The many changes that have been made to the bars around the Memorial Stadium during the summer break have mostly brought great improvements that have been overdue for some time but several have caused problems and these, combined with the closure of the Supporters Club’s shop at Kingswood have affected our membership.
The Committee is fully aware of all the problems and several of us met with Rovers’ recently appointed Chief Executive Officer, Martyn Starnes, last week to try and resolve those problems that are causing difficulties. Our Club membership is an area of particular concern to us as, with no employed staff since the closure of Kingswood, we are totally reliant on the Football Club’s new ‘Superstore’ and our own matchday-only cabin to take payments and issue cards. It was intended that we would use the Football Club’s BOSS system which would have enabled Sam Parsons, our Membership Secretary, to keep track on those joining but, for technical reasons we understand, this has not proved possible, hence long delays in sending out cards to members and for this we apologise. Also, we have not been permitted to take memberships and coach bookings in our bar. This has proved to be another frustration that we hope to get resolved shortly. Please bear with us whilst negotiations on these problems continue and we will inform the membership as and when we get things sorted, thank you.
We have not yet agreed a date for the A.G.M. as our books are still with the Auditor but we expect to get the ‘go-ahead’ from them soon and we will then advise members through this column and on our website. We will certainly hold a ‘fans forum’ for members (only) to follow on immediately after the A.G.M. and both Chairman Steve Hamer and Manager Darrell Clarke will be invited to give answers to questions from the floor so sign up this afternoon if you have not done so far.