CEO Festive Remarks 2022

Chief Executive, Steven Ferguson gives us his 2022 remarks with the year drawing to a close:

Firstly, I would like to wish you all a very Merry Christmas and hope you have a prosperous 2023.

This year has certainly been a memorable one for our club clinching only our third ever top six finish in the Scottish Premiership. This season we compete in arguably one of, if not the, hardest Premierships there has been in a number of years. To be competitive at this level it requires a lot of things to fall in to place and I am grateful to all of our staff for enabling us to continue our journey in the top tier for the 10th season in the last 11.

In 2022, we rolled out our new internal club strategy which was a monumental moment for our club. This has enabled us to bring everybody together including our players to showcase what we want the next period of our journey to look like and how we will achieve this. To have this strategy in place will now give each of our departmental leads the opportunity to succeed with their teams and continue to see our club exceed expectations.

2022, has been a vital year for the commercial side of the football club and I would like to thank each member of the commercial team for their commitment, dedication and willingness to exceed expectations across the year. On the back of COVID, it has been a real challenge to get the commercial department back on a level-footing but through hard-work, innovation and collaborative thinking, we have managed to bring back all commercial areas of the club. We are no different to any other organisation and have had to be creative in finding ways to make the football club sustainable with the real challenges facing us in 2022. We will continue to face these challenges head on and strive to find ways to best protect the football club against big challenges such as the cost of living crisis and surging energy prices. In addition, the operational requirements of handling fixtures against the Old Firm here in Dingwall has become even tougher but by listening and working with our own supporters we have managed to make some real progress in managing these fixtures when they come around.

Over the past couple of months we have seen record half season ticket sales, the introduction of a new online shop, our new kit for 2022/23 and Christmas campaign launches- as well as initiatives to save supporters money during these challenging times. We are excited to continue our positive relationship with key partners such as Joma, who have again produced kits that have seen us exceed projected retail sales and we go in to 2023 with positive excitement rather than optimistic adrenaline.

Our Academy has also continued to develop across 2022. We have been very fortunate to add Gary Warren to the staff as he leads the Head of Professional Development role which sees Under 18’s football combined with education. Again, for our club to continue to compete in a national games programme doesn’t happen by luck, it takes real commitment, endeavour and determination from staff, players and parents to make this happen. It must be noted the success of Academy Graduate Dylan Smith who has claimed International recognition in recent months being a part of competitive Scotland youth squads in big matches, Dylan serves as a great example of what can be achieved in our academy.

Our community department has also started to transition to the foundation which has already lead to some really positive work. This work will be delivered by our four community staff under the Management of Dale Pryde-MacDonald and we are all very excited to see what the future holds for the foundation. The Foundation also launched its 2022-2025 strategy earlier this year which will give everybody a clear and identifiable direction of travel for what the foundation wants to achieve in the next three years.

My thanks to our board and Chairman, Roy MacGregor. Without the consistent support, encouragement and passion from our board and Chairman this club would not be able to keep hitting the highs and punching above our weight on all fronts. On behalf of myself and all of the staff, thank you.

Finally, to our supporters. Hopefully across 2022 we have given you a lot to feel positive about. For the club to continue performing in the Premiership we need each and every supporter on board and we have been overwhelmed with some of the support we have had this year. It is important that we continue to build on that support and become stronger, more together and build on the strong foundations that have been set here over a long period of time. Together we can achieve more!

Merry Christmas

Steven Ferguson