What would Chris Snowdon say?
Thursday, May 21, 2015 at 20:06 What would Chris Snowdon, a Middlesbrough fan, think of it?
It was reported yesterday that:
Wembley officials have apologised to Middlesbrough fans for misspelling their team's name on tickets for the Championship play-off final. Tickets for Monday's game with Norwich called the club 'Middlesborough'.
It's easily done. I've done it myself.
Years ago I edited a magazine for chartered accountants. I had no interest or expertise in accountancy so most of the articles were of a general business nature.
To lighten things up I slipped in a regular feature called 'Money Talks' which gave me the excuse to interview well-known people on the subject of, er, money.
Subjects included Gyles Brandreth, Sir Clive Sinclair, Jeffrey Bernard and (whisper it) Jimmy Savile.
Ironically the publishing company lurched from one financial crisis to another which meant advertising always took precedence over editorial.
In a desperate attempt to generate income the sales team approached local councils and chambers of commerce in the hope they would pay us to produce a 24-page supplement about their town or city.
I remember doing one on Manchester. And another on Middlesbrough.
When the Middlesbrough supplement was delivered to our office in south London it's fair to say no-one broke sweat in a rush to read it.
In fact, until a fateful phone call two days later, we were totally oblivious of the fact that the town had been spelled 'Middlesborough' on every page including, would you believe, the cover.
But here's the amazing thing. Even though it cost the company thousands of pounds in lost revenue our young MD never once shouted the odds or held anyone to account.
Even the sales team, with whom the editorial staff had a love-hate relationship, found it amusing.
What could have been the most embarrassing day of my career ended with drinks all round and the MD laughing ruefully at our costly error.
And for that I am eternally grateful.
See Wembley sorry for misspelling Middlesbrough play-off tickets (BBC News).
Update: Chris is not a "native of Middlesbrough", as I originally suggested, merely a fan of the team.
My mistake. Again.
Trust me, this is the last time I will ever write about the place.
Reader Comments (1)
Easily done. That's what you get for calling yourselves The Boro.
(Quite a few miles from being a true smoggie, but a fan nevertheless).