Chris Heck - President of Business Operations

[Villaphan04]

2 hours ago, Captain_Townsend said:

Cannot warm to this bloke. Don't think he 'gets it'.

his remit is not to "get it", it is to make sure we are competing financially with the top clubs in the PL. 

53 minutes ago, wishywashy said:

Clearly the appointment of Heck and co. is an Americanisation of the commercial department. I do wonder a bit about the viability of his quite public committments to increasing prices and targeting hospitality while the non-footballing services on offer (including to hospitality fans!) have been dreadful for a long time and are somehow getting worse. You'd imagine something's going to give at some point if there aren't marked improvements. He's got a lot on his remit, to say the least: even if you ignore the hospitality conflict some areas such as Villa Park and the commercial strategies have been pretty questionable in their approach. I've only done a bit of marketing in my life but I'm not sure announcing a highly controversial and divisive decision on the badge (with radio silence since then..) within the launch itself was a clever move. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I'm also pretty sure they didn't even bother to put up the kit launch video on social media, only on VillaTV (Straying off topic for a minute, I beg of you Heck, please do something about whoever Villa outsourced the website to, it's baaad. A good website does not take 10 seconds to load an article page).

Most of the commercial issues obviously precede Heck, but going to have to improve on his first impressions pretty rapidly: his first move being to cause a palaver over the badge and his first in person meeting at the AGM seemingly terribly thought through is not the greatest of starts. We'll see. Given the state of the commercial department at the moment it can only really get better from here. You hope so, anyway.

I definitely think it is the club trying to go the way of other clubs who have increased their commercial activity and most of those were in ways that can be considered "Americanization". 

[Feidhlim]

7 hours ago, Captain_Townsend said:

Cannot warm to this bloke. Don't think he 'gets it'.

Based on what?

Since we're making big claims based on nothing, I'm not sure you "get it" either

[tomav84]

3 minutes ago, Feidhlim said:

Based on what?

Since we're making big claims based on nothing, I'm not sure you "get it" either

it's not based on nothing though is it? it's things like turning the holte suite into a new hospitality area etc and his view that "we're going to bring in as much money as possible even if that upsets the fans" (paraphrased from the FCG meeting minutes). in said meeting he seemed to take umbridge with the idea that corporate and 'regular' fans were different which is nonsense. it's these 'regular' fans that will be there through thick and thin...you won't find many paying for the terrace view if we got relegated.

[Captain_Townsend]

7 minutes ago, Feidhlim said:

Based on what?

Since we're making big claims based on nothing, I'm not sure you "get it" either

Charming.

This man ripped up the new badge that Villa fans, very publicly, chose after a lengthy consultation process and now, is turning the Holte Suite into a more exclusive hospitality area than it was.

Anyway, I don't appreciate your tone and wonder why I bother.

[Zatman]

8 hours ago, Captain_Townsend said:

Cannot warm to this bloke. Don't think he 'gets it'.

I get what you mean but he wasnt brought in to get. He is here to make money and wont care about being unpopular

He will be cold and professional and not trying to win friends like Purslow

[Wainy316]

Heck off

[Kingman]

Ohhh Heck, Now look what you've gone and done! 

[Vive_La_Villa]

Instead of all these hospitality attempts how about you just add more staff to ticket office or allow more options online. 

Just called now and was told due to demand please call back later. Shocking.

It surprises me when they look at all these new avenues to generate money but can’t fix the existing issues first. Come on Heck; sort it out mate.

Edited September 26, 2023 by Vive_La_Villa

[duke313]

On 20/09/2023 at 08:00, Captain_Townsend said:

Charming.

This man ripped up the new badge that Villa fans, very publicly, chose after a lengthy consultation process and now, is turning the Holte Suite into a more exclusive hospitality area than it was.

Anyway, I don't appreciate your tone and wonder why I bother.

This is a negative?

[Pinebro]

The heck was up with this appointment?

[ender4]

Not President of Operations, but 'Business Operations'.   It will be all about the revenue business for him.  I assume there is someone else underneath him who looks after actual operational issues.

[El Segundo]

I don't like what Heck has done so far or some of what he's planning to do but if we want to be able to match the sky 6 on the pitch we're going to have to maximise revenue.  Unfortunately that means appealing more to the hospitality market and attracting a bigger share of the "tourist" fanbase.  If we want to remain "traditional"  I doubt we'd ever be truly competitive at the top end.  It's sad but seems the only way now. 

[Captain_Townsend]

10 minutes ago, El Segundo said:

I don't like what Heck has done so far or some of what he's planning to do but if we want to be able to match the sky 6 on the pitch we're going to have to maximise revenue.  Unfortunately that means appealing more to the hospitality market and attracting a bigger share of the "tourist" fanbase.  If we want to remain "traditional"  I doubt we'd ever be truly competitive at the top end.  It's sad but seems the only way now. 

