shirts?

Excellent business speak, people. I am a mere pleb when it comes to the inner working of such things. However, today I went into a sports shop in Northern Ireland and all I could see was rows and rows of Liverpool shirts, followed by Man Utd. I delved deeper and found Arsenal, Man City, Spurs and Chelsea.

Whatever the profit margins blah blah, we should be a presence amongst our rivals. Surely it is business sense to make your product be seen and to be available to purchase.

Yes, Dan, that's exactly what they have done. You can only buy an Everton shirt 3 ways:

Walk into Everton 1. Walk into Everton 2. Online.

Imagine if you could only buy a Mars bar in two shops in Liverpool or on your computer. Yes you would buy some, but many a time you simply would not bother and would have a Cadbury's Crunchie instead because these were available in a multitude of places.

It's decisions like this that need looking at, especially when as Damian found out, they can't even manage to get enough stock out there for just three locations!!!!

Bollocks to the business side of this arrangement. If kids can't get an Everton shirt in their local sports shop they will simply get another team shirt and there's 㿔+ down the pisser. I live in Durham and up until a few year ago you could get Everton shirts all over up here. Since thats stopped I have bought one in the last six seasons....too much of an arse on. Multiply that by even just 5000 around the UK and we are missing out on serious wedge. Fucknut Kenwright strikes again.

I ordered stuff from the official site a few months ago and it ended up lost. Without a real way of tracking it. And the customer service is fairly clueless to resolving the issue. Of course I took the cheapest shipping but to have it lost without actual trace is quite another thing in modern times...

Our merchandising is crap. It yields a risk free ١m per year. To put that in context, our beloved neighbours sell more merchandise than our entire turnover (tickets, TV money, merchandise). That's nearly 30x our total.

Our marketing is similarly pants. The recent giants event brought huge media attention to the city, and what did the club do to capitalise? Same with the golf at Hoylake.

Let's not get to upset though. This is the same outfit that runs out of pies on match day like they were surprised when so many turned up.

All the hallmarks of an absent chairman and part-time CEO. The best run organisations have executives that totally get what's happening on the ground day to day.

Sadly that's not EFC.

Everton are a risk-averse, poorly managed, organisation. Outsourcing potential moneymaking activities (of kit merchandising and catering in our case) is a typical way of operating in such organisations. The Kitbag deals guarantees ١m pa without Everton having the risk and the worry of doing what they should be doing -- raising revenue. It's a decent deal so long as you have no ambitions and no expectations of on-field success.

To promote anything you need exposure. The Kitbag deal gives the club no exposure whatsoever.

As a side negative, the outsourcing deflates Everton's total annual turnover by c 㾶m and with it a few positions in the global league of top clubs.

What's the answer guys, could it be raisd at a shareholders meeting as there's talk of a fans trust. Could this be a way of voicing our concerns so the club matches the fans ambition for full exposure of our brand?

I could not agree more, especially with the giants in town, Everton should have pulled up trees on the merchandice front.

People say its not down to the club, well I am sorry it is, can you imagine the top boss of say Tescos not use his loaf and say erm I did not see the hot weather having an impact on our icecreams, be allright will order some more for beguinning of August.

Its not just on this occasion, this has happened for years.

Forget any agreement on shirts going on sale in July, why oh why do they not have an agreement where last game of the season the new home shirt is available to purchase in the Everton stores.

Everton could set up kiosks outside the park stand, think how many fans would purchase the new shirt, just get the kit designers to have the new design ready, last home game is nearly always a sell out.

If one in four fans bought the shirt, thats nearly 10,000 shirts sold.

Now if this is some barmy league rule where new tops are only available in July, every club should raise this to make the shirts available for the last home game.

Before anyone mentions names on the back, just have it with plain shirts, instead of a 10 per cent discount we get inundated with, have it where spend a certain amount and have the option to have a free name print and number on a previously bought top from the club.

Ok I do not have the knowledge like buisness marketing, but surely its time someone sorted our merchandice marketing out.

Not all companies try to compete in the advertising market, just look at Rolls Royce and Bentley, I can't remember the last time I seen a billboard, tv commercial, internet pop-up etc with their logo on. Rolex is another one that has seriously cut back in their advertising. The point being that they are so elite that they don't need to over sell themselves because their name is good enough to sell itself.

