RFU considers England ticket prices after Women’s Six Nations grand slam success

The Rugby Football Union (RFU) could review its pricing strategy for England fixtures as interest continues to swell after another dominant Women’s Six Nations campaign.

John Mitchell’s side beat France in Bordeaux to secure a sixth successive title having not lost since 2018 in the championship.

Their strides on the pitch have been matched by progress off it, with a record attendance for a fixture outside of Twickenham recorded for the game against Wales at Ashton Gate, and just short of 50,000 fans watching the thrashing of Ireland at the home of English rugby.

A “small profit” was made on the round four clash with Ireland and the Red Roses are set to return to the Twickenham turf in September for one of two scheduled WXV warm-up games.

With the programme on track to break even in 2028 or 2029 and a home World Cup on the horizon, the RFU are contemplating the next steps to continue driving the side and revenues on.

“At the moment, the gap between the average price for a ticket for a women’s match at Twickenham and a men’s match is massive,” said chief executive Bill Sweeney. “It’s a huge gap.

“I think we’ve probably priced [them] too cheaply at the moment, but we want to keep the fans coming in and we want them to enjoy that experience. I’m not saying we’re looking at a price increase but it is pretty low at the moment.

“I mean it was fantastic to get nearly 50,000 at Twickenham for the Ireland game. At the moment it’s about growing awareness, getting more fans in, growing the game so certain decisions will be made around that as the priority rather than purely maximising the financial side.

“The reason we can’t take the men’s team around the country is because the financial hit to us is massive. We have the stadium which costs a lot of money and we need to leverage that and make sure we get the right return at the moment. One of the WXV warm-up matches is being played at Twickenham but we want to take the other one around the country.”

The cheapest adult ticket for the men’s fixture against New Zealand in November will cost £99, but a family of four could have paid just £50 to attend the Red Roses’ encounter with Ireland, with a younger, more diverse audience watching on.

A world record 58,498 crowd were at Twickenham for the grand slam decider with France in 2023, with selling out the final next year an achievable goal, particularly with England embracing a more expansive, entertaining style.

While their monopoly on the Women’s Six Nations could pose commercial problems for the tournament, Sweeney has been encouraged by the interest in the Red Roses from a sponsorship point of view, even if the team remain without bespoke partners.

A World Cup on home soil next summer that England will begin as major favourites should accelerate growth, with the RFU having communicated closely with the Football Association (FA) in recent years to try and learn from the success of the Lionesses.

“I think what the Red Roses are doing, the way the players connect with the fans, the way people see them go about their business, has really struck a nerve somewhere,” Sweeney explained. “People can identify with that.

“They are great role models and they are aspirational. I think they just create so many young fans who want to emulate the, you see that filtering into the community game. It’s good for rugby overall. It’s not just the women’s investment, but it’s good for the men’s game.

“There’s a number of commercial discussions we’re having at the moment and the women’s game, and the Red Roses in particular, is always in that conversation. We know that the men’s team generates 85% of the revenues of Twickenham so the numbers are bigger, but it never feels as if it’s ‘women are the afterthought’ or ‘that needs to be a bolt-on’.

“Long-term we believe it’s going to more than break even, eventually. We see tremendous growth in the women’s game, you see it in women’s sport in general, and it’s good for rugby overall as a sport.”

With the RFU’s airline partner British Airways not chartering a flight, the England squad flew home with easyJet early on Sunday morning, though Sweeney insisted the decision was not financially motivated: “They’ve been in the competition for a long time, and the BA flight was in the evening and easyJet flight was in the morning. It was their choice.”