Official Thread of the 1906 Supporters

With the crap management in place, I am really impressed with you San Francisco supporters. Keep up the good work, and you would be surprised what passion can turn in to. In Portland, just ask the 12 guys in 2001, who used buckets as drums. They created the roots for one of the largest supporters groups in the U.S. It just takes passion and will. Sure, help from the FO is encouraged, however it is not required, as people (the supporters), are the main reason for success.

 

Thanks for the encouragement, IceFunk. The Timbers Army always impresses me with its enthusiasm and class. You've set the bar to which others aspire.

 

"Dmitry Piterman, the president of the Spanish club Alavés, reached an agreement last week to buy a team for $350,000 in the First Division of the United Soccer Leagues, which is one rung below Major League Soccer and includes teams in the United States, Canada and Puerto Rico."

For $350,000 some industrious supporters could in fact buy their own USL team.

 

So can anybody fill the rest of us in on the results of your meeting??

Thanks

 

Hey I've gotta run out, but I'll detail the different things we discussed later tonight.

 

I'm not sure whether you folks have been checking the pictures on the Vics website, but there are some pics of the group, like this one. Unfortunately, most of them are at the beginning of the match when people have not yet "strolled in."

 

That is a nice picture...and I sure like the banner too!!!

 

Please! Share what you discussed with management! I'm sure I'm not the only one itching to know the details'

 

Thanks Delle!

 

Okay, finally found my notes. We spent most of the time just having them clear up our questions. Most of the questions were things that are being asked daily on this forum, but I didn't take notes for the answers. If you have any common questions that you want answers to, feel free to ask me and I will probably be able to answer after that meeting we had.

The more important part of the meeting was broken down into two parts:

1. Short-term Responsibilities of Victory's supporter's group (whether we continue to be known as 1906 will be decided as soon as we start meeting)

2. Supporters' ideas for the Victory staff.

1. 1906

A. Posters: We will be distributing color posters to restaurants and bars and other places where they can be seen. The poster has been designed and printed, but the status beyond that I do not know yet.

B. Handouts: I know this sucks guys. Being the guy to handout stuff is never fun. Personally, when I'm on the street, I hate being handed pamphlets for things, but it's gotta be done. There seemed to be a consensus at the meeting that flyers needed to be handed out. We will probably start at this weekend's North Beach Festival. (Which I probably won't make due to my sis' graduation. Sorry fellas.)

C. Organization: This is the key thing that 1906 should be focusing on before we can have any leverage toward the Victory's goings-on or can focus our energy toward common goals in productive meetings.

i. Website: I believe this is in the works. More updates later. We were talking about this on another thread.

ii. Formal meetings: Guys and gals, we need to get offline. We need to sit down and hold meetings where we can hash things out.

iii. Spokesperson: The result of this will be a spokesperson who will relay the concerns (or demands!) of 1906 to the Victory staff in special meetings where the other members of 1906 will not be present.

iv. Further down the road, we will most likely be paying small dues and getting a return for this investment in our favorite club. Some ideas flowing are a significant discount on next season's season tickets or discounts on merch. Of course, these ideas can be discussed at our meetings and then relayed to the Victory for approval. (I personally would like to see some benefits to club membership that I would be willing to discuss with you all)

2. Ideas for the Victory: Before entering this section, you should all know that we discussed the owner, Mr. Piterman, as well as available funds for the club. As you well know, the Victory was pretty cheap for a professional sports franchise. The San Francisco staff of the Victory have had little contact with Mr. Piterman so far. Most likely, he has been caught up in Alavés' battle against relegation and will turn his attention to the Victory in a couple of weeks when he returns here (he lives in the Bay Area). Funds for the team thus far have been sparse and it shows as our staff is only a few great guys and our shirts are the 05/06 Alavés shirts. So all the talk of funds and our owner will continue when he arrives and hopefully states his intentions for our fair club. For now, let's just put that stuff aside and concentrate on ideas that do not take much money and can be worked on soon.

A. Merchandise: This has been a common concern among the supporters. Scarves would be fairly popular, especially among the members of 1906, but JERSEYS!!! Holy crap! Imagine how many of those beautiful Kelme shirts they could sell and for how much. However, the shirts are unavailable and will probably stay that way until next year. Only a couple hundred shirts were available for the team. (Left over from last season) They have no extras to sell. Team 99 is taking care of all of the clothing right now, so any concerns we have can be worked out with them.

