To put this into stark perspective, as I gather San Jose had 4,000 season ticket holders in 2012. Not sure about last year. It seems possible that in 2014 SRFC will have more season ticket holders than the Quakes.
Wow this is great news. With 6000 season tickets sold in an 8000 seat venue, that will make individual game tickets a hot commodity, especially of STH have priority purchasing individual game tickets as well. Almost with the stadium was more like 10k if they sell this much.
It's better to sell out every game. That sows the seeds for building a bigger, permanent -- MLS ready -- stadium.
More numbers on the San Jose comparison, this time from Grant Wahl. He reports that San Jose sold : "5,000 in 2014, up from 4,500 in 2013." If SRFC hits 6,000 as they say they expect, then I really think it's game on for Sacramento's MLS ambitions. Hell, if they "disappoint" and merely surpass 5,000, I'm going to say the same thing. If SRFC can get those sorts of numbers for a minor league team, then I think you can start to make the serious argument that Sacramento, and not San Jose is the strongest soccer market in Northern California.
I think SJ wants the season tickets at the 5k range, thats why they dont market it that much. If you want to build a fan base, you have to have seats for new fans. Plus you have to take into account that its SJ's last season at the crappy stadium and people will want to save their money for the new stadium. We should wait and see what the season tickets for Sac is next year if they fail to win a trophy. To me that will be the true indicator of where they are at.
There's no need to defend San Jose. Most of us here rooting for the Republic are also Quake fans. Sac's STH sales are pacing quite a few MLS teams. With that being said, 5k STH for the Quakes is shitty, esp in a market like the Bay Area. Most pro sports teams shoot for ~3/4 capacity for STH sales. SJQs were just as bad last year and the year before for STH as well. So it's not just due to the new stadium. In fact, the new stadium is probably the reason STH went up this year. This just reinforces what a lot of people think about SJs front office and their advertisement/ promotion of the team (which sucks). I hope the Quakes hit advertising hard when the new stadium comes online. They SHOULD have ~12k+ STH in the new joint.
If you look at what Portland ans SKC are doing you can see that Portland caps its STH to 15,300 which leaves about 5,138 tickets available each match. SKC caps its STH at 14,000 which leaves about 4,467 tickets available each match. The difference between these teams and SJ being that we only have 10k capacity, so obviously the STH will have to be around 5k to keep the 5k tickets available to grow the fan base like these good teams FO's are doing. Dont get me wrong, Sac is doing a good job, but you cant really compare a brand new team in a new stadium to a team about to move out of a shitty stadium. Great to see a D3 club doing well, its good for American soccer.
Season ticket sales reportedly up to 4,800... http://www.bizjournals.com/sacramento/news/2014/03/18/work-begins-on-soccer-stadium.html
5,000.. that is a great benchmark to hit. I think that is the most in USL Pro. So, at least 5,000 seats in an 8,000 seat stadium will be automatically filled, leaving less than 3,000 for single game purchases, which STHs have priority for as well. I'm hoping Cal Expo is packed!
I'll be missing the first two games at the new stadium. I can't complain though, I'll be in Europe during the first game and going to a friends wedding during the second game.
Wow, 5k season tickets are great. It is literally money in the bank. Bad weather, poor performance the week before, in a bad streak of games. You still have the ticket revenue for 5k for that game. And a something most people done take in consideration. At different times in the season, you might have a couple of weeks with no home games. No home games means no ticket revenue that week. This helps you get through those lean times of reduced revenue.
Picked up my season tickets today. They are at 5200+ STH, and are still anticipating close to 6K. On a related note, they are at 11,000+ tickets for the home opener.
Picked up one today too. First time seeing their headquarters, cool spot off of Broadway, used to be my stomping grounds a few years ago. Lots of people there, and lots of staff. I resisted buying a beer glass, but I know I will eventually Well they are giving every season ticket holder free tickets to the three first games at Hughes, so that's doubling the number right there. I really hope we get 20k there opening night. It's going to be a logistical and traffic nightmare, but will be good if people show up an hour or two earlier like they're hoping.
I saw somewhere that the attendance record for a regular season game was just under 12,000 for Minnesota & Milwaukee back in the 90's.
We are going to crush that on Saturday.... Upset I have to miss the game though. Have a wedding that day which I'm one of the groomsmen. My tickets are going to worthy people though!
Picked up my tickets, two shirts, a hat for my dad and a pin. I'm trying to figure out the traffic situation as I'll be driving in from Folsom. I'll probably try to show up as earlier as possible.
My source for this, plus 2013 attendance figures for USL from the blog of Big Soccer member kenntomasch ... http://www.kenn.com/the_blog/?tag=usl-pro
That's awesome. 5500 guaranteed at the new stadium out of a capacity of 8000 is outstanding. Hopefully the general public continues to buy tickets and attend games.