Being a New England fan I would like to say that it just doesn't feel like the Krafts give two shits about this team. There is no reaosn for there to be tickets priced at 16 dollars for the cheap seats. I think they seriously ned to reconsider there front office management system for the upcoming off season. There is no reason that there should not be 20,000 a game. Some things that need to change in the off season. 1. Lower ticket prices in the GA to 10 dollars. 12 dollars day of game. 2. Lower the parking from 15 dollars to 10 dollars. 3. Hire back the staff they fired. Bring back Brian Donovan.... SOmeone who actually cares about soccer. 4. Fire Sunil! 5. Open up both sides of the stadium and close down one end zone. Its obvious that this experiment did not work.
Thanks for Caring Mr. Kraft! please, come up up with something better than the old crap that is brought up ad nauseum. if your list was all that was between 20k a game and heft profits for MLS & the Krafts, can you speculate why your will is undone? could it be: a the Krafts give 2 shits about making the team succesful on the field, and have made changes to make us a winner. however, these were the last two shits left, and they don't have two shits to give to make this team grow revenues or profits. so they are tanking the teams financial prospects on purpose. b the Krafts are mental midgets who lucked into profitable businesses, and wound up owning the revs & pats. thier stupidity should yield to the wisdom of part-time GMs and CFO's on bigsoccer. sonny kraft was at the last game i belive, handing out prizes... what do you want them to do for you personally? i sure would like it if james earl jones came and set up my voicemail. those bastards at verizon just dont give two shits about my service... sure i'd like to pay less. that'll help me reach profitability. MLS can aford to take the hit! just ask Mia Hamm! you should send them your resume. what would this do for the krafts, besides give the 15k average fans a discount? how many fans, in your expert opinion don't show up for lack of a few freakin bucks? please explaing in detail the cost benifit analysis of this discount program. would you drink more water if it was free? more free money for you. no new fans. winner = lufy. loser = revolution. yeah good idea. put more people on the payroll. did you ever run a dot com companyt? before they were fired, the revs averaged 60k in season tickets, with 10yr wainting list. now they strugle to get 15k. on second thought you seem to care about soccer, but your ideas are weak, and tired. like this topic. does sunil come into your work's message board and declare 'fire Lufty!'? nobody seems to know what he gets paid, or what he does, or even what hes supposed to do, so how do you know if he isn't doing a bangup job? obvious to whom? what is the criteria for this judgement? the sad fact is that they would open those seats up every game, if you would just buy the tickets. but you don't, now do you. sorry lufy, your suggests lack any credibility. maybe if you had a bake sale we could sign rivaldo, i hear he's looking for a new home. or maybe you could sell your baseball card collection and... FIRE SLYDE!!! i do agree with the seniment that AngryFrank and the MagPie, and tOmMyHilLfigER have put forth, that it would be great if there were more fans at games. nothing like a dose of the obvious to get the faithful in a froth. the sad thing about this is that there are more posts about opening 30 thousand additional empty seats to acommodate the 15k that show up than there are about the best revolution season ever. ever.
Re: Thanks for Caring Mr. Kraft! It's classical economics. As a good or service becomes more expensive, demand falls. If there is no correlation, then maybe they should double ticket prices and double their revenue from the same 15K average fans? Back to the original point. I think they do care about the team. Jonathan Kraft is frequently at the matches and always defends them against the goons on EEI when he is on. I just wish they were more succesful in marketing the team.
Re: Thanks for Caring Mr. Kraft! The Krafts are usually very smart business people. The frustration is they do everything they can to make the Patriots successful and barely pay lip service to their other team. They certainly possess the resources to spend money to attempt to make money on the Revolution. If they so chose that tact, which they haven't. When there were actual soccer people running the organization, the team averaged more than 20,000 per game in a spartan dump for the worst team in MLS. Now that the Revs have one of the best teams in the league, they get 5-7,000 through the gate for stand-along games in the state-of-the-art stadium. I'm sure the Krafts will appreciate the business comparison with dot.com's. Not angry. The only anger was during the laughingstock Zenger's cartoonish reign of error as manager. Frustrated. Frustrated that what had all of the makings of being a wonderful soccer situation for New England fans is being squandered. I still hold out hope for the future, but it ain't easy when you look anywhere but out on the pitch.
