Everton correspondent Joe Thomas shares his thoughts on the new season ticket prices and what they indicate about how the Friedkin Group plan to run the club
The Everton team bus arrives as fans set off smoke flares outside the stadium prior to the Premier League match between Everton and Chelsea at Hill Dickinson Stadium. Photo by Alex Livesey/Getty Images
The Everton team bus arrives as fans set off smoke flares outside the stadium prior to the Premier League match between Everton and Chelsea at Hill Dickinson Stadium. Photo by Alex Livesey/Getty Images
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Everton’s new season ticket prices represent the latest evidence of a shift in culture at the club.
There can be no doubt new owners the Friedkin Group (TFG) are a sea-change on what went before them. For years one of the biggest charges laid against those in charge was that the club was not run like a business. That is no longer the case.
TFG have moved in with a professional efficiency that has brought stability to a club that has undergone years of turbulence - chaos that placed its future at risk.
But while Everton have received significant benefits from that style of leadership, it is also one that offers little room for sentimentality. Every increase matters on the balance sheet. That appears to be true even if it comes at the expense of supporters and, arguably, when that burden is increased out of choice rather than necessity.
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The Friedkins have already had a significant impact through their first 18 months at the helm. We saw the first glimpses of that in the latest set of accounts, those for 2024/25 and which covered the six months after they had bought the Blues from Farhad Moshiri. Released last week, the biggest complement that can be offered is that the documents were relatively mundane.
Gone was the jeopardy that characterised the final years of Moshiri’s reign, the terrifying numbers and hints of impending catastrophe replaced by sensible solutions provided by sensible people. The Blues' future is no longer under threat. The only way is up.
Making progress comes at a cost, however. It is one thing, Everton would argue, to have stability, and an entirely different thing to regularly compete. The accounts may have shown a promising final loss of just £8.6m but that was a figure massaged by the one-off sale of Everton Women within the TFG empire for £49m. Factor that in and the Blues are a long, long way from profitability and sustainability.
They have, of course, made significant strides on that front. The current financial year will be the first to see the benefits of the new stadium, the commercial deals it has inspired, and the reduced costs associated with the club’s debt now the overall figure has been consolidated and refinanced on much more favourable terms.
Revenue is expected to top £250m for the 2025/26 season - a major rise on the £196m of the previous year. Partnerships with the likes of Pepsi, Budweiser and Heinz show the club has become an organisation that global brands want to attach themselves to, while the stadium naming rights deal with Hill Dickinson is one of several lucrative income streams now available following the move to the Liverpool waterfront.
Everton and TFG would argue this still only takes the club so far towards its goals, however. Turnover topping £250m would still be less than half that of Chelsea, Arsenal and Manchester United for the latest available financial year. Liverpool’s revenue exceeded £700m for 24/25. They have announced a three-year inflation-linked structure for season ticket price rises that has sparked plans for supporter protests.
The Blues might claim that situation is different because Liverpool’s income is so high and because the club is increasing prices despite having turned a profit - something they are a long way from achieving. Everton's increases for next year may be, on average, greater than that of their fiercest rivals, but it is the view at the club that the move is necessary for one playing catch up from a long way back.
Everton are, no doubt, trying to play catch up. Even a record revenue of £250m would only put the club on comparable terms with the likes of West Ham United. For 24/25 Aston Villa and Newcastle United, two clubs most Evertonians would feel should exist within the Blues’ orbit, posted revenues of £378m and £335m respectively.
There is, clearly, a long way for Everton to go to reach those figures. The big question is not whether Everton are behind their competitors, it is how they catch up. And this is where the issue with placing more of that pressure on the supporters becomes questionable.
The price rises announced on Friday will represent a significant burden for many match-going supporters at a time when the cost of living is rising. Facing a hike, in some cases of almost 10%, fans will have to weigh up whether they can afford to keep watching their club in person given the price rises elsewhere in their lives that are an inevitable consequence of the conflict in the Middle East.
The Everton Fan Advisory Board, in its response to the new prices, said it feared the club was now putting short term gain over loyalty. It is certainly fair to ask what the club will truly gain from the changes and whether it is worth it. The additional income generated by the increase in ticket prices may not even cover the uplift in costs associated with running Hill Dickinson Stadium over the coming year.
Everton and TFG’s counter to that would be that every penny does matter - this is a club that has paid a heavy price for failing to comply with Premier League spending rules and the move to a squad cost ratio framework means more diligence will be required. Against that backdrop, maintaining concessionary rates when rivals have watered down their offerings does deserve credit.
But given the Blues stand to benefit to such a small financial degree from the increases they are implementing, a look at the bigger picture would surely be prescient. Incremental rises in ticket prices will provide some extra money for the club but they will not carry it towards the rivals it is hunting down. A better way to chase the revenues of the likes of Newcastle and Villa would be through on-the-pitch performances - European qualification and increased merit payments through higher league placings.
Everton stand a far better chance of achieving that progress if, like the whole world witnessed to such great effect against Chelsea, the players are performing in front of a stadium filled with passionate supporters following their club in good faith for 90 minutes plus stoppage time. Instead, there is a danger of inspiring cynicism and frustration - with higher prices will also come greater expectations, and greater disappointment, if and when they are not met.
With the changes to the family area and the addition of another season ticket rewards scheme - entry to which comes at another extra cost - it feels as though the latest changes are indicative of a club finding new things to charge for, rather than necessarily looking to improve the experiences of those already paying a lot of money to support their team - though the club insists it is looking at ways to make matchdays better for all fans.
There is, perhaps, a chicken and egg scenario here - to get better revenues the club needs to perform better and the debate is whether that starts with more money being spent on the squad or less money being extracted from loyal supporters.
But one thing is clear: In a world in which the value of the Premier League owes so much to what match-going supporters provide, the season ticket increases are a missed opportunity to make a stand for fans. That, after a week in which the club has worked so hard to successfully provide accessible fun to children on their school holidays, would surely have far greater value to the club than the extra money the new prices will raise.
And the increases are another indication that TFG, whose owner Dan Friedkin is still yet to watch an Everton home game, plan to run the club without room for sentimentality. That approach is a big reason for the progress the club has made this season. But it also comes at a cost, as the reaction to the new prices has shown.
That matters at a club that is, rightly, as proud of its connections to the community as Everton.