it wasn't that bad. the Southeast corner always bring the action. and the east side upper deck brings it in. and the northwest corner tried their own wave a while after the south end attempted to start there's... if a game ends with no successful wave, then i guess it is a dead atmosphere.
well EB did play what sounded like a new song tonight and I didn't know it and it sounded like vamos houston with a different beat honestly. i was like wtf but i'll go with it. and TA wasn't that loud tonight and i only heard brickwall do their thing maybe twice... and a night without that celia cruz song is always a fail night so maybe SG's failed tonight but i think crowd did fine
Yea new song by EB. We are Orange Forever we are Orange Forever we are Orange Forever we are Ooooooorange Starts at :14
I liked the new song, it sounded good but I didn't know the words either. I kept thinking it was a real fast "I Believe that We Will Win!" but I knew better. I didn't think the crowd was bad and it was very involved, even singing the Anthem louder than usual. It was also very loud for corners. Not a bad game for a late Sunday night. I wanted to mention something I keep noticing, I wonder if anyone else has too. When I get home and watch the game on the DVR I'm always surprised by how many empty seats there seem to be in the lower bowl. I always wonder why I didn't notice that at the game. Last night I did checked out the seats in the lower section, there were very few empty seats down there, only scattered ones here and there. But again on the DVR it looks like the are a lot of them. I guess it's just that all the orange blends in, I don't know, and maybe on a better tv the fans in those seats show up better....
I was thinking the same thing-but really started analyzing it seat by seat-there were a lot of empties in the lower bowl. I am not surprised. I hardly saw any kids at the match either-first day of school for a lot of them the next day.
yep.... and along with no kids means a lot of no parents. I know scheduling is hard, but these school/work night games just stink. Wouldn't Friday night at 8 have worked better?
Astros home game last Friday night. The schedule should get better next year when we have the entire 32 weeks to spread out our home games.
Well crap there was no one there anyway. We shall see if it gets better . . . they are running three Sunday games a week right now across the league, so it is not just us.
Selling tickets and then having no-shows is a better problem than not selling tickets. Its funny because the attendance issues that many (including myself) talked about in the winter have manifested themselves not in tickets sold but in the turnstile count. I love the Dynamo, but fixture congestion or fatigue can set in for fans as well. We had 13 home games in about 3 months and some weekends or nights it just doesn't work out to be there. We had something on Sunday and when you see a Saturday game in 6 days, you think about skipping (although our tickets were used). Next year will be better. However, the renewal process will be interesting. Airflow is not gonna improve and the lights still seem bright. I just don't know if the renewals will be as automatic as before for some.
I talked to a rep that voiced a similar concern about next year. I think the "new" factor will wear off. If Les gets the club and raises the STH prices in the offseason you could see a double dip in attendance. My bigger concern is getting more butts in those west side lower level seats for TV. Gotta lower the prices on that side or something. Those seats must be filled.
I will point out that KC did not sell out all their games last year for many of the same reasons we are not this year like fixture congestion. They have increased their average attendance by over a thousand per game in the 2nd year. Barring a big ticket price increase I can see Houston doing something similar next year.
I agree-but the Alexander thing does make me nervous in terms of prices and overall number. Next year's schedule should allow us better attendance (not like this year's is horrible).
Just invite everyone in the 200 section to fill in the empties then make sure that the camera's keep their sightline below the upper mid level lcd panels
I'm going to go the other way with you on that. Originally I thought we'd ramp up year 1 to year 2 in BBVA Compass then we'd hit a plateau. I think the Dynamo may struggle - at least STH-wise - to improve much on the 2012 numbers. The huge increase in STH numbers from 2011 to 2012 was very likely almost solely due to the new stadium, primarily from fans who never saw value in season tickets at Robertson. So you have a new group of STHs that are significantly different than most of us from the Plaque Era (my new term to the longtime STHs). With so many new STHs, there is bound to be a certain percentage who determine having a full season subscription doesn't fit them or isn't as rewarding as they thought. Then others may or may not like the higher prices from Robertson (although single-game tickets with fees make a season ticket a good deal). I can tell you that at the elevated BBVA prices, it's not quite the auto-renew that you had at Robertson, at least for our block of tickets. Investment in the product has gone up significantly. And one limiting factor for gross STH sales, which is sort of by design in a way, is that the best locations seats on the sidelines on both sides are already taken. To significantly raise STH numbers they have to come from endline and upper endzone sales, which I think is a harder sell. If there was one design flaw in the stadium (other than no airflow and blinding lights) on seating it would be too few sideline seats that aren't club seats (IMO). One thing I noticed on TV on Sunday night is that while a seat in the lower east side may be vacant, the lights are so bright that they put a white reflection on the top quarter of the seatback such that you can't tell at first glance if it is vacant because there is something "in" the seats (the glare/reflection).
Yes; but everything you mention is in play any season with the exception of new fans. And the question will be how many of those new fans were actually existing fans that transferred from game day tickets to season packages. The average renewal rate in sports in in the 70 percentile and anything at 80% is pretty good. So the question is, will they lose more than 2500 seats. I doubt it. And if they lose the 2500 seats, I would bet they can back fill that many with ease. Especially since they are shooting for an earlier renewal giving them more time to focus on new sales (as compared to years past).
Why do you think the prices will change differently with Les as an owner instead of AEG? I'm willing to bet that AEG did some research to find out the most they can charge and how much they can increase prices each year and still meet their sales targets. Les taking over wouldn't change those numbers so I don't see how the prices would change all that drastically. I think they will increase next year, and continue to increase over time, but those increases are going to happen regardless of who owns the team.
The other alternative is to come up with the same kind of technology they use in the NFL when they superimpose the lines on the field. They could superimpose images of people in seats.
I agree. I think they would go up eventually even with AEG. Although I think they might hold off an increase for a year if the STH number goes down. I have to believe Les, as with any owner, is looking to recoup as quickly as possible his investment. The quickest and easiest way to do that is with STHs, especially if he ponies up and gets a DP sooner rather than later. But as you pointed out-the prices will go up no matter what. We all knew that was coming. I am kinda of surprised that they don't heavily discount those lower east side seats starting 30 minutes before kick off to make sure any empties are filled. Of course, that could create a nightmare but then again we have seen the FO do some very silly things so like I said I am a little surprised.
If Les buys and brings in new management (or even not), they will look to enhance revenue immediately to prove their value to Les. Its human nature and practice in the business world for new management to shake things up or even if he leaves Canetti in place, for Canettu to make his mark in grow revenues. When Les walks in to that first meeting, no one is telling him "AEG has it all figured out right, there's nothing for us to do to grow revenues". No one. Go look at how escalated Rockets prices.