Nova - Guess the attendance

[CappinHard]

Re: Nova - Guess the attendance

So $7 was the tipping point between a "lock" and not going? mmmmKay.

Exactly. Must spread rep.

[jakejc795]

Re: Nova - Guess the attendance

Exactly. Must spread rep.

I'd definitely put myself in your camp, but I can also appreciate that people may have expenses/considerations I lack and/or they don't count Jacks games as one of their "vices." For me, spending time with family at Jacks games is tops among my favorite pastimes.

However, it would be disingenuous to say that a $10 price reduction per ticket wouldn't be welcome. Sorry, but saving $180 over the course of a season for three tickets isn't merely a drop in the bucket for me, and I have trouble believing that Admin. making such a concession to attract fans would risk bond default. Moreover, it allows them to position themselves as being receptive and considerate to both casual and avid fans' economic needs and interests.

[Southeast]

Re: Nova - Guess the attendance

Our casual fan base just isn't there. If there were "there" - $40 and cold weather wouldn't matter as much.

Our rivals up north have two things going for them. Much more rabid fan base and they play indoors this time of year. Although I worry if, theoretically speaking, SDSU was seeded higher than NDSU and we were playing this weekend's game at The Dana. There is a very good chance there would be more green and yellow in the stands than yellow and blue.

That is the second reason I'm glad the game is in Fargo. Watching our offense flounder in the cold is bad enough. Being outnumbered 2-1 in our own stadium while watching said floundering would be much worse!

The way I see it FCS football in general just has an extremely casual following in SD. My guess is that 3/4 of the sports fans in the state could not name four schools in the MVFC. Most probably assume USD and SDSU play football in the "Summit League". It's bigger than just an SDSU "problem" and it is going to take a lot of time (and winning) to change, if it ever does.

[MontanaRabbit]

Re: Nova - Guess the attendance

I'd definitely put myself in your camp, but I can also appreciate that people may have expenses/considerations I lack and/or they don't count Jacks games as one of their "vices." For me, spending time with family at Jacks games is tops among my favorite pastimes.

However, it would be disingenuous to say that a $10 price reduction per ticket wouldn't be welcome. Sorry, but saving $180 over the course of a season for three tickets isn't merely a drop in the bucket for me, and I have trouble believing that Admin. making such a concession to attract fans would risk bond default. Moreover, it allows them to position themselves as being receptive and considerate to both casual and avid fans' economic needs and interests.

I understand the price issue and to be honest the tickets seem fairly expensive. Lots and lots and lots of families that just can't afford to spend that kind of money on a football game. I just found it funny that $7 was a tipping point between a for sure I'm going to not going. To me that says attending the game just wasn't that high on the priority list. Nothing wrong with that.

[NorCalJack]

Re: Nova - Guess the attendance

Well my brother has 4 season tickets and ponied up for the playoff tickets. He usually takes my parents to the game but they did not want to sit in the cold weather. They all went to the MBB then they split up and Bro/Wife/2 friends went to game. Parents went to Cubbies to watch the game. My parents spoke to a lot of people and they said they would be at the game if it was indoors. Price was not the determining factor. They all met up again and went to the WBB game.

[HandoEX]

Re: Nova - Guess the attendance

Our casual fan base just isn't there. If there were "there" - $40 and cold weather wouldn't matter as much.

Our rivals up north have two things going for them. Much more rabid fan base and they play indoors this time of year. Although I worry if, theoretically speaking, SDSU was seeded higher than NDSU and we were playing this weekend's game at The Dana. There is a very good chance there would be more green and yellow in the stands than yellow and blue. Rabid fans tend to ignore the price and weather more than non-rabid fans. NDSU's rabid fan base > SDSU's rabid fan base.

Yes, I know...5 straight national championships will do that. The run of national championships they had in the 80s doesn't hurt either to build that base.

So - best thing we can do. Continue to support our really good team and get as many friends to come with you as you can to games like last weekend. We have to build our fan base one person at a time and the best way to do that is growing the small network of fans around you.

Let's also go out and get a win up north on Saturday.

Winning cures everything in athletics!!!!

Having a metro with 10x the population probably helps.

I'd like to see average attendance numbers at Dakota Field (DII) vs CAS/Dana (all-time). I bet those numbers were fairly similar.

[Nidaros]

Re: Nova - Guess the attendance

Let's hope they adapt and do not become over-reliant on the concept of elasticity at the expense of basic tenets of supply and demand

I don't think Christy and her staff think in terms of elasticity. I was being a smart aleck in bringing it up. The weather to me seems to have been a big factor. I don't ice fish nor go to football games in very cold weather anymore. Yeah I am a chicken. The weather forecasts were not what was predicted in that the temp was about 10 degrees less, and the snow flakes were not predicted that I recall. This is our first experience with a bye and no doubt we will learn from out mistakes. A twenty degree bump would have brought out the casual fan, but that's just my gut feeling.

[SF_Rabbit_Fan]

Re: Nova - Guess the attendance

So $7 was the tipping point between a "lock" and not going? mmmmKay.

I am telling you my reality. You are telling me my reality isn't possible because... it isn't the same as yours? Mmmmmkay.

It isn't much money, but a ticket close to $50 gave me pause. It factored into my decision.

This is exactly the tone deafness I was talking about earlier. You can't seem to fathom the idea that a $50 price tag could influence a 10 year season ticket holder's decision to attend a playoff game. The reality is, it did.

Punch down all you want, but it won't change that reality.

