My Mate said:
Hey Mate,
Thought I might forward the following email to you. A mate of mine in London booked a trip to the recent Cardiff game through the fanatics. As you will see, he had a less then fantastic experience.
The email below was actually sent to the fanatics and the guy is a good friend of mine.
Thought you might want to spread the word...
To Whom It May Concern:
I don't usually do this but I somehow think that it is necessary to take the time out of my busy day to write in and provide you with feedback from last weekend's Rugby game in Cardiff.
I booked 4 places for the overnight stay package which included accommodation and a ticket to the Rugby for £149. Initially I thought since only includes the accommodation and the Rugby for £149 we should get a good ticket on the sideline and half decent accommodation at a hostel near the stadium and everything else.
When we turn up at Cardiff station we work out we need to get a cab, which is not a problem until we started driving out of town, far away from the stadium and all the night life. The hostel was probably the worst I have stayed at, we were sharing with 14 other guys and the room had a foul odour (that was before anyone else was in there as well).
So at this stage we aren't happy, especially when we learn the advertised rate for a bed is £15pppn and with the buying power of the fanatics i'm sure you got that rate down as low as possible. We even call around a couple of hotels to see if there are any rooms available. With no luck we open our packet of starched linen and make our beds... saying no worries it's only for 1 night, we are going to have awesome seats if it only costs this much for the bed.
So another taxi into town to meet everyone at the Ha Ha bar... £3.80 pints, no worries we'll just have a couple and head to the game. So this is when we really started to question the moral fibre of the fanatics empire. We received the tickets and the face value of the ticket is £40... with my friends standing around me, looking at their tickets like deer in oncoming headlights, I feel it necessary to ask why we have just paid £149 for £55 worth of "value"... the responses were "ha ha are you in the 14 bed rooms... ouch" and "Yeah but that's not the price that we pay on the ticket, we pay a tourist price to guarantee the ticket".
Realising I wasn't going to get any logical response out of these 2 guys I lead my mates, who are still stunned and with their blood pressure starting to increase at a high rate, with the help of another mate towards the game. In case you're wondering the other mate was on the day trip with the fanatics but received a £60 ticket, a return bus ride and apparently free beer on the way back to London that he unknowingly had to pay for on his way off the bus for £129.
So at the stadium, gate 5... as semi expected we start walking up the stairs until we can touch the roof of the millennium stadium... back row... not many people can say it was their dream to go to the Millennium stadium for many years, pay for seats in the corporate catered area but on arrival receive a nose bleeding kit on the way to my seat. To be fair the other fanatic supporters in the back row of one of the corners were in good spirits unless the name Fanatics was mentioned and I've never had a better atmosphere for watching coloured dots moving around throwing around an even smaller dot in my life! I did take a picture with my phone, if you would like I can forward it to you so that you can use on your website.
After the match... where to go? Maybe the fanatics had organised an area in a bar where we can have a few beers? Maybe the difference in price is going to be made up with some free beer? No, obviously knowing the back lash that would be received.
So to sum this up: 1 Person 4 People
Ticket price - £149 £596
Bad Hostel - £15 £60
Rugby ticket - £40 £160
Special Fanatics tourist ticket price - £5? £20
Total Gross Costs - £60 £240
Gross Profit £89 £356
Gross Profit Margin - 60% 60%
Not many companies can pull a gross profit margin of 60%, especially in a recession where everybody is hit.
Myself, my friends and everybody who we spoke to feel extremely ripped off and very angry. If I had have known that the tickets were in the back row and the accommodation was less than budget I would have booked the tickets myself and found accommodation in the city at a decent hotel for less than what it cost to go with the Fanatics, and that's before adding the £70 in cab fares we had to pay to get to and from the hostel over the 2 days!
Basically, I have wanted to go to Cardiff to watch Australia v Wales for the last 10 years and your expensive budget trip absolutely ruined the experience for my friends and I. We have all said we are never booking anything with the fanatics again and feel obliged to tell as many Aussies as we can so that the Fanatics empire cannot rip them off either. I think it is disgusting that your company would make so much profit at the expense of other unsuspecting hard working Aussies who are just wanting to get out there and support their team!
