Kolabear, I wonder how the demographics of Rochester and Portland compare. I'd felt that Rochester and surrounding area could have the right demographics to produce support (but hadn't really thought about total population). So what was I thinking their demographics were, I'm asking myself. Relatively high education level. Relatively middle and upper middle classy. A combination of committed to women's rights and soccer mom-ish. Possibly positive on gay rights. No competing major league professional sport franchise during the NWSL season. I don't know if any of that really applies to the Rochester area, but it fits my image of that area. Although it's been argued here that Portland is unique and therefore can't provide much information on what it will take for more teams to have attendance anywhere near Portland's, I haven't yet given up on it's possibly providing some useful information related to where teams are likely to be successful. It's gotten me to thinking about the Portland MSA geographically and demographically. Here are some things that may be contributing to what's going on here: 1. Although the MSA is large (Snohomish and Yamhill counties?), the population is compact. For the Oregon side of the MSA, that's largely due to Oregon's land use system, which heavily favors compactness of development rather than sprawl. (The distance between downtown Hillsboro, OR, which I consider the outer edge of the likely attendance drawing area, and downtown Portland where Providence Park is, is 21 miles, about a 30 minute travel time. The area within 20 miles of downtown Portland, I'm guessing, includes the great bulk of the MSA population.) On the Washington side of the MSA, the great portion of their population is in Vancouver and nearby towns. Vancouver has a common border with Portland, in the middle of the Columbia River. 2. For whatever reason, Portland has many very nice single family residential areas very close to downtown, where Providence Park is: the West Hills, Willamette Heights, Sellwood, Lair Hill, Irvington (where I live), Laurelhurst, Eastmoreland, Alameda, Buckman. On an absolutely no traffic day, each of these areas is 5 to 10 minutes from Providence Park. In addition, there are some very new dense very nice apartment areas, also within 5 minutes of the Park: the Pearl, the South Waterfront, Nob Hill (which is much older). 3. The areas I just mentioned, and other close-in suburban areas, are relatively well educated and affluent. As a generalization, the well educated and affluent tend to live closer to rather than farther from Providence Park. 4. I'm betting that the average income and education level of Portland fans is quite high. 5. The urbanized area of the MSA is big on women's issues. It also has a large and "out" gay/lesbian community. 6. Youth soccer is big here and, perhaps more important, it is very big in the urbanized area of the MSA, which all is within the 20-mile distance from Providence Park I've described. Over on the College Soccer topic I've posted data previously suggesting that Oregon -- and in this case, read "Portland" -- on a per youth basis, is one of the most productive girls soccer areas in the country. So, lots of soccer moms and dads. So, Portland may be a unique combo of all these things, but other areas have some of them. I'm betting that Rochester has a bunch, but maybe not the population level of Portland.
At the moment, I don't think there's anywhere like Portland when it comes to women's soccer. I think it shows in the support for the college team, the Univ of Portland Pilots. There's nothing like it anywhere. But (for whatever it's worth) we can ask what reasonable level of interest and attendance we can expect in other, well-chosen areas. Very roughly, the table I made showed the difference between Portland and the other areas/teams ranged up to a factor of 10 or so; very roughly ranging from 0.5 to 0.05. So at the low end, we can guess that teams will draw 1/10th what Portland draws as a percentage of the area population. Can we hope/expect that the best locations for expansion are able to draw 1/4th the percentage? 1/3rd? Rochester, in 2014, actually drew about 1/2 (again, as a percentage) as much as Portland! That seems astonishingly good to me, in retrospect. There are also signs of increased fan interest in general. The attendance at US Women's National Team games has been strong in the "off" years between the Olympics and the next World Cup, much stronger than it's been since the Mia Hamm days. We can hope that, between the World Cup and the Olympics, many teams can reach 1/4 or 1/3 the audience in terms of percentage that Portland does now.
guest article in the Washington Post by Tiffany Weimar. Not sure if this is the best place for this but a lot of the article -- and the comments -- is about attendance and why people do, or don't, attend games. As of the moment, the comments section is quite civil and respectful and the reasons people cite for not attending are quite practical ones such as cost and location -- the Maryland Soccerplex where the Spirit play is a bit of a schlep for someone closer to D.C. proper.
