The true potential of our Women's Team

[CBDees 3,167]

The best thing about our AFL Women's Team is that it is currently in a restricted women's competition with only four other Melbourne-based teams, meaning we effectively get the jump on the Hawks, Bombers, Saints, Roos and Tigers!

It is an advantage that we will only have for a short window so we must exploit this and leverage off it to the maximum in promoting MFC to a entirely new market of potential members. If we don't, the Blues, Pies and Doggies will!

With Daisy Pearce as the face of our Women's Team, we have a very good competitive advantage over the other three Melbourne-based teams as she is by far and away the most high profile and articulate ambassador for women's football in the AFL.

It is imperative that we take the initiative and get the jump on them all. If we can build a supporter base for the women of (say) 10,000 members, 5,000 for the Casey Demons, and 45,000 for the Melbourne Football Club male team, we could attain 60,000 MFC members in 2017. No reason why this is not attainable and possibly it may even be conservative, (seeking a modest return of 15,000 for our two extra teams' if Casey are allowed to be included in our total as I am sure the other VFL linked teams are such as Collingwood might be). Anyway, food for thought!

Go Dees!

 

 

[RalphiusMaximus 6,088]

The selection of two senior figures as our Marquee Players suggests the club is aiming for early success in this league.  Daisy is still the best player in the land and Mel Hickey is one of the few who can go toe to toe with Mo Hope.  Hopefully the leadership they provide fast-tracks the development of the youngsters and helps us to a flag or two before the rest of the competition catches up. 

[CBDees 3,167]

26 minutes ago, RalphiusMaximus said:

The selection of two senior figures as our Marquee Players suggests the club is aiming for early success in this league.  Daisy is still the best player in the land and Mel Hickey is one of the few who can go toe to toe with Mo Hope.  Hopefully the leadership they provide fast-tracks the development of the youngsters and helps us to a flag or two before the rest of the competition catches up. 

I share your enthusiasm for the team under the captaincy of Daisy, but I am hoping more than anything that we can leverage off Daisy's profile and the team's success to catapult our membership to over 50,000 for the first time, especially considering the fact that the first Women's season is concluded before the 2017 AFL season proper commences.

Edited December 18, 2016 by CBDees

[DeeSpencer 26,083]

I'm not a huge fan of Casey but we do become the team of the East/Outer East whilst Collingwood are based at Olympic Park, Carlton at Carlton and the Dogs in the West. 

So much of Hawthorn's transition from minnow to power club has been on the back of the booming Eastern suburbs. 

I wasn't alive at the time but I'm sure the early travellers to Waverley felt the same way I do going to Casey now. 

I'm not convinced on the membership numbers in the short term. The women play either 3 or 4 home games at a busy time of the year. I'm not sure people will be buying memberships rapidly. Nor will buying women's memberships lead to men's memberships in the short term. 

But we do have a chance to get thousands of young girls from Melbourne's Eastern suburbs seeing AFLW in red and blue and hopefully overriding their dads or brothers and sticking with them. We might get the long term presence in the area that I doubt our current VFL and irregular trainings have achieved.

[Lucifers Hero 40,364]

6 hours ago, DeeSpencer said:

I'm not a huge fan of Casey but we do become the team of the East/Outer East whilst Collingwood are based at Olympic Park, Carlton at Carlton and the Dogs in the West. 

So much of Hawthorn's transition from minnow to power club has been on the back of the booming Eastern suburbs. 

I wasn't alive at the time but I'm sure the early travellers to Waverley felt the same way I do going to Casey now. 

I'm not convinced on the membership numbers in the short term. The women play either 3 or 4 home games at a busy time of the year. I'm not sure people will be buying memberships rapidly. Nor will buying women's memberships lead to men's memberships in the short term. 

But we do have a chance to get thousands of young girls from Melbourne's Eastern suburbs seeing AFLW in red and blue and hopefully overriding their dads or brothers and sticking with them. We might get the long term presence in the area that I doubt our current VFL and irregular trainings have achieved.

When Hawthorn move to Dingley they will be a stone's throw from Dandenong and not much further to Cranbourne (Casey).  They are looking to lock up that whole Eastern/South Eastern corridor of potential members when they relocate. 

If our AFL team doesn't have serious success in the next 5 years we will be handing that territory of members to the Hawks.

Also, with St Kilda moving back to Moorabbin where they will have their 'Home' suburban ground/training base also makes it challenging for us to grow our membership in the southeast.

Can't see the growth in membership as CBDees sees it.  The demographics of the southeast would suggest the interests, financial resources of the residents and distance to travel to see games/training limit the potential number of paid up members (for all clubs in the region).

It is good that the women's team is playing 3 games at Casey which does gives us a bit of a start in the region ahead of Hawthorn and St Kilda who do not have women's teams but I can't see anything like the 10,000 CBDees is hoping for.

Getting members from the southeast will be very hard work.

 

Edited December 18, 2016 by Lucifer's Hero

[CBDees 3,167]

The thrust of my post (which includes Casey) was that we have a great window of opportunity to generate MFC members whilst there are only four AFL Women's Teams based in Melbourne. If we are successful as a team, and have such a marketable captain as Daisy, then there is no reason that we can't reap the benefits of their popularity in terms of membership growth (two teams, two leagues, one MFC)!

[Redleg 41,468]

Do yourselves a favour and have a look at the article on Dee, Shelley Scott, if you want to see real dedication and commitment to a football goal.

It's on the AFL site and probably the Melbourne site and maybe even on Demonland already.

[beelzebub 23,383]

5 hours ago, Redleg said:

Do yourselves a favour and have a look at the article on Dee, Shelley Scott, if you want to see real dedication and commitment to a football goal.

It's on the AFL site and probably the Melbourne site and maybe even on Demonland already.

Bloody amazing

[Akum 2,660]

On 18 December 2016 at 8:26 PM, CBDees said:

The best thing about our AFL Women's Team is that it is currently in a restricted women's competition with only four other Melbourne-based teams, meaning we effectively get the jump on the Hawks, Bombers, Saints, Roos and Tigers!

It is an advantage that we will only have for a short window so we must exploit this and leverage off it to the maximum in promoting MFC to a entirely new market of potential members. If we don't, the Blues, Pies and Doggies will!

With Daisy Pearce as the face of our Women's Team, we have a very good competitive advantage over the other three Melbourne-based teams as she is by far and away the most high profile and articulate ambassador for women's football in the AFL.

It is imperative that we take the initiative and get the jump on them all. If we can build a supporter base for the women of (say) 10,000 members, 5,000 for the Casey Demons, and 45,000 for the Melbourne Football Club male team, we could attain 60,000 MFC members in 2017. No reason why this is not attainable and possibly it may even be conservative, (seeking a modest return of 15,000 for our two extra teams' if Casey are allowed to be included in our total as I am sure the other VFL linked teams are such as Collingwood might be). Anyway, food for thought!

Go Dees!

 

 

Wanted to put this thread back towards the top, because there's been such an amazing change since it was posted.

Daisy is a great player & great ambassador, but some of the other 'senior' players - Elise O'Dea, Karen Paxman, Mel Hickey - have been amazing too. And some of the newer younger players - Alyssa Mifsud tonight, Cat Phillips last week, Deanna Berry, Jas Grierson, Lily Mithen, Jess Anderson - are really exciting. And they play an entertaining attacking style of footy.

For all of Daisy's qualities, it's certainly not the one-woman show that some of us who were less familiar with the woman's game might have expected back in December.

What do others think?

Edited February 18, 2017 by Akum
getting names right