Sugababes flop leaves sour taste for cricket club
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by
Rachael Woods
A Sugababes concert that flopped at Kent County Cricket Club’s
ground left a sour note, as the club’s accountants totted up the
balance sheet for 2009 and announced substantial overall losses of
£802,452.
Dismal attendances at the heavily-promoted Canterbury concert,
which took place on June 26 last year, together with a
smaller-than-expected crowd at the James Morrison concert the
following day, resulted in a combined concert deficit of more than
£190,000.
In his report on Kent County Cricket Club’s 2009 financial
results, honorary treasurer Simon Philip said: “The two concerts
incurred losses of over £190,000, which was an acute
disappointment, given that our budget was predicted on very
significant returns.”
Mr Philip also cited delays over the redevelopment scheme for
the ground and difficult trading conditions as being central to the
bleak state of the club’s finances.
The club had hoped to sell 9,000 tickets for the
Sugababes show, but sold less than half that amount with just 4,000
tickets purchased. The James Morrison concert attracted a crowd of
8,000 with sales again being predicted at 9,000.
Commenting on the concert losses, Kent’s chairman George Kennedy
said: “The budget was submitted saying we would make a very
substantial profit. That was accepted, and we assumed it was going
to happen, it was only nearer the time when we were nowhere near
our targets that I started to get very concerned.”
He added: “There was a lack of appetite for a concert in
Canterbury, we advertised it widely in newspapers and radio,and
simply didn’t get the support we had hoped for.”
Mr Kennedy conceded that the organisation of the concerts had
not gone to plan, compared to the success of the Elton John concert
in June 2006.
He said: “The difference was that when Elton John was here, his
people hired the ground and paid us a fee. We took the management
of the Sugababes and James Morrison concerts on ourselves, and
appointed various agencies to do the staging and that type of
thing.”
He admitted: “It simply didn’t work, and we won’t be doing it
again.”
Kent County Cricket Club is on schedule to sign a deal with a
yet to be named developer for a new hotel at the St Lawrence
Ground, before the club’s annual meeting on Monday, March 29.
Friday, March 12 2010
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