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Date Posted: 23:44:09 11/25/00 Sat
Author: Dave Peacock
Subject: Re: Future tours
In reply to: Alexie 's message, "Re: Future tours" on 07:47:02 11/24/00 Fri

Alexei

I would have preferred to read about the tour report from Lahore bit as this doesn't appear to be forthcoming I'll continue our discussion as I'm sure regular message board viewers find it rather amusing.

I've been criticised since the moment the Barmy Army was started and I'll add your name willingly to the long list of well known people which include Ian Wooldridge, Martin Johnson, Bob Willis, Neville Oliver,Mike Selvey, countless other journalists, the majority of the ECB, most of the MCC membership and countless Australian's who were humiliated when they couldn't make us laugh with a witty song despite being offered $20 dollars by me. None of them really know anything about the Barmy Army and therefore their criticism is based on assumption rather than fact. That's why your comments are taken seriously, you've been in The Barmy Army a long time and we first met in South Africa in 95, you know most of the regular tourists and they ( including me) regard you as a good bloke.

I won't bore you by going over old ground, I'll try and address your main grievance which seems to be the sale of merchandise and your perception that Leafy and I make a killing out of the fans who buy a shirt overseas, especially when we don't go. I'll move onto your second point , that it was originally started to fund long overseas tours. It was actually started for a laugh with 50 ball and chain t-shirts that Monty and I flogged. It's now become much bigger, but it's still run by the same 2 guys who gave up their jobs to watch the whole of the Ashes series, cricket fans, first and foremost. I work full time because we don't make anywhere near enough money to live off the Barmy Army ( we are actually running at a five figure loss) and Leafy carries on because he hopes one day that we might! It's still going because we enjoy it, it's our hobby and we love English cricket, the reason why it's still going is that hundreds of others feel exactly the same way -its fun and the vast majority of people who go overseas want to make the most of their holiday and joining in with the Barmy Army style of support is the natural choice. That's why there is a demand to buy a souvenir shirt and for the life of me I can't see we are criticised for producing a fairly good souvenir for about a tenner. We produce about 200 shirts for Pakistan ,I take a couple of nights to design it (Wot no booze), a friend at work puts in on the computer from my hand drawn sketch, a few more hours, we send it to a designer who creates the artwork, more work, which we take to our printer. He prints them up, we collect, I take to the airport. The t-shirt is good quality and will last, it's therefore expensive at about £3.80, plenty of colours so they cost £60p, it costs about £200 to produce the screens, more for the artwork,loads of phonecalls, petrol money and time. Then we do some Alec Stewart shirts that cost £7 each which we sell for a fiver(small volume-high price). Not great business is it? I know you'll come back to me about Oz, so I'll get in first, the reason why we sell so many is because we negotiated a deal to sell them in the ground. We pay them 25% commission again on a tenner, we got the t-shirts a bit cheaper due to volume and then had to fly them around Australia, get them to the grounds etc etc. So in Oz if you buy a shirt Leafy and I make between £2 and £3 once every 4 years. That means we make a bit of cash and have a free trip. (We also spend a few hours organising events, tickets, bands, negotiating with breweries for cheap booze and all for no financial benefit. Then there's liaising with the ground authorities and police(in Australia specifically), sorting out pubs, onward accomodation and deal with the media)Again that time and effort is put in for no financial reward whatsover - not great business, but greatly appreciated by nearly everyone else. I don't know why this seems to piss you off so much. The Pakistan shirt cost us time and money but I'm sure it will be worn with real pride by everyone who went - which is why we produced it in the first place! Just because we didn't go on that tour - surely it shouldn't mean that we can't make and sell a t-shirt to those fans who were The Barmy Army on that tou, at no financial gain to ourselves. Many thanks to all those who smuggled the shirts into Pakistan and if Gaz made a bit of cash flogging them, it's small compensation for the hassle involved.

In return for our merchandise where we make between £2 and £3 on each shirt ( not Pakistan obviously), we are able to try and work on behalf of everyone. Leafy and I have met with the ECB for the past 6 years and finally we were granted tickets for reunions (which you've been to in the past), liaised in advance with both the ticket offices and ground authorities,we'll not hesitate to use the power of our name to organise parties overseas, cricket matches and most importantly run this web site (which is crippling us). You'll be pleased to hear that we will soon be going into a deal with a company that runs sporting websites, the advertising that they will generate should be enough to keep it running. Then again, it costs nothing to join the Barmy Army, receive our newsletters etc etc. Not a bad deal Alexei.That's why I do take unfair criticism personally and just as importantly take the time and effort to show you why your views are misguided.

I'm not sure when I'll be going away again as Cadet/tte No 2 is due in May, but I will say that I hope to go back to Australia every 4 years, at the very least until we win The Ashes and then after that to gloat that I was there when we did!

The fact that I'm no longer The General is to be honest a real weight of my shoulders, to try and represent not just my own opinions but also those of all the Barmy Army members is a very difficult job, the novelty of being on tele has long worn off and destroying my voice on the first day of every test match no longer holds the same appeal. Saying that I loved every moment, and wish Gaz, Charlie and anyone else who fronts it all the very best, especially with the media!!!!

I hope that you now have a better understanding of where we are coming from and if there's any more discussions on the subject let's do it over a few beers at the reunions next summer.

Dave.

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