UKC

Doesn’t seem plausible?

https://www.ukclimbing.com/forums/premier_posts/abc_non_exec_director_wante...

I haven't seen the research but that figure might include one off sessions like kids parties.

No

It doesn't say that, though. It says "1 million individuals made more than 6 million visits to indoor climbing walls in the UK."

That's going to include a lot of people who went once and never again.

https://www.ukclimbing.com/articles/features/social_climbers_-_the_evolving... quotes ABC as saying "around 1 million people currently climb independently indoors in the UK, including about 100,000 regulars."

Yes what they say is very plausible. Some reasons why:

Its based on their research!

There are 85, 000 BMC members including only a very tiny minority of all who have climbed indoors.

Many millions of kids for whom indoor climbing at least one must now be getting close to normal.

Individual numbers on databases on walls is often close to or into the tens of thousands. There are several hundred walls

Only a very tiny minority of BMC members have climbed indoors? That sounds unlikely. What's that claim based upon?

I don't think that is what was written. Although what was written was not very clear. If I understand correctly:

The BMC has 85,000 members, and they only make up a very small proportion of the total number of people who visit climbing walls.

Is perhaps slightly clearer?

Cheers... I was trying to provide a realistic indication of a lower limit and maybe should have explained more how BMC member numbers help on this.

Not all BMC members clinb ( a sizable minority don't.. hill walkers who don't scramble) and not all BMC climbers climb indoors (a minority of climbing BMC members don't) but of all regular indoor climbers, BMC members are a smallish minority. So the numbers of active regular indoor climbers has to be well into the hundreds of thousands. Add in all the single and occasional use kids and adults indoors (the majority of most of the wall databases)  and you have to be around a million.

I wonder if they've just got the figures for each wall and added them together, without taking into account those who go to more than 1 wall.

As an example my club goes to THREE different walls regularly, and numerous individuals go to 2 or 3 others occasionally.

Easy to bump up the figures if they want to.

Yet most registered wall users are one time or very occasional indoor climbers. What you are thinking of only really applies to a much smaller number of indoor regulars. Arguing something isn't approximately 1,000, 000 because its actually, say closer to 900,000, is a bit silly.

What I am suggesting is that MANY people go to more than 1 wall. Where I live there are 3 walls within cycling distance of each other, so I'd be surprised if people didn't go to at least 2. In Sheffield, Bristol, London, etc. there's more than 1 wall, so again I'd be very surprised if an awful lot of NON-BMC  people went to more than 1 wall.

Basically there's lies, damn lies, and statistics. Considering the desire of any Olympic Sport (which indoor climbing has now sadly - in my view - become) to big up their figures to obtain more funding, I'd be shocked if these figures weren't (grossly ?) inflated as well.

We are talking around 3000 independant members registered per wall on average and most of them probably occasional or one-use visitors. If you think that's the ABC massively exaggerating I can only conclude you must never talk to anyone running these walls. There are some walls getting this number annually in school kid group visits alone.

Its not unfeasible at all. The 1 million will include 1 off visitors, but that doesn't make the statistic false.

6 million is, I suspect a severe understatement for total annual visits. There are 155 walls listed as members. 6 million visits per year across that many walls only gives 106 visits per wall per day, and there are many walls that are not abc members.

I would have thought most regular users doing 2 or 3 times a week in winter, many in summer too, are on a monthly / annual subscription deal, so they are more or less committed to using just one wall, even when there's a choice of 3 or 4, unless your one of those jammy people who got a move GB deal for 2 walls when it was a decent deal.

I occasionally do another wall on PAYG, but can't afford 2 memberships.

No they de-dupe where possible. Of course fred99 of S1 1AA might have moved and become fred99 of LS1 1AA

Graeme, is it possible to share the stats for the Works? I know this would be atypical, but would be interesting.

I think I signed up to two walls with different variations on my name, being 'Phil' and 'Philip' therefore I probably account for two. Not that I've been indoor for a bloody long time, mind.

Paul, over 57,000 numbers issued. Obviously some (a couple of dozen) are used for admin tasks and there will be some duplicates caused by bad handwriting! But safe to say at least 55,000 unique peeps have registered. And that doesn't count signed in guests or people on courses etc.

We are changing to Rock Gym Pro soon so that will give us an idea of how many dormant numbers there are on our system.

The research was outsourced. The ABC believed an independent assessment would best sift the data; and were aware that a number of member Walls consider their user numbers as commercially sensitive data and would be reluctant to reveal these to an in-house survey. The survey was commissioned through genuine interest; but when the results were delivered it highlighted how fast the indoor climbing market is growing; and equally how the BMC has failed to engage with the huge increase in those participating in climbing.

IIRC the BMC has about 85000 members and 33000 would consider themselves primarily climbers. This number has not significantly increased in the last few years; whilst individuals using climbing walls is measured in the hundred of thousands. There are probably more climbers indoors of an evening in London Walls than climbing outdoors across the whole UK. The Walls don't need funding because they are (in the main) successful commercial operations. The Olympics will act as a nice advert for indoor climbing, bringing some new users through the door; but that's about it.