Tom McCann and Richard Gregg try to deliver the best in the form of the Emirates Stadium in London (UK).
Richard Gregg is the Operations Director of Arsenal FC and is responsible for delivering a resilient, sustainable and service-focused operation that supports the club’s stakeholders across multi sites. His team oversees all service delivery for the facilities, assets, travel, security, playing surfaces, and event safety, who welcome in excess of 1.5 million supporters each season to the Emirates Stadium.
As the Venue Director for the Arsenal Football Club Tom McCann has overall responsibility for £100m+ of annual revenue relating to Emirates Stadium’s matchday and non-matchday business. McCann leads a full-time team of 71 in the ticketing, sales and service of 50,000 general admission seats and 10,000 premium seats including 129 Executive Boxes and a number of lounges including the exclusive Diamond Club.
In a conversation with ‘Coliseum’, Richard Gregg, Operations Director, Arsenal FC, UK, and Tom McCann, Venue Director, Arsenal FC, UK, tells Neil Levett, Emcee, Coliseum, UK, that their job is to ensure that business gets a proper boost in the Emirates Stadium with the former “looking after business at functional level” and the latter “trying to commercialize the building”.
Arsenal FC
The Arsenal Football Club is a professional football club based in Islington, North London, England (UK). They compete in the Premier League, the top tier of English football.
Emirates Stadium
The Emirates Stadium (known as Arsenal Stadium for UEFA competitions) is a football stadium in Holloway, London, England (UK). It has been the home stadium of the Arsenal Football Club since its completion in 2006. It has a current seated capacity of 60,704 making it one of the largest football stadiums in England by capacity.
Stated McCann – “My role as Director is I try to commercialize the building. So, we try and maximize revenue from major events, minor events, ticketing, and hospitality. The Emirates Stadium is the first building of its kind to have a dedicated club level. Like any building we made a conscious decision to prioritize to continue to evolve the building over time. Everything across club level has been refurbished. We have 100 seats Executive Boxes, Corporate Boxes and they sold out. That’s what the market called for in. Fast forward, we share experiences, share spaces. So, just before the pandemic happened we came back with 14 Boxes and there is a current shift in the market and we see that continuously – more shared spaces and it reflects that in the new design and in the new build itself. We invested in general admission (GA) and we spent three-and-a-half-million last year. So, we are always trying to figure out how we can deliver the best. We deliver quality products.”
Stated Richard Gregg, “We invested not just in front house but in back house too. We were provided Coldwell Banker Richard Ellis (CBRE) services and on that basis we can understand the lifecycle and we can map out using that data everything outside the building, our sustainability strategy and we are able to optimize the existing assets in our way because of CBRE.”
The Arsenal Women’s Super League games are something to write home about as McCann said – “Let the numbers speak for themselves. We had 60,000 supporters in the building for the Super League matches here.”
Wrap-up
Tom McCann and Richard Gregg summed up by stating, “We are really proud about our building and we continue to make sure that there is something for everybody.”
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