Credit: Bury FC Youtube Channel
Bury FC’s newly appointed CEO, Neil Sears, has spoken on several issues surrounding the club and its changing future.
The new CEO has voiced his plans for the future amid online tension surrounding the club. Due to sustained pitch issues, points deductions, and fan misconduct this season.
Speaking on club media, Sears voiced his vision for the future. Beginning with infrastructure changes:
“We’re obviously working to try and get the main stand fully open and operational and extend the safe certificate for how many fans we can have in.”
“All this is based on trying to increase capacity at Gigg Lane, get more fans through the door, and create a really good atmosphere for the players.”
Despite challenges with the FA, Sears has reinforced his desire to improve the fan experience:
“I’ve had some initial conversations last week around getting a fan zone, so where you come out in front of the stadium on the far side, we’re looking at maybe trying to do something with the fan zone there.”
“You might have franchises there; you might have some food stores; you might have some, a big screen showing the early 12:30 kickoff all with the aim of getting fans earlier down to the game.”
Fanzones have seen a rise in sports over the last few years. Their success has been a key part of the expansion of many sports teams.
A recent report from the Julia Charles Survey showed 61% of all sports organisations in the UK are targeting the development of a fan zone to increase revenue.
Following pitch issues and countless games called off this season, CEO Sears has also pledged the development of a 3G pitch to reduce waterlogging issues at the club.
“We just had a couple of phone calls this afternoon over this, so we’re 99% of the way there now in terms of getting this 3G pitch delivered, which is obviously good news because we’ve had all these games off.”
Due to rain and moisture issues with the pitch, the groundsman at Gigg Lane has struggled to keep the pitch operational, seeing various games called off this season.
Bury council also pledged to support Bury FC is their move to redevelop the pitch, all to increase games at Gigg Lane for the following season.