Having compared NWSL attendance with the population of the teams' hometowns and surrounding area, I became curious about the corresponding stats for the WNBA (Women's National Basketball Association). Here it is, again using 2014 attendance with the Metropolitan Statistical Area estimates for 2012, as reported by the US Office of Budget and management - pop. Rank (2012 est) 2014 avg fraction of 1% 1 New York 20092883 8949 0.04 2 Los Angeles 13262220 8288 0.06 3 Chicago 9554598 6685 0.07 7 Washington 6033737 8377 0.14 9 Atlanta 5614323 5864 0.10 12 Phoenix 4489109 9557 0.21 15 Seattle 3671478 6717 0.18 16 Minnesota 3495176 9333 0.27 25 San Antonio 2328652 7719 0.33 33 Indiana 1971274 7900 0.40 55 Tulsa 969224 5566 0.57 172 Conn (Norwich/New London) 273676 5980 2.19 As with the NWSL and Sky Blue, there was one team where I wasn't sure what was the best population figure to use. In this case it's Connecticut, which plays at the Mohegan Sun Casino in Southeastern Connecticut. Ignoring them for a minute, as I do for Sky Blue, one number leapt out at me and that's Tulsa's. Tulsa had one of the lower average attendance records but it's a much smaller metropolitan area measured in terms of population compared to the other cities in the WNBA. As a percentage of the population, Tulsa's attendance matched the Portland Thorns with a score of (.57)!!! As before the score of .57 is a fraction of 1% Although it's notable that Connecticut's score is greater than 1 - the score of 2.19 means the average attendance is actually 2.19% of the area population , given the population figures I was able to find. Again, I don't know what to make of this, as with Sky Blue. The other notable thing, besides the WNBA's attendance being higher (as we know) than the NWSL's, is that the percentage of the population in attendance goes up fairly steadily as the cities get smaller.. The biggest cities have the lowest percentage and the percentage climbs, more or less, as the cities get smaller. I think that's significant in terms of the NWSL's future expansion plans in that there's evidence that the rates of attendance can reasonably be expected to go up in somewhat smaller cities and that attendance doesn't necessarily shrink in an even line as cities get smaller. *** as before, there are several caveats about the table and I'll point out some in a subsequent post
kolabear, this fits with my sense that the first order of priority in siting a team is not whether it is in a major television market. As for Connecticut, I wonder if this relates to the success of and attendance for UConn's women's basketball team. If so, it might suggest the need to think more about where attendance is the greatest for college women's soccer teams -- as in some areas of Texas (not necessarily Houston), some areas of Utah, and so on. It also suggests to me that it might be interesting to see how Tulsa's and Portland's demographics compare.
I agree that most teams don't have to be in major TV markets, presuming you mean like top 10 or something like that. And, absolutely, I think the fact there is a Connecticut team has to do with the success of the college team - that's one parallel with soccer and the Portland experience, although of course Connecticut isn't the huge success that Portland is -- but population size is a hindrance for Connecticut, apparently. The one downer when looking to the WNBA attendance is that, while most fans like us, no doubt, would be thrilled to have the attendance figures that the WNBA has, the WNBA is still widely perceived as a failing or unsuccessful league. I don't think the parallel is exact but it is a sobering thought. *** I accidentally left out the comma markers on the area population column so I'll repost it here; it may be easier to read. Population figures again based on Metropolitan Statistical Areas as put out by the Office of Budget and Management. WNBA attendance figures are for 2014 - source Wikipedia article on WNBA. pop. Rank (2012 est) 2014 avg fraction of 1% 1 New York 20,092,883 8949 0.04 2 Los Angeles 13,262,220 8288 0.06 3 Chicago 9,554,598 6685 0.07 7 Washington 6,033,737 8377 0.14 9 Atlanta 5,614,323 5864 0.10 12 Phoenix 4,489,109 9557 0.21 15 Seattle 3,671,478 6717 0.18 16 Minnesota 3,495,176 9333 0.27 25 San Antonio 2,328,652 7719 0.33 33 Indiana 1,971,274 7900 0.40 55 Tulsa 969,224 5566 0.57 172 Conn (new London County) 273,676 5980 2.19
I'm surprised Minnesota's so high. I know the .27 isn't earth shattering or anything (especially compared to Connecticut), but that is a crowded market having every major league sport (except MLS, if you consider it major league).