Re: Thanks for Caring Mr. Kraft! Sorry, but I'm not going along with the "no more fans will come if the prices go down" argument. Haven't we seen enough posts from people who were fed up with the price increases? And, since you love punching holes in everyone else's posts, let's hear your opinion on why attendance is down despite a better team playing in a better stadium.
Why can't this crap wait till after Nov 23 when we win MLS CUP, please until then worry about the team, the 2 game series against Metroscum,.
Re: Thanks for Caring Mr. Kraft! Preach on brother preach on. There are some legitimate things that could and should change. Marketing projects that would make it a lot easier, more affordable, and more comfortable for fans to come to the games. You can only hope that some of those things happen. Certainly there is a concern that attendance was down this year and has been trending downwards when other organizations have stabalized or grew. Maybe a lot of people are like some on this board who are really turned off by the Revs. I for one think that in this case it takes two to tango. I have and will continue to question the loyalty and fanship of those who claim to be 'season ticket holders from day one' or those who claim to be hardcore soccer fans but find every which reason not to go to Revs games.
Re: Re: Thanks for Caring Mr. Kraft! While the Revs ain't cheap anymore I don't think pricing is the main reason for their decline at the gate. Especially when you consider what it costs to see the other major league sports teams in the area. I think this is strictly a marketing and management problem. It can also be fixed but they better get someone in there who knows what the heck they're doing when it comes to promoting and marketing soccer. They also need to start thinking a little like a minor league baseball team while at the same time really working at attracting the area's actual soccer fans because there are a bunch of them. And they would be entertained by the product if they bothered to come watch it.
Re: Re: Thanks for Caring Mr. Kraft! eric_a - you may be right, however, this could also be a case of inelastic demand. lowering price does not always increase demand to the point of increaced revenue. lowering price could have the effect of leaving money on the table. I don't ( and I assume you don't either) have enough info to make the call. BigFrustrated - you harp about attendance, yet you never mention what it costs to get fans in the seats. you seem to be generous in spending kraftys money on all things revolution, yet get indignant about 5 bucks extra for parking. maybe you can write your congressmen and have them rasie taxes on the rich to fund the 'proper' marking of soccer in this area. NPS - National Public Soccer. P.S. BigFrustrated: - we are in the playoffs, afther the best reg. season ever. it don't get more wonderful than this. PPS - i think i get you... you are looking for a job in the FO! send your resume to Lufty - he put in fo r a job there too! good luck!
I guess the point I am trying to get across is that they need to do something down in foxboro to get people back in the seats. A winning team should help.. but in this case it is not. You have to start looking at the other aspects of what could be going wrong. I know myself that I could go to a game and bring 15 people along back in the day and they'd only have to spend 10 dollars on tickets and split the parking. Bringing those 15 people nowadays is impossible because you cannot convince people that it is worth the 20 dollars just to get in the door. The casual sports fan will not as of yet spend that much money for a soccer game. It may not seem like a big difference but to the 18 to 30 year old crowd I think it may be a big difference. ANother thing. This ship has not been flying right since the got rid of B'oD. He was passionate about soccer. We need someone like that back in the front office. I am not saying that the Krafts don't care about soccer, but you gotta show us that they do.
Rememebr the day when the walk up crowds would not make it into the stadium until well past the 15 minute mark of the game. What was being done different in those days? Anyone?
Re: Re: Thanks for Caring Mr. Kraft! REV-OKe, aren't we going to get to hear your opinion on why attendance is down despite a better team playing in a better stadium?
i've said it before, and i'll say it again. i agree with many/most of the reasons presented on our board about why attendance is down. they all seem at least somewhat plausible. my beef is with those 'remedys' to this problem. for example, i don't buy that simply dropping the price of tickets will magically fill the stadium. and even if it did, you'd have to do some math to figure out if the added people didn't shoot your profitability in the foot. all the price drop arguments lack any mention of