Fair enough but his unilateral binning of the vote on the new badge is a disgrace for me.

He has deliberately sabotaged the new badge for his own reasons. The club badge is the symbol of the club. The brand. It should be 100%. We just about have the worst branding imaginable - two different designs everywhere FFS.

 

The way it has been communicated too has been a joke.

Edited September 26, 2023 by Captain_Townsend

[blandy]

Posts moved/removed. Please stay on topic. There are other threads for raising club revenue, threads for ticketing for each and every match, and for season tickets and threads for the badge and/or identity.

[OutByEaster?]

2 hours ago, Don_Simon said:

"Deliberately sabotaged" - what?! 

And what does the "the club badge is the symbol of the club, the brand, it should be 100%" about? What's the 100% bit?

Not to answer for someone else, but I'm guessing the deliberate sabotage is the decision not to implement the new badge; not to use it anywhere but on the shirt, not to use any of its variants and not to support it through any of our media channels - it's in 10% of the places that it should be.

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Would you rather he went ahead with someone else's decision even if he thinks it's a poor decision that doesn't best serve Villa?

And the big problem here is that the "someone else" that you're hinting at is Christian Purslow, but the "someone else" who made the decision is Villa fans - albeit most likely steered that way by a mixture of restriction of choice and the appliance of nostalgia. 

Ultimately, he'll do as he pleases, as did his predecessor, and I'm sure he's already drawn up the new badge he wants to use, ready for us to be 'consulted' at until we agree with it.

And in fairness to him, he'll probably come up with a really, really good badge, and one that is an excellent representation of the club across all sorts of media channels, because he's an extremely clever, extremely talented brand manager - but I can't help but feel that the need for change comes as much from the need to prove that as it does from any problem with the badges we currently have.

I don't want a new badge every time we get a new CEO just so that the new CEO can put his stamp on things - once Heck has done with this one, there needs to be some sort of commitment from the club that they'll stick with it - something that they can be held to - something that stops the next very clever man changing it again to prove how much better he is than whoever he replaces.

 

 

 

 

[HKP90]

I appreciate that he is to some degree encumbered in his work by the decisions made by the previous incumbent, but in my 33 years as a fan I've never seen the marketing, kit, crest and sponsorship in as much of an absolute shambles as it is now.

I know he'll be wanting it all his way, and I have no doubt he can get us there, but I'm sure there could have been some compromises made to make at least some of that list work until more substantial changes can be made. 

As it is it's all bloody awful, to the point that it will be hindering our progression. If, and as we are being successful on the pitch, we need to pick up support from new markets. That's how you get sustainable growth.

As it is, I half think that the reason we're going 'under the radar' in the media is that no-one is sure who the f*** we are these days. 

[OutByEaster?]

4 hours ago, Feidhlim said:

Is there a preference that the new badge had been rolled out everywhere, at significant cost, and then changed again later since he believes it's not up to scratch? 

I think there's a preference that given that we'd hired one of the world's foremost brand companies, who worked with the Villa senior team and our owners, consulted with half a dozen fan groups over dozens of meetings, consulted, twice, on elements then the finished badge with the wider fan base and received an overwhelming support for one of the options - there's a preference that the new man wouldn't arrive on launch day and throw a grenade into it because he, personally, didn't like it and felt that he knows better. There's a stage at which you're so far along that sometimes you're better off launching the product and then looking at your own revision a few years down the line. We'd started to launch the badge, it was already on the shirts, we'd committed - it's a real shame that he didn't arrive two months earlier when he still had a blank canvas, but he didn't, and by pulling half of the commitment and half of the badge, he's left us in a bit of a mess.

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The guy is trying to do his job as best he can and sometimes it feels impossible to please fans.

He's come in looking to make an impact, with a mandate and a clear instruction to make more money - I would hope there's a genuine benefit to what he's doing, that he is the genius that his reputation suggests he might be and that he can make a new badge something that can generate the incomes our owners demand. I would hope that he's not just come in and decided that in order to satisfy his ego and show the world that the new boss has arrived, he hasn't picked something like the badge as a way to demonstrate his power - "My club, My badge".

We're now in a position where in order to build what he wants, he's torn down an awful lot of stuff, we've gone from being a stable club with reasonable relations with the fan base, to one that's a little chaotic and has fans up in arms on a number of issues despite the best football we've played in years - it's tempting to judge him on the mess he's made, but important we give him time to build what he's going to build.

I'm hoping he'll be brilliant and given the start he's made, he'll need to be.

 

 

 

[Feidhlim]

Trust the process

 

[maqroll]

My worry all along about Heck and by extension Edens, is that they'd apply the American sports hospitality concept to Villa Park, and dilute the atmosphere as a consequence. 

[rbcuk]

Redbull fans didn’t like him