The Lexu$ Centre, has it enriched the club?

[Clement]

Joffa

No one is doubting the good things around the club. They are just asking for a decent meal and a good place to come to when they visit the Lexus Centre.
It is not just me but the wealth of opinion of fellow Collingwood members and supporters on this site.
The quality of the social areas at Victoria Park has not been replicated at the Lexus Taj Mahal and this is a big issue for a number of the people you call friends.
We talk about go forward but the only area that we, as a club, have gone backwards is looking after social club members and people generally visiting the Lexus Centre.
Now if there are plans to improve the facilities and dining area, that is fine but it would be nice to see them. At the moment they are about as real as the Lockness Monster.
The Collingwood football club is the social club members and supporters and they deserve the best.
I like a beer like most people. Before and after the game, I would like to be able to hear the person next to me that I talk to and the Lexus Taj Mahal doesn't provide that for us social club members and supporters at a moment. it is a shame because if it did, I reckon you might get 10 thousand back there after a game. Imagine the $$$$ that could produce for the money men who control our club.

[joffa corfe]

[Johnson#26]

[Neil Appleby]

I thought Eddie asked us for our opinions months ago yes? Guess he'll work on them over summer.
But why all the bitching?
I've only been to Lexus twice to buy merchandise and found it a good location and a good shop. Couldn't find any cafe or restaurant but maybe I didn't look hard enough.
Drove passed on Saturday on way to Sofitel to park car and there were people eating and drinking in the courtyard overlooking the Yarra, now that's a pretty prime location with a great view.....they just need to work on it a bit.

As for Vic Park.........can we please move on?
My old mum sold our family home last year; lots of memories still there for me.........I drove passed the other day and remember fondly, as I do Vic Park.

Vic Park has forty years of memories for me including the 1990 premiership party, but we needed to move on.

Our players enjoy the best facilities in the league and I suspect our administrators do too.

As for the cafe/restaurant, who ever remembers a great meal at Vic Park anyway?
I ate there plenty of times and it was always just pub grub but without the pub atmosphere.

Who wants to eat at the Lexus centre anyway? Not me.
And plenty of Pie People were eating at other spots last week. The Cellar Bar at Florentino's was full of Magpies. So were the cafes in the Sofitel both before and after the game.

I went to Pellegrini's for great spag bol and Melbourne's best coffee for under $15. Why would I go to the G or Lexus Centre and pay twice the price for rubbish?

The Lexus Centre is a great home for the Pies.........and for supporters after a premiership or big Collingwood occassion, what's wrong with a return to the spiritual home? Vic Park will be packed with Pies again shortly.

Time to let go of this mouldy, smelly old bone I think Tess.

[Clement]

Sounds like you are quite the gastrinomical food connoisseur mate. I bet you like your beers from a small bottle with a twist of lemon too. You should write a good food guide for Melbourne in French, German, Sweedish, Russian and Spanish so that everyone around the world knows how good we have it down in little ol Melbourne town.

Maybe you should blog here with your lefty mates.

foodconn.blogspot.com/

For me, seeing the 4 premiership cups form 1927–1930 in the foyer of the Lexus Taj Mahal is great but I would rather see a decent sized juicy hunk of steak hit my plate when I order a meal.

If the Lexus Centre sold decent nosh, the people would come home and be all together like they should be and the money would fill the coffers of the Pies as it should.

The Lexus Centre currently turns over about $1 million a year on food and beverages. Well if they had decent facilites, they would turnover $4 millionstraight into the revenue line of the greatest football club in the world. You do the math.

Will you go to "Pellegrini's" if we win the Premiership with all your toffy mates drinking lattes? I'll go to the Lexus Centre with the "Real" Pies supporters to salute the boys at what is meant to be our new Mecca.

[Neil Appleby]

A bowl of Spag Bol and a coffee hardly makes me a foodie and I have never heard of that site you quoted. Do you visit it often?

I and plenty of others went elsewhere for our pre game lunch.
Footy clubs never have provided decent food and they never will.

Lexus is not meant to be the David Jones foodhall.

[Clement]

It's meant to be our home mate. It is meant to cater for the social club members who are virtually giving a donation because there are no real facilities at the Lexus. It is meant to be big enough to hold everyone. Every dollar you spend on food away from the Lexus is a dollar that could be spent to help support your football club.

You said you haven't even been into the cafe. Doesn't sound like you are much of a supporter! Too busy getting up your corporate mates.

Lexus could be the grandest supporter base in Australia. We keep on saying we want to be the Manchester United of the AFL. Well i have been to Old Trafford and let me say, the facilities for the fans there are supercharged and it just reverberates through the whole club. People don't just go to the home games; they live the Manchester United experience. This includes eating at a fantastic restaurant/bar area that is just heaving and thriving with the lifeblood of the club, the supporters. Everybody stays together. You wouldn’t hear Manchester United fans say “Lets go up to central Manchester, I hear they have a lovely Spag Bog up there!” Sheesh.

Until we can match that experience at the Lexus Taj Mahal, then we are not meeting one of our key "Business Plan" criteria.

[Proud Pies]

[HAL]

Only temporarily.

[Cam]

I still have my first car. A Maroon HQ. Ah the memories.. but the bastard was hard to steer and cost me an arm and a leg to keep moving.

I drive a Black VS now, its more modern, but now my missus bought me Magpie plates its my dream car. It's not perfect, and I've only had it 3/4 years, but I have quickly grown to love it.

The HQ is still in a shed, I visit it now and again, have shown my kids.. but I can't afford to get it back on the road and well, its better that I don't.. It doesn't spoil the memories.

[Piethagoras' Theorem]

lol, Hal could be on the money.


Cam, love the HQ

[HAL]

Tell me about your likes and dislikes?

[Neil Appleby]

Why is it that the internet has created a breed of inhabitants who think they can be as rude as they like whenever they like?

Not sure how old you are 'Clement' but your writing suggests mid-late teens.

Not much of a supporter eh? Well I hardly need to justify my passions here especially to such a rude fellow as you.

Needless to say, my return to Melbourne allows one game a year and I like to plan it well in advance so as to enjoy every part of it. Lunch at Pellegrini's is an institution for me..been going there 30 years and it's hardly the 'foodie' trendy place you imply.

Your views on Collingwood and its history and its current status are appreciated; your rudeness and dismissive arrogance are not.

[die4pies]

[die4pies]

What disturbs me the most about all this is how Lexus appear to be almost embarrassed (?) to be associated with the Collingwood Football Club.

www.lexuscentre.com.au/lexus.html

Where is the co-branding?

In all of the gallery photos significant Collingwood FC pictures and logos appear to be deliberately out of shot. Hmmmmm.


Perhaps I can help with a new moto:

Lexu$, taking The Magpies for a ride.