GB SUCCESS LEADS TO SPECTATOR RETHINK
Bosses to revamp arrangements after thousands flood to Wales for UK’S showpiece
Unparalleled ticket sales for last week’s Rally GB are likely to force the event into rethinking its spectator strategy after thousands of fans poured into Wales and filled car parks up and down the event.
Event managing director Ben Taylor was delighted with the success of the Deeside-based event, reporting advance sales 30 per cent higher than before. He added, however, that the team needed to work harder to find places for the fans next season.
Cars were abandoned at the side of the road as spectators walked miles into stages to watch Britain’s round of the world championship.
Taylor told MN: “It’s been simply incredible. We’ve had an exceptional rally with a home winner, huge crowds, fantastic cars and brilliant sunshine. We simply can’t ask for more than this.
“We’ve seen this coming in ticket sales and all the other measurable in recent years. Yes, we are benefitting from the regulation changes which has given us the most exciting World Rally Cars ever and yes, Volkswagen’s departure spiced up the driver market and left us with incredible unpredictable rallies. Previously we would have been using that as our story, but now that’s a bonus on top of the story of our rally. We’re in a position to take advantage of the strength of the championship.”
Taylor said he would be paying special attention to the ticketing policy in the coming months. “We know the car parks were full and we know this is a problem,” he said. “We have to factor this into our planning. We’ve sold twice as many World Rally Passes this year and the issue we have with that is that these tickets have access to every car park and we just can’t predict where those people will be going. We looked at so many different iterations of the route to make sure we could accommodate as many people as possible. We will be doing more of this next year.”