A live business warning: the economic rehabilitation that Beitar needs starts with the fans

Beitar Jerusalem was saved from League A, but understands that it is in an economic game against the majors and must reinvent itself. Barak Abramov will have to change quite a few things so that the audience will buy subscriptions and come in large numbers over time, and that is not going to be easy

Ofir Saar

08/28/2022

Sunday, August 28, 2022, 2:45 p.m

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Barak Abramov at his first press conference as owner of Beitar Jerusalem (photo: Shlomi Gabbai; video editing: Aviad Belili)

During Barak Abramov's first days at Beit Vegan, he talked with a number of existing and potential sponsors and was surprised to find out how difficult the whole issue of sponsorships and the business community around Beitar Jerusalem is. and a negative image, when only those with money who are fans or have an interest remained around.

In the coming years, Abramov will bear the burden of the debts created by Moshe Hogge, but on the other hand, in order to produce a worthy team, even for the top playoffs, he will have to increase revenues and decrease expenses. Easy to say, but very difficult to carry out, especially in light of the fact that due to the large expenses this year, the entire Beitar staff is being reduced and Kafir Adri will bear most of the burden.

It is difficult to recruit sponsors.

Abramov (Photo: Shlomi Gabai)

For tonight's game (Sunday, 20:15) at Moshava against Hapoel Be'er Sheva, all the tickets for Beitar fans were sold out, when a few thousand more could have been sold. This is not surprising, it is much more convenient for Beitar fans to get to Moshava than to Teddy, and not only The great one is not from Jerusalem.

Convenience and access are ultimately very significant, getting to Teddy on a weekday outside of Jerusalem is a nightmare of traffic jams and the lack of parking that take away people's desire in advance.

And it doesn't end there, Teddy for Beitar is financially unprofitable. Security and policing requirements in Jerusalem are much higher than those required in the center, north or south, when 14 thousand people in a Teddy bring in the same income as ten thousand people in a colony, enormous disparities in requirements and costs.

The stadium issue is only part of the problem, Beitar Jerusalem simply needs to recalculate its route, understand that the three biggest are far from it by an astronomical distance for the next few years and create something of its own. On the networks, a great social pressure has begun on fans to subscribe even if they don't come to the field. Until yesterday, 4,400 subscriptions were purchased Man, it is likely that by the time of the Jerusalem derby in the next cycle it will exceed 5,000. Relative to the period in which the team is and the season without expectations, this is a reasonable amount for an audience that is not identified with the purchase of subscriptions. If this is the beginning of a path that at the end of the years, Beitar will be able to have ten thousand subscribers permanent, this is perhaps also a reason that Bitar will be able to conduct itself independently and will not need saviors.

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The club needs them, especially on the financial side.

Beitar Jerusalem fans (photo: Danny Maron)

And beyond subscriptions, this will also have to be expressed in the purchase of tickets.

For years it has been said that most of the fans live outside of Jerusalem and only come to a few games a year, I wish that were true.

If Teddy had 20,000 ticket buyers for the games against the majors, the income level would balance out and easily reach NIS 20 million a year.

The problem is that even those who used to come a few times a year gave up on Teddy and took a step back.

You will see them at away games, in the colony or anywhere else, but after several traumas on arrival, in traffic jams and parking at Teddy, they gave up for good.

Beitar will have to sit down with the municipality and produce something completely different with Teddy in order to bring back a large amount of fans, or alternatively ask the manager to hold some of its games elsewhere. In the current situation, as long as nothing changes, most of the games will not have many audiences for Teddy beyond the subscribers.

So that's it, celebrating outside, Abramov inside, but in the end the crowd joins in large numbers when there's a good team and it's easy to get to, especially when the team didn't run for the championship.

Abramov will have to arrange this platform for the audience, otherwise he will not be able to bring about the desired change.

Now he is still at the stage where fans are mobilizing and coming out of appreciation that Beitar was on the way to League A and he was there to prevent that, but in the future if one does not agree to suffer, Beitar will have to give something else to the fans.

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• Israeli soccer

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• Beitar Jerusalem