#StopExploitingLoyalty: Chelsea supporters deliver a clear mandate and vote against the club’s new exploitative ticketing measures
Chelsea supporters have today (23 June) given a clear mandate for the Chelsea Supporters’ Trust (CST) to join the FSA’s “Stop Exploiting Loyalty” campaign.
A week after the FIFA Club World Cup kicked-off, a competition in which the club could pocket up to £97 million, Chelsea FC supporters have indicated that they do not believe their loyalty is understood or appreciated by the club.
Across a recent survey conducted by the CST, almost 90% of respondents instructed the CST to join the campaign which was launched in 2024 and has received worldwide attention.
The message is clear #StopExploitingLoyalty.
The Chelsea Supporters’ Trust will now take action to highlight how supporters are continuously being overlooked and shine a spotlight on how Chelsea FC is exploiting the loyalty of those people who are the lifeblood of the club.
Despite record-breaking profits, Chelsea FC has broken its commitment to “maximise all other revenue streams before increasing costs for supporters,” by introducing a range of new policies that hit the pockets of loyal supporters.
The new booking fee per ticket was widely rejected by supporters, as was the decrease to concession discounts for cup fixtures. The decision to introduce a credit system for tickets sold on the ticket exchange rather than giving the money directly back to the seller’s bank account was also dismissed by supporters.
In addition, the club has introduced an exploitative ‘priority’ membership costing £60 which has no recognition of loyalty. This is a 50% price increase for the “most popular” membership. The sales of the new ‘priority’ memberships will be uncapped and will therefore mean that members will have to pay more for their membership to access tickets which are not guaranteed.
The pockets of members are being hit with an additional initial membership cost, plus raises to the actual price of tickets, plus a new booking fee. For example, a member who attends only 5 games across a season, can expect to pay a minimum of 16% more in 2025/26 than they did in 2024/25. This is a bad deal for members who just want to watch their team play, and many are rightly asking “What is the point of buying a membership?”
In addition, Season Ticket prices have increased by an average of over 17% in the last two years. While the club has committed “that any money raised by Chelsea will be spent on Chelsea,” only 29.25% of respondents to the CST survey thought that the ticket price increases were either acceptable or very acceptable. In addition, only 22% have confidence in the club to effectively reinvest the increased revenue into Chelsea FC.
The CST has consistently warned the club that time after time they are making poor choices that infuriate supporters. This statistic is therefore really alarming and cannot be ignored.
A Chelsea Supporters’ Trust spokesperson, said:
“Piece by piece, Chelsea FC is alienating a large part of our core fan base with decisions that will slowly force supporters to pick and choose which games they attend.
“The exploitation of members is also a worry, and we are deeply concerned that the increasingly bad deal that members have will negatively impact our club for generations to come.
“This should be a huge wake-up call to the owners and the senior leadership team within the club. Supporters are rejecting the decisions made by the club and are evidently unhappy with the current path being taken.
“Not only is it ethically wrong to exploit the loyalty of the lifeblood of our club, but it is strategically short-sighted and obliterates any trust or goodwill that had started to be built by recent positive initiatives.”
