Quote: SEB "That sounds a bit half-hearted though to me. Whilst my suggestion would require much more effort (and some investment) it would surely yield much better results.'"
Amateurs will come if they want to, but playing the game in the South East does take up a large part of your weekend, no matter which club you play for, coming to watch the London side is quite a commitment and means your weekend is wiped out. I would target one match a season, maybe a challenge cup game or any weekend when there is no league games for them, they are all given matchday tickets and more than encouraged to come down, something nailed in the diary at the start of the year that gives no excuses and puts a few hundred extra on the gate.
My suggestion is give all the kids season tickets and give adults who help out with their kids matchday tickets for matches that we want them to attend as loyalty bonuses and discounts for having a league playing kid.
There has been a winding down of the matchday experience for adults, ie half-time entertainment, cheerleaders, full-time entertainment not what it was, etc but kids need a bit more than buck and dusty; face-painting, bouncy castles, kicking at small goals, running with the ball against elastic, the same thing kids have enjoyed around rugby grounds for years.
Kids bugging parents to go to the games, and we get the parents interested too.