[Nidaros]

Re: Nova - Guess the attendance

I am telling you my reality. You are telling me my reality isn't possible because... it isn't the same as yours? Mmmmmkay.

It isn't much money, but a ticket close to $50 gave me pause. It factored into my decision.

This is exactly the tone deafness I was talking about earlier. You can't seem to fathom the idea that a $50 price tag could influence a 10 year season ticket holder's decision to attend a playoff game. The reality is, it did.

Punch down all you want, but it won't change that reality.

I don't doubt what you are saying for one second, and myself, I did not even try to find out prices. I had a feeling that football outside in December is not a good idea for old guy like me. I usually go through a cold and bronchitis by now but have been lucky so far.

[MontanaRabbit]

Re: Nova - Guess the attendance

I am telling you my reality. You are telling me my reality isn't possible because... it isn't the same as yours? Mmmmmkay.

It isn't much money, but a ticket close to $50 gave me pause. It factored into my decision.

This is exactly the tone deafness I was talking about earlier. You can't seem to fathom the idea that a $50 price tag could influence a 10 year season ticket holder's decision to attend a playoff game. The reality is, it did.

Punch down all you want, but it won't change that reality.

There were $37 tickets and you could have sat on the 50 yard line with them. Just saying.

[joeboo22]

Re: Nova - Guess the attendance

I'm sure there is more to the economic side of this.

if you lower it to $20 a ticket do you get twice as many to show up? In that weather? probably not.

As for the attendance. IDK, I thought they'd do better, but a cold day against an east coast team and that is what you will get.

[91jack]

Re: Nova - Guess the attendance

The financial reality is that if you can afford a $40 ticket, you can afford a $30 ticket. People that could afford season tickets, could afford playoff tickets. There are so many other reasons than cost that went into low attendance. Would it have been nice if tickets cost less? Sure, but there's no way we get 10k if the tickets were just $10 less. Another thing people don't take into account, there's not a bad seat in this stadium. The reason why NDSU is able to have $30 and $20 tickets is because they have bad seats (end zones, high corners). The students occupy the only bad seats in the house. The next worse seats are occupied by corporations, which is smart. Every ticket that the general public can buy is a sideline ticket, which is always the most expensive ticket in any stadium. The difference is, we don't have any "cheap seats", so it seems like tickets are really expensive because there aren't any less expensive options. All in all, quitchyerbitchin.

I don't think we needed 10k to show up to make the same money we made for this game. It would be more around 8,200. If you had that many people show up at $30 tickets, you would make $246,000. If you have 6,200 people attend the game at $40 tickets, you make $248,000. That is fairly close. On top of that, you make more money in concessions, parking, etc... It would look better to have more butts in the seats, too.
Weather that many of people would have shown up at the cheaper tickets is anybody's guess. I've heard that SDSU couldn't charge a cheaper price so this is all for nothing but it is interesting to see how people look at things.

[MontanaRabbit]

Re: Nova - Guess the attendance

I don't think we needed 10k to show up to make the same money we made for this game. It would be more around 8,200. If you had that many people show up at $30 tickets, you would make $246,000. If you have 6,200 people attend the game at $40 tickets, you make $248,000. That is fairly close. On top of that, you make more money in concessions, parking, etc... It would look better to have more butts in the seats, too.
Weather that many of people would have shown up at the cheaper tickets is anybody's guess. I've heard that SDSU couldn't charge a cheaper price so this is all for nothing but it is interesting to see how people look at things.

Here is the exact wording from the NCAA Pre-Championship Manual:

"There are no minimum ticket prices for first-round games. However, for the second round, quarterfinals and semifinals, the
host institutions shall not set ticket prices lower than the regular-season ticket prices."

This is a little ambiguous in that we had two games (Hobo Day and USD) that were priced higher than the rest of the games. It doesn't address that situation. We may never know if the prices could have been set lower.

Did the price influence attendance. I'm certain it did. To what extent I'm not sure. If they could have lowered the price would it have dramatically increased attendance? I think that's unlikely. Price is one of just many factors.

[OldHare]

Re: Nova - Guess the attendance

I'm sure there is more to the economic side of this.

if you lower it to $20 a ticket do you get twice as many to show up? In that weather? probably not.

As for the attendance. IDK, I thought they'd do better, but a cold day against an east coast team and that is what you will get.

The week before Villanova hosted the first round game on the edge of Philadelphia with 50 degree weather and 2089 fans attended that game.

[Carolina010]

Re: Nova - Guess the attendance

I've read through this whole thread and have wanted to post what I was thinking but didn't how to phrase it. All the complaining about the poor turnout because of the price is ridiculous. What number would people have been ok with? 8000? 10000? 12000?Was the price a little high? Probably. I think everyone somewhat agrees that it was maybe a little high and I understand that everyone's financial situation is different. But I also think it is about priorities and obviously everyone has different ones and has things that are important to them and would do it at any cost. This is something that I personally would have spend more than $50 to attend if I had to. I have family members that think that is dumb and expensive and a waste of time. But that doesn't mean it is to me and obviously the 6000 other people that were there.

Do people actually think that if they were $10 cheaper or even $15 - $20 cheaper that 2000-6000 more people would have showed up.

I guess what I am trying to say is ya the price was maybe a little high but you cant tell me you have never spent more than $50 to do something you really wanted to do. And I also understand that people with families are spending close to $200 to get in and that is kind of expensive, but for the 17,730 people that went to the Hobo day game, it wasn't too expensive then.