B. Another thing lacking in the stadium is concessions. Domino's Pizza is okay, but not great. Plus, most of us agreed that a Domino's tent right in the center of San Francisco just doesn't accurately reflect our flair for tasty, ethnic food. Most of us also agreed that we should encourage local companies to sponsor the Victory and local food suppliers to set up concessions at matches. One great idea was Taco Trucks! They could easily just drive into Kezar and park right near the concesssions and sell tacos. That would make our concessions look much grander. Plus, people from out of town would definitely be getting their money's worth. (Correct me if I'm wrong, but you can get Domino's in Portland, and Seattle, and Charleston, and Hoboken, etc.) North Beach Pizza across the street also would be willing to set up a concession, but they do not have the manpower to run it. The same goes for Peet's coffee, who would be a welcome addition to our cold night matches. (Domino's should not be getting money for handing out hot chocolate packets.) Peet's is interested but cannot provide the workers. They offered to sell us coffee and hot chocolate in bulk, but we cannot take on that challenge right now.

C. There are two or three ideas that will probably need a lot of publicizing if they come together. Mike of the Victory came up with the original two of these.

i. MLS Open Cup matchup: If, and this is a big if, we make it to the third round of the Open Cup AND gain the right to host the MLS team instead of the reverse, we could milk that cow dry. Finally, we could get mainstream newspaper coverage, maybe a mention on TV news, and huge attendance (depending on publicity). This would certainly be the most important event of the season for the Victory.

ii. Here is the first of Mike's brilliant ideas: A SFPD vs. SFFD soccer match before one of the Victory's matches. If you pay to get into the first match, you could stay for free for the Victory match and see 2 matches for the price of 1! I personally know the significance of the age-old Fire vs. Police matchup and a lot of families and POA connected folks would love to see this matchup. A lot of these guys play in SFSFL anyway, they're not half-bad.

iii. Here's the other Mike idea: Have an SFSFL Premier (CPSA) match before the Victory's match and the tickets would be the same as the other idea. It could be one of the large Latino rivalries, or just a match of a lot of importance in the Premier Division. Either way, this would definitely draw a brand new crowd.

D. 2 for 1 deal: Somebody came up with the idea that if you buy a ticket to the July 4th game, you could get into the July 7th? game for free with some sort of receipt. I'm not sure if this will come together.


That just about sums it up. Details concerning the first official meeting of 1906 will come on the threads later naturally I hope. Somebody throw out a date, time, and place, and we'll try to agree on it. If anybody at the meeting has anything to add, go for it.

Attendance included:
-Bruiser
-Me
-deedougie
-Dellealpi
-Allllgood
-Alexi
-Yuri
-Mike
-one other guy, forgot to ask your name!!! Write it below please so we know who you are.
-maybe i forgot some others too. let me know.

 

Thanks for writing it all down. There was only one thing to correct:

The posters have been designed but not published as of yet. Yuri said he might be able to take care of that this week and hopefully we will have them next week.

If we get the posters we need to organize people to hit all the soccer-friendly bar's and pubs and restaurants in the area to put up the posters.

 

How very organized of you Sko! Thanks for keeping notes.

 

Shit I didn't know there was a damn meeting or I would have been there. If people are meeting for the North Beach Festival to promote, let me know and I will be there all friggin day recruiting people to come and support!

 

Fund raising for 1906

I know we didn't even have our first meeting yet, but I've already been thinking about some fundraising ideas for 1906 (i.e. if the Vics allow it).

What would you think of selling mini checkered flags like this one:
(blue and white, of course. 12"x18" flag with 24" stick)
Could get em in bulk and sell for around $5. I'm just envisioning a see of blue and white. Gets me psyched.

 

I'll be happy to distribute posters to pubs, bar, etc. I can probably get another friend or two to help out also.

 

Thanks for the additions guys. Delle, you were right about that last Victory staff member, I forgot about the English bloke. However, there was one more supporter there.

 

The last unknown man goes by FCSF.

 

According to the Directv guide it's the Seattle Flounders v Carolina ChickenHawks.

 

I was in attendance as well....

 

I got you covered, my friend, a few posts back.