Presentation of FC Barcelona Supporters' Club Project

The FC Barcelona Board of Directors made use of the Penyes Festival to present its new project for the official supporters' clubs, which reaffirms its dedication to the movement and its intention to maintain a closer relationship with the fans and supporters' clubs from all over the world.

The fundamental objective of this new project is to revitalise and foster a more modern movement that affects more than 160,000 people and which brings benefits to the club. The idea is to shift from "What Barça can do for the Penyes to what the Penyes can do for Barça", applying a new management model and relationship without intermediaries between Penyes and the club, ensuring a model that is more transparent and fairer.

In order to develop all the changes that will enrich the relationship between the club and its supporters, as well as empowering Penyes to become true ambassadors of FC Barcelona in their regions, three core areas, or 'levers', have been taken into account, that will guide the entire project: Belonging, Recognition and Community.

Belonging

The first of these is that of Belonging, where the goal is to achieve a more integrated supporters movement with FC Barcelona and its members, moving from pyramidal to a circular form of communication between club, members and Penyes, thus fostering more dialogue direct between all involved.

In order to do so, it will be essential for FC Barcelona to prepare a census of Pneya members, just as there has traditionally been a census of its official Penyes, which has allowed them to obtain so many benefits from the club.

During the 2022/2023 season, FC Barcelona will launch a new platform to prepare this census, where supporters club members will be able to enter their details directly, ​​which will ensure proper processing and use. This census will serve to reduce fraud, to provide benefits to all Penya members (discounts on official products, tickets for matches, participation in Barça events, etc.) and also to ensure standardised communication with all members of the Penya community. But it will always be the club that will confirm who is part of the group and who is not, i.e. which Penyes are officially recognised, and which will validate the different requests received from its members, thus ensuring more streamlined management without losing any of the core components.

Recognition and Community

The main raison d'être of the Penyes is to promote the club around the world and the club wants to recognise and reward this commitment. To do so, FC Barcelona has modified the requirements to become an official Penya by applying certain standards. All Penyes must have a street level clubhouse, a minimum number of members, a TV screen to show FC Barcelona games, and so on. Official supporters' clubs will receive a certificate from the club to attest their official status, which must be displayed in a visible location so FC Barcelona members and fans can recognise it as such.

In order to obtain this certificate, Penyes will be attributed credentials based on the number of Barça members who are registered in the system, the actions and activities they perform, their attendance of matches, and, ultimately, their involvement with Barça and its teams The maximum distinction that a club can achieve is that of a 5 Star Penya.

Via this recognition, the club will be able to reward certain Penyes with more visibility on its official channels and offer it greater benefits. In other words, the more committed a Penya is to FC Barcelona, the more committed FC Barcelona will be to the Penya.

The third lever, Community, aims to take the movement worldwide, growing it on an international scale and so that the clubs closest to Barcelona also have an impact outside of their local communities. FC Barcelona will also be encouraging interrelationships between its Penyes so that they become a true supporter community that is more connected, more united and stronger.