I think that attendances are down because prices are too high. A few years ago people would come to the games and pay ?20 because SPL football was exciting and new. Now that we have been here for a few seasons that isn't really the case - SPL football in Inverness is routine. Also, given that we have less money for wages than most of the other clubs in the SPL and the dire financial consequences of being relegated from the SPL, we have to play a different sort of football to what we were used to in the SFL. Thus we have football that, while it's of a decent quality compared to what we used to watch in the SFL, isn't exciting and can be frustrating. I don't think it's surprising that fewer people are willing to pay for that.
I think that if we went on a great run and were in the top six crowds would be decent. Perhaps if we were fighting relegation they might also pick up, particularly towards the end of a campaign. If we are going to push into the top six then we'd need to spend money and that would mean either going into debt or attracting investment (which in football terms often mean the same thing, hello Hearts, Gretna, Dundee). Going into debt is not a something that we should follow as a model - we simply aren't a big enough club to countenance 'spending to accumulate'. Few clubs in Scotland are, even Rangers are feeling the financial pinch of having to spend to compete. Attracting investment is difficult as basically you are asking to someone to hand over money and expect no return. There are very few people like that. In most cases it falls flat.
Ideas like building a pub at the ground, building a club shop or securing a city centre retail outlet are all well and good but they require big initial investments and we simply aren't in a position to do that. When it comes down to it, can we afford to throw a couple of hundred grand at building a permanent club shop? Wouldn't that money be better spent on players? How much extra value would we get out of a club shop, how long would it take us to get the money back? Are there really lots and lots of potential customers of our club shop who we are missing out on due to it being the way it is?
I haven't read all of this thread, so apologies if these points have all been made.