Minnesota has had (finally) a really good team the last 3 or 4 years. Finally some smart roster moves coupled with winning the draft lottery once or twice. Seattle, on the other hand, hasn't had their two big stars, Sue Bird and Lauren Jackson (LJ, or the Big L'Oz) in like two or three years because of injury and international play. But, to repeat, what I also think is interesting (and perhaps encouraging), is that the percentage of the market attending games can (and does) go up as the total population goes down, meaning you don't have to be a New York, Chicago, Los Angeles to get the same sized crowd. In fact you can be a lot smaller and get a bigger crowd. That (0.27) figure for Minnesota isn't bad compared to NWSL, with of course the key exception of Portland. We'd love it if teams were averaging 9000 fans per game. From our perspective, the women's soccer fan's perspective, we might have to wonder why the WNBA is looked down upon; those numbers look like success to us. However, there are some caveats. Some people say the numbers are inflated by free or discounted tickets. Of course the same is often said of women's soccer and any other sports league outside the big sports of baseball, football, basketball, hockey and (maybe) now Major League Soccer. There is one form of inflating the numbers though that ought to be considered -- and that is the inclusion of "club seats" or other VIP seats. At many of the newer, luxury-oriented arenas, there are VIP seats or seats with special privileges that require people to purchase a complete package which means they buy season tickets not only for the NBA team but the WNBA team as well as hockey and other sports. I don't know for sure how clubs count these seats but my guess is since they're paid for, they're counted as paid attendance. How many seats are we talking about? I don't know that either but from what I remember looking at some seating charts, I'd say they could total 1000 to 1250 seats or so. Perhaps more. I don't know.
by the way, comparing the NWSL numbers with the WNBA's led to me realize one key advantage that the WNBA has and that's college basketball. Women's basketball in college is a fairly big thing. The tournament is a pretty big thing that gets a lot of fans in the stands supporting their team and also gets TV coverage. And you have these stars coming out of college, who are almost household names by the time they enter the pros, names like Diana Taurasi, Maya Moore, Candace Parker, Sue Bird... Except for Portland, or unless some girl in college makes it with the US team, that doesn't happen in women's soccer.
That's a good point. That might also be why the Dash's numbers are always higher than people think were there. All the people that bought them for the Dynamo also count for the Dash.
Tonight's attendance at @SwopeSoccer was 1,847. Thanks for coming out and supporting! #FCKCvWNYF— Blues Gameday (@BluesGameday) May 15, 2015
I thought attendance was going to be worse...bad weather most of the day and High School Soccer play-offs/graduations going on in the area. I wasn't able to go bc it was senior night for my team, but hopefully next time.
3,527 in Houston apparently. I feel bad b/c I've missing all of the first three Spirit home games... First one I just didn't get organized in time to go, I'm back in STL this weekend, and I've got other plans for the 30th. =-(
2,669 in Boston yesterday - up 302 from the home opener, and their net so far this year is up 1751 over their first two games last year (i.e. 875/game up, which would put them around 3300 average for the season if they can keep it up). No official number for the rain-delayed, stream-failed Spirit game yet, though they're saying 3,095 on Twitter, which would put their current average around 300 above last year's season average and 1200 above last year's first-two average.
