Arsenal announced today (March 5) that ticket prices are to increase next season. This is our response.
- We have held discussions with the club about ticketing, but we were unable to persuade it not to impose an overall rise in Season Ticket prices
- We don’t accept that the club’s best option this year is to raise prices, and we will continue to make that clear to them
AISA is represented on the Arsenal Advisory Board (AAB) which has been consulted by the club on proposals for ticketing next season. There have been three meetings about ticketing in the last few weeks and AISA is pleased that the club engaged directly and openly with the AAB fan reps as part of this process. They presented their proposals and there was an open and honest discussion about them.
While the club listened, it is fair to say that we (AISA) and the other groups did not achieve everything we hoped to and most importantly we were unable to persuade the club not to impose an overall rise in Season Ticket prices.
We support the adoption of a 19-game Season Ticket which will mean that members who choose this option will have a significantly reduced sum of money to find at renewal whilst retaining priority booking for domestic cup games played at the Emirates. Those choosing the 23-game option (which includes the 4 UEFA competition ties) will also have priority for FA and League cup matches.
We recognise that the club is taking a potential financial hit by doing this, but we hope this is more than offset by making more tickets available for Silver and Red members.
We are also pleased that the club has retained concessions for younger fans and (if limited) for the over 65s. It is very good news that Arsenal is committed to bringing more of its community into the ground for matches, something raised by supporters at AISA’s AGM.
While there is a lot of detail in Arsenal’s ticketing announcement, we acknowledge that most supporters will focus on the headline, which is the 3.7% overall rise in ST prices for next season. The rise (3% for those in the Upper Tier and 5% in the Lower, and on average 4.1% in Club Level) is disappointing and we argued strongly and forcibly against it, as did the other fans groups represented on the AAB.
AISA supports the FSA’s campaign to #StopExpliotingLoyalty and we urged the club to follow the actions of other PL clubs in freezing prices for next year.
We didn’t win that battle, but we will continue to press the club to take supporters’ interests into account when they decide their strategy for next season.
We all recognise that the club is aiming for financial sustainability on and off the pitch and we applaud that. They have some important decisions to make around sponsorship (AISA has consistently challenged the club on its association with Rwanda for example), and has made good ground with its commercial operation. But we don’t accept that the club’s best option this year is to raise prices and we will continue to make that clear to them.
The AISA committee, March 2025.