I wondered a while ago whether Everton were guilty of this way of thinking, purely because it's not very often you happen upon our crest where you're not expecting it. You sometimes- as in the case of some sports outlets- don't see it in places where you are expecting it!! But then I realised......................... no we're just shite at self promotion.

Oh and as for the Giants, I'd have had a giant Everton scarf outside Goodison that could be seen for miles and insisted that Liverpool Council make the trip past Goodison as part of the route.

But alas

I agree Brian we need to get a grip, at the present time with all the positivity about the recent moves to tie down our best players and with Lukaku signing again it's just criminal that we can only buy shirts in Everton 1 and 2 and online.
Our shirts should be in all the high street sport shops so our fans who are not from local areas can get their hands on the new kit.
In regard to getting the kits in July I actually think we're one of the slowest clubs to to rubber stamp new designs, thus leaving it too late for kids parading their kits in airports and holiday resorts.
One day we might get our act together and surprise a few people but at least it's happening on the pitch.
Let's not get too greedy eh lol

Great idea Chris, also a giant Everton kit could have been worn by the giants with a bit of negotiation.

Damian

They would have but it was too much trouble getting my lad his socks, so imagine trying to get them to fit a giant!

Seriously though, I often go nuts when I see glaringly obvious chances for promotion go unused, and I can never figure out why we don't do it. But not to worry because in the Everton shop I can buy a golf tee and an egg cup with the crest on!!!!

Kitbag Customer Services are waste of space and time. I sent them an email the other day asking when the Europa League shirt printing will be available and also if the sleeve badges will be available also. I received an email from them when Barkley signed his new contract saying theyÂ’re offering free Barkley printing and it had a pic of the new Away shirt with the Europa League printing and badges on the email so thats how I knew.

I had a look at the online store and saw all the new Away shirts with the EL printing on them, when I put ’Europa League’ into the search bar, so obviously available when the shirt is released in a couple of weeks.

I received a reply not long ago with the usual "we donÂ’t know when it will be available"!!! I take it they canÂ’t ever be bothered to check the enquiry as donÂ’t know how many times have received that in an email from them if making an enquiry about a product.

They have the shirts there on the website, which went up a few hours after sending the email, but it’s only the Away shirt at present as I was wanting it for the Home shirt so I canÂ’t understand why they havenÂ’t got the Home shirt with the EL printing also up when its the exact same printing in white also?!!

Everton can't organise a piss up in a brewery, they are run by bumbling imbeciles. Ten years of moaning about club incompetence on here hasn't improved things one iota. Carry on if you think it will do any good.

Phillip Carter fighting outside Wetherspoons

Agree with all of the comments a lack of imagination and ambition is the hallmark of our marketing strategy as a rule and it's actually not a bad product to market, attractive football, youngish team and in Europe as well.

No real consolation but all the official Barcelona stores are fully stocked with fang's shirt.

Let's hope Barca draw the RS in the CL and Fang & Maschereno have a field day at anfield.

I ordered a full kit for my lad who's 7 on the 13th a couple of weeks ago. At the time they said stock was coming in on 1st August, but now any mention of small boys sizes seems to have disappeared completely. I've emailed the club but yet to get a response, my gut feeling says it won't be here for his birthday. Not bad for 㿷.

Chris #283, Rolex do a lot of advertising at F1, yachting and horse riding events. Sports where the fans are likely to have a higher disposable income than the average match goer.

I ordered a Lukaku 10 Home Europa League shirt for my nephew last week. It comes through today and it’s got Lukaku 10 on it but has the Premier League printing on it — not Europa League!!!

I have now sent it back so will see what happens since they say you canÂ’t return printed shirts unless theyÂ’re faulty. Told them in no uncertain terms theyÂ’re going to send another one out with the correct style of printing due to no fault of my own as I didnÂ’t pick the item from their stock when sorting the order.

Do they not check catalogue item numbers for each item when picking the stuff and check the printing before sending it as canÂ’t be that hard to do. It’s just the wasting of your time having to return it, filling out the return form etc when they can check to see if theyÂ’re sending the correct item!!! Nice to see Kitbag are on the ball again!!