Season 2. It is upon us. Saint Louis FC is back this summer to unite us once again in our love of the beautiful game and our quest for fun. Thank you to everyone that made 2015 so special and welcome to the new people that plan on joining us for the 2016 USL season. Longtime soccer fans will know that the scarf is an essential piece of kit you need to stand at the game. Newer soccer fans may wonder why in the hell would I need a scarf in St. Louis in July? That’s actually a good question. In European countries where they play a winter schedule those scarves keep your neck nice and warm. Over here we tend to wave them proudly or hold them up to salute our team. Also they’re nice to have and trade with other fans on road trips. Some just hang them up in their office or home. Whatever you end up doing with it- trust me, you’ll want a scarf.
This year’s scarf has a revolutionary theme. Inspiration for the design was taken from propaganda posters and we encourage you to use your scarf as a way to convert the masses of people to come out and support our local team. Anyone who’s a soccer fan or likes to have fun is our target demographic. Please do not bring people that don’t like to have fun- they will be miserable. Our scarves have a tendency to be a little SiLLy! Kind of like our membership. We don’t take ourselves seriously but we do take our soccer seriously. DANCE WITH SOMEBODY. If you were in the corner last year you know what it means. There comes a time in every game when our Drum Corps breaks loose a funky beat and the groove demands you dance. It’s at this point that Whitney Houston’s spirit takes possession of section 8 and we break out in song. Seriously, you have to be there- it’s involuntary. If this all sounds ridiculous, it is. Just come out to Soccer Park this summer to witness the glee. It’s like a Chupacabra, you have to see it to believe it.
Ok. You’re probably convinced by now that you NEED a new scarf and you want the latest and greatest from the Louligan Design Hive Mind. Well getting one is really quite easy. You need to PayPal $15 for each scarf you want to treasury@stlouligans.com. $15 is our pre-order discounted price. The deadline to pre-order is February 2nd. After February 2nd the price goes up to $20. So, if you help us out by buying early you save $5. We ask that you use PayPal because it provides us an easy way to keep track of who’s ordered and how many scarves they’ve ordered. Also we can quickly and easily transfer that money to our friends at Global Scarves so they can start knitting in time to get the scarves to us before the season kicks off.
If you live outside of the St. Louis Metro Area and wish to purchase a scarf, add $5 to your order total and PayPal that amount to us. Please include your shipping address in the comments. PLEASE- do not mail order if you live in our area. We want you to come to the games and hang out with us in person. Don’t be shy.
Now that you know how to buy a scarf you need to know how to get that scarf. We will have a preseason meeting. Formally we call it the AGM (Annual General Meeting). At the AGM we will discuss business for the upcoming season. We’ll be joined by members of the front office of Saint Louis FC and perhaps a few players at this meeting. It’s a time for you to ask anything about the Louligans or our relationship with STLFC. It’s also a good excuse to get together and have a few beers and get to know some of the the new people that plan on joining us for the season. The AGM will be the first delivery of scarves. Show up that day and pick yours up. If you can’t make the AGM then any event we have (including all games) you can pick yours up. If you live outside of St. Louis and placed a scarf order to be shipped we’ll mail it out after the AGM. Locals get theirs first. The AGM will be sometime in the month of March at iTap Soulard. We will announce it on Facebook and Twitter when we have a definitive date & time.
The last point I’ll address is what we do with all the filthy money money you send us. Obviously we’ll pay to have the scarves made. But I won’t lie- we do make a little extra. The St. Louligans have never charged membership dues. It’s cool that other groups do, but we don’t. Everyone that shows up can claim membership. Most groups give their members a scarf when they become members. We just separate the two. The extra money we make from scarves goes to a variety of things: tailgate “supplies”, paint and materials for Tifos, the cost of maintaining our website, podcasting equipment, free scarves for badass kids, beer buckets for our Players of the Game, drum repair, paying off my new car… you know, essentials for making this whole thing work.
I hope you’re all as excited as I am for the upcoming season. Last year we sold over 400 scarves. This year we’re starting with 500 and I think we’ll easily surpass that mark. We do have a very limited number of last year’s scarf. We’ll have those at events while supplies last, but once they’re gone we won’t order any more. If you have any questions about the scarf or anything related to the Louligans, please contact us at info@stlouligans.com.
Thanks for your time and we’ll #SeeYouAtThePark #AllFleurOne #ThisIsSiLLy #TooManyHashtags #MissYouDad #PWICB #MILYB
