The Good, The Bad & The Ugly of Chris Heck at Villa

Christopher Heck, Villa's President of Business Operations - all but CEO in everything but job title judging from his actions as well - has gone.

Divisive within the fanbase, and pointing clearly at the booming chart on his spreadsheet, Heck proved to be a bit of a character in his own way. And now, another one will replace him at the command of Villa's 'off-pitch' operations.

Here's the post-mortem.

The Good

• A 'modern' Villa Village - and North Stand

Villa are a better experience outside of the ground since Heck came in. A newly realised club shop, new ticketing offices, a pre-fab fan zone. These are all different levels of cool, the fan zone 'shed' being the lowest of the low, but at least it was new, and some liked it!

It's an improvement, but the bar was in hell. Still, credit where it's due.

The Warehouse could end up being a brilliant addition to Villa Park's footprint, and a decent venue for the city. We'll be waiting a while to step foot in the place, and then figure out exactly what it is and how it works outside of matchdays though.

Heck maximised resources at Villa Park, including North Stand plans that build around the existing structure. He showed promise when it came to the 'Villa Experience' at times.

• Decision-making

I mean, when Chris Heck had a decision to make, it was made. I guess that's a good thing?

• 'Record revenue'

The big figure is this. Villa's revenue grew by 27% during Chris Heck's reign, and it will skyrocket again this year. Villa have never, ever, ever, made as much money as they have during Heck's time in charge.

Which brings us to...

The Bad

• What was 'actually' him?

What does a CEO actually do? In my head, they lead with vision, and sign off on projects that are brought to them. They steer the ship. Make no bones about it, Heck was essentially Villa's CEO.

But for any income-helping decision that Villa made to transform their off-field revenue, it leapt further because of a few other things.

• Under Unai Emery, Villa have played in the UEFA Conference League and Champions League, meaning more Villa Park games, meaning more matchday revenue due to on-pitch success.
• Under Unai Emery, Villa have played and progressed in the UEFA Conference League and Champions League, earning increased TV revenue.
• Under Unai Emery, Villa have finished higher in the Premier League, earning increased prize money.

The Swiss Ramble notes that Villa expect to receive about £60m in revenue from being in, and progressing, through the Champions League league phase alone. From existing and competing in one competition. That's around triple the 22/23 matchday revenue total.

If I'm picturing 'the guy' who increased Villa's revenue, I feel like I'm picturing Unai Emery.

As for 'record-breaking' sponsorships, achieving a kit deal with Adidas doesn't seem that hard when your boss - Villa co-owner Nassef Sawiris - has a $3.3 billion stake in the company?

Realistically, it feels like everything done here could've been achieved anyway with or without a specific CEO/President of Business Ops? Was the North Stand improvement going ahead regardless? I mean, he's not mentioned here?

It might come out, with time.

• Carving up The Holte

The decision to carve up the Holte and charge a premium for what many would consider a standard 2020s concourse in The Terrace View might not have been Chris Heck's decision, but to not reverse it - like the other decisions he immediately killed - lost a lot of goodwill.

The only way you could ever consider The Terrace View a 'hospitality' experience is because it's better than the Holte End concourse. That's because, despite a lick of paint, the Holte End concourse is a complete shithole, because of the Terrace View's placement.

Holte-Enders lost the entire middle section of their existing concourse to accommodate The Terrace View which is completely segregated and walled off. Existing space, gone over a summer.

For a stand that was defined by flow, comradery and energy - it was tone deaf to strike up these walls, and close to idiotic to not bring them down. You'd just need to walk the Holte before-and-after as an exec to see what you'd done.

Taking away the Holte Suite was a bitter blow as well. It's that whole idea that bolt-ons and packages aren't just there to upgrade an experience, they are there to make the existing one shite, so you fancy the upgrade in the first-place.

• 'Tough decisions'

I've gone on and on and on about ticket prices, but Villa yanked them right up in 24/25.

What would've once been the 'cheap seats' in the rail seating in the Holte End being some of the most expensive is laughable, and the empty patches of hospitality seating are plain to see. Raking up the price of disabled parking was a bizarre mistake as well.

I get that the world is changing, but the ticketing prices, choices and mapping at the club is/are mad. It helps with generating the income that Villa need, acknowledged - but the difference between £50-55 quid tickets and £79-90 ones is a bit of a gulf for the average fan, and in reality, Villa can take the hit there, surely?

Heck knew they didn't have to, because they would sell out. It's basic stuff, really.

A club can, however, choose to not squeeze fans even more when the opportunity arises - and in the long run, that might make more business sense.

True power in that sense isn't claiming as much cash as possible, it's choosing the path of balance when you don't 'need' to.

Balance hasn't been Villa's strong suite under Heck. In fact, a lot of the revenue-building relied on taking the easiest decision possible. I think I could probably increase revenue at a football club doing well by dialing up ticket prices.

It's not particularly hard, or smart, to do so.

• This was utterly, utterly predictable

New York Red Bulls, Philadelphia 76'ers. In some spells , the same things were highlighted with Chris Heck - that it is, and always will be business first for him. To annoy Americans with your business decisions is a hard thing to do.

At NYRB, Heck 'alienated' fans with season ticket price hikes and blundered into own-goal errors, being called 'plain idiotic' for a scheduling choice. In Philadelphia, he seemed to be against an obvious nickname and annoyed with jersey choices.

