Not sure if this is the right discussion to ask this, but was there ever a published ticket price for any individual game seat at Audi Field last year? Season tickets had a price, but as far as I can tell individual game tickets were dynamic pricing only, and never had any sort of starting point listed by the team anywhere. Did I miss that?
like pr0ner said, it was listed on a page that let you buy season tickets - but since that was before the whole dynamic-pricing-fiasco, I'm not sure if they still supply it or if they do if it's a projected minimum price for a theoretical game. Makes it hard to decide if you're going to be able to go to a few games later in the season when you can't have any clue what the price of those games would be. Or to invite a friend. People will say you can just go to "the app" and see the prices of tickets people are selling, including the team's prices - but last year that was not true - ticket prices lower than the team is selling tix for will not show up in most of the places you can see tickets for sale - and definitely do not show up on the app (based on reports, I have no access to any apps). Some people said they could see some of the lower prices on either a ticketbastard website or some other ticket broker website.
Update on streaming video from FloSports: the cost for season ticketeers/supporters is $71.88/year *or* $14.37/month. Cost for others would seem to be $107.88/year or $21.59/month. No mention of a trial period. And I couldn't see if the lack of Android app has been resolved or not.
If you do the math in terms of how much it costs for just the MLS season, sure. And that is also not the text from the actual DCU email.
I'm still not getting the whole Flo thing. We grew in visibility last year People who weren't even sure we still had a team suddenly were asking me how they could get tickets. People were lurking, not full on fans, but, hey it started to get cool... So you have a small amount of addicts and a huge amount of casual users. The addicts are your base, assuming you treat them moderately well. The casual users, well, if they're at the party and DC United is being passed around, sure, they'll partake. Now you make the product hard to get for hardcores and invisible to casual fans. I have zero interest in watching tractor pulls, or other small sports, and I don't want to EVER watch a game on my phone unless that's my last option. In this I know I'm not alone. I just want to watch the game, and if we won, the post game. Now I'm being asked to pay monthly for something that was free last year. $21/month with a max of 3 away games per month for the casual fan? I'm an economist and I'm stumped.
Like a bunch of other things, like ticketless entry, it's people in the Front Office in love with themselves and with whatever technology somebody manages to sell them. The Front Office has always tried to push promotions into reality. It's hubris. Remember that they said they would only sell the lower bowl when Fredy Adu joined the team to create scarcity and demand? I don't remember a whole lot of sellouts. The same thing would have happened to attendance at Audi Field last season had the team not totally caught fire: there would have been lots of empty seats. Taking United off of free TV is a huge mistake. The FO is confusing the digital world with flesh-and-blood fans. Baseball teams used to think the same way in the 50s and 60s about television, not understanding what a promotional tool it was. I understand that the club needs to cash in quickly to pay for the stadium, to pay for Rooney and other big contracts, but it is very short-sighted.
Understand that DCU was not on "free TV"in the DC area. NC8 or whatever it's called is a cable access channel for which you pay money -- more if you want an HD signal. Same for ESPN and UniMas or Fox Sports for away games. For the first year of the Sinclair deal, DCU was over the air on some weird HD signals in Baltimore and Richmond, but I sure heard a great deal of bellyaching about how hard it was to get a signal or find what actual station the game was on. I think DCU was once on Channel 20, but I may misremember. DCU has not been on "free"TV for quite some time if ever.
True, but just about everybody has basic cable. You could watch the team without purchasing a subscription to specifically watch the team. That's no longer the case, and it sucks.
It's like the FO is being run by 20 somethings who think they have invented the wheel. They could not be more clueless.
What do you mean would have been a lot of empty seats. Most games, especially the more garden variety opponents on Sunday nights, the club level was a third or more empty, tons of empty seats on the south stand, even 20-30 minutes into the game. They might have sold a bunch of cheap standing room tickets to hit the sell out "threshold", but there were ALWAYS a significant quantity of empty seats in the club, essentially entire sections at either end of the club.
Why in your eyes I am choosing to "miss out" so yes I WILL call this FO clueless. I'm just not that impressed by HD. It does not make my viewing experience that much better. So I refuse to pay more for a supposed "privilege" I don't want or need. I am still seeing the game. It is still a clear picture.
I often watch my HDTV without my glasses so I can reminisce about an America that was once great, too. Thx, Jay!
This is incredible. So they expect people to put up $22 a month for a fly by night streaming service? I can't even lock into $10 a month for spotify and I listen to hundreds of hours of music per month. Some geezer with our FO heard of streaming and figured this is what all the kids mean by cutting the cord.
As my eyesight and hearing get worse with age, I find HD to be wonderful. And maybe it's imagination on my part, but I believe the sound is better, too. When I watch some shows on SD channels, I can't see the action as clearly, nor hear the sound as clearly as HD.
I think it's simple. They saw $. They'd been getting $0 from their broadcast partner, right? If the content is any good, they may be able to get some $ out of some of the millions of worldwide Rooney fans. They just didn't think through how bad it would be from a PR perspective or from a long term... losing potential local fans who just don't watch the games cause they won't pay for them or don't even know that they're available.
Those casual fans can still catch some matches on ESPN, Unimas and Fox. It is not the end of the world as we know it.
If the team plays like they did to finish last season people will watch on FloSports and it will become the new normal.