If everyone in the NWSL held their current attendance average (and Chicago won't, Kansas City likely won't), the league would finish with an average of 4,433 for the year. In reality, it will probably end up in the neighborhood of the first two years, which would be something the first two attempts at a league could not say.
If the league is anywhere near the first two years without the benefit of attendance draws of the U.S. And Canadian stars and international stars for most of the season I think it would show real progress.
I missed every Portland game in Boston the first 2 years but I was surprised to see how well their fans travel. I saw at least 100+ fans with Thorns jerseys on by far and away the most I have seen for any visiting team in Boston.
Cutting costs is what matters for the foreseeable future in this league (other then Portland). Red Stars are affordable at Benedictine, not affordable at Toyota Park. Also as I said many times before, some markets will take a while to grow. I know that in Chicago the popularity of the Red Stars is growing. Maybe not to some people's liking, but it is growing, fan by fan, little by little each year. Everyone is not Portland. Looks like even Houston is having problems drawing good crowds and they are owned by an MLS team. This league and it's teams need to exist for 5 years and more in order to give it time to grow and grow the women's pro game. That's why I think this attendance watch in early years is pointless. The teams need to entrench themselves into the fabric of the local town/city and that may take some years.
If only there were some way to prove that... Oh there is? Red Stars averaged 1713 in 2013 and 1786 in 2014 (not counting the doubleheader) and are averaging 1969 so far this year (not counting the doubleheader). Hmm.... looks like what you said is true. Good thing we do this attendance watch so we can prove you correct...
Actually, having been a Portland (Pilots/Thorns) fan for decades now, that's how it built up here too. As long as it's growing little by little each (or almost every) year, if they can hold out long enough they'll probably get there.
I don't know about the Pilots or the USL/NASL-era Timbers, but you can see the four full MLS Timbers years here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Major_League_Soccer_attendance Constant upticks: 18.8k, 20.4k, 20.6k, 20.8k You can also slowly backtrack on the Timbers' single-season articles back to 1975 EDIT Actually, there's also a full list of Timbers seasons here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Portland_Timbers_seasons Attendance is last column, modern Timbers era starts in 2001
I'd especially like to see the Pilots (I should've been specific). I mean, because it's women's soccer. What's happening in Portland, what's happened, is quite a phenomenon. Maybe it can't be duplicated anywhere anytime real soon but we need to learn as much as we can from it
I'll put it on my task list to see if I can come up with the Pilots' year-by-year attendance numbers since my wife and I started regularly going to their games -- ~1998. (I started sooner than she did. If I can get numbers for the earlier years, I'll include them too.) I'll do that right after I (1) get my DDG's U12 "age band" girls' soccer teams' tournaments for this summer organized and (2) complete my work trying to identify the best Elo-based formula for use in rating Division I women's soccer teams. Or, maybe I'll do it before I get back to the Division I rating work. I thought I might not have much to do when I retired from the "trying to make money" world. I was wrong!
I was able to find the Univ. of Portland's attendance on their website under the stats for each year. The records online go back to the year 2001. year avg attendance 2001 1440 2002 1685 2003 1440 2004 2101 2005 3403 2006 3408 2007 3771 2008 3622 2009 3472 2010 3549 2011 3110 2012 3313 2013 2937 2014 2971 It would be nice to back and a little farther but the years covered shows the dramatic leap from 2003 to 2005. As I suspected, evolution often features periods of sudden, dramatic change. The breakthrough from around 1500 (which is excellent attendance for a small school like Portland but not much higher than several other schools) to over 3000 which put Portland on a level far above all but perhaps one or two other schools (Texas A&M comes to mind) took place over a two year period. This was part of the Christine Sinclair years and includes the championship year of 2005.