Town chief executive Simon Clegg says that Town would welcome sponsorship of the South Stand and also of Portman Road as a whole. Brewers Greene King ended their long association with the stand formerly known as Churchman’s in the summer.
Clegg says replacing Greene King would bring in useful additional cash: "It would be an excellent way of driving new revenue into the club if we could find someone. But we need to recognise we are in recession at the moment and things are tight.
"It is one of the still uptapped areas of sponsorship that the club has available and I would be delighted to see a main sponsor come on board and pick up the title rights to that stand. But there are no talks ongoing with anyone at this moment in time.”
The chief executive says that sponsorship of the ground could also happen: "Everything will be considered in the context of trying to drive more revenue into the club. This club is costing Marcus Evans a significant amount of money on a year-in, year-out basis out of his own pocket.
"He has made it clear that he is committed to this club for the long-term, but everything that we can do to help reduce that offset is helpful to him and perhaps allows him to invest in other areas of the club which without that he wouldn’t be able to.”
Clegg says Evans would like to continue the ground improvements made earlier in the decade but admits that a new Cobbold Stand is unlikely until such time as the Blues have spent a period in the Premier League.
Town’s ticket prices have faced criticism from away fans this season with the lowest cheapest ticket for adult travelling fans above £30 other than in the family area. Clegg says matchday pricing is something which is regularly assessed: "It’s something we’re constantly looking at but it goes back to making sure we’re running this company on a sound financial footing.
"I am highly conscious that we’re living through the worst recession in living memory and we have to be conscious of that. But conversely people would expect me to run this on a sound financial footing and to do that and offset the significant costs that we incur as a football club, we’ve got to ensure we’re charging the right level for gate entry.”
Clegg explained the reasoning behind the switch to grading matches made in the summer: "We’re trying to simplify the basis on which we were charging people. It’s quite straightforward, it’s A, B and C games. We’ve simplified all the different ticket pricing levels within the stadium as well, so it was an issue of simplification really.”
The chief executive says dialogue is continuing with Section 6 regarding improving the Portman Road atmosphere, while he has also spoken to the Ipswich Hospital Band about the possibility of some involvement on matchdays.