Some of the critiques that would emerge about Heck at Villa, were right here. All along.

The Ugly

• The gossip

Whatever he was trying to achieve at Villa behind-the-scenes, he has come off as aggressive, commandeering, shock-and-awe, and unlikeable.

I mean, again, we saw this coming.

How about this from a Red Bulls insider?

“I don’t think people really comprehend how much damage he’s done in the little time he’s been there,” one team insider said. He added: “He just came off as arrogant and ignorant, and in this business it’s a very bad combination. He was so arrogant, you just couldn’t talk to him.

You might say that his job isn't to be liked. But why isn't it? Relationship-building in business and sports goes two ways. Not just one way.

• Income over everything

Hiking up disabled fan parking was the cherry on top of what started with grating ticket prices. Tearing into away allocations to make more money from GA+ followed.

Constant bits, here and there. Every single decision led back to a quick buck, and it was exhausting.

Yes, the job was to increase revenue, but not one bit of it was done with care, or any thought, other than to tweak the percentages.

That's shopkeeper stuff.

• Fan engagement, or complete lack of it

Heck made a lot of the right noises, but when evidence emerged regarding points of contention (matchday issues, ticket prices, etc), he was very quick to take things personal, blocking fans on social media who would critique him on basic, basic stuff.

Fair enough, if you're blocking someone for being a moron, but the criticism was the ball there to be won. Engage, get your point across, convince. None of that happened at Villa. I wish it had happened.

Even when the goal was wide open at Fan Advisory Boards, Heck didn't show. Didn't engage.

Villa under Heck were probably defined by this. A complete unwillingness to engage with the fanbase. It's not acceptable.

Heck is perhaps extremely lucky that Villa were playing well during his time at the club. If they weren't, he'd be compared to Tom Fox.

Both, who made choices that were anti-community.

• It didn't turn out the way he wanted it to - or maybe it did?

In an interview with Kevin Kinkead on Philadelphia sports blog Crossing Broad - last summer, Heck had a really good answer on revenue streams, and change in football:

CB: You worked here for a long time. Philadelphia is old school and traditional. Maybe not as old school as the Villa fan who has been standing in the Holte End for 30 years. But they’re traditionalists in the same way the Philly sports fan doesn’t want anything to change. I think that’s a concept that’s applicable everywhere. I say to Sixers and Eagles fans, if you want the team to have the best facilities, the best practice center, training setup, whatever, then yeah, money has to be part of that. If you want to be up there with the Yankees or Manchester City, or pick any high-spending team in any league, that just comes with the territory.

Heck: The magic is trying to find that where you’re not forcing people to change as much as you’re giving them options. And remember, the biggest difference in revenue generating in the Premier League vs. all U.S. sports is that we go global. They’re territory restricted in Philly, all of the teams. That’s it, what you see is what you get. But we control our merchandising. We just did the Adidas deal, which was a game changer. Now all of a sudden we’re in 120 countries, in stores. Before, we had a very underwhelming local brand, that couldn’t do anything. The revenue stream in that alone is through the roof. That’s a win for the fans and a win for the club. We have better gear, more stuff, we look cooler, our brand is cooler. Everything is better. That’s a good win for everybody. The other area we’re focused on is that we put a lot of money into completely changing all of our premium seating. It’s a big stadium and we have 5,000 premium seats, about half of which before were made up of suites. So we wiped them out and made restaurants, clubs, loge boxes, at all of these different price points. Some really cool things. We sold those in a much different fashion to generate a lot more money. Who does that affect? It affects the rich, so the common fan doesn’t get upset with that.

You can read the full interview here.

Looking back at this with hindsight, it's an ideal answer. There'd be options for Villa fans. We can leverage the global power of the league. We can get more out of people with bigger pockets.

Win. Win. Win.

What we have is that there are options for Villa fans, but the existing options were made poorer to create them. The 'global power' of the league was leveraged by essentially touting tickets with 3rd parties. We did get more out of people with bigger pockets, sure - but everyone was made to see the hole in their own if they wanted to follow the Villa.

Reading the above made me sad. It's almost perfect. I want to believe that what I've read there is the truth, and at the time, it might've been - but the reality is so much different.

Director of Football Ops Damian Vidagany, I think, proves that there is way to navigate the sewer of modern football. It's just about speaking plainly, clearly and thoughtfully in front of any decisions that have been made.

In a letter to Villa's Fan Advisory Board and wider fanbase attempting to whip up hype ahead of the pivotal clash with Newcastle United, Vidagany mentioned his appreciation up-front. And it felt genuine.

First, I would like to show how grateful we are to the supporters - from everyone at the club, the manager, the players, and the staff - for the European night atmospheres we had at VP. We know how hard it was for many people to get tickets… and pay for them.

You see that? Vidagany straight up mentions how hard it is for fans to get tickets, and how hard it is to pay for them. It's as subtle as a sledgehammer.

That's what we need going forward. Not mealy-mouthed hype, not cool one-liners, not making pals with the people who blindly stick up for you in the face of obvious and needed criticism. We need honesty. Transparency. Decency. We need someone who is going to own what they do, explain it without bullshit, and lead the club.

I think Heck, and this might be me, didn't seem genuine, and that's where it falls apart in the fanbase. All in all, you can't hate the player. You've gotta hate the game, but people like Vidagany show that it can be navigated, and that the bad things can be mentioned.

Even, if you're like the next person to take the role, you're the one making the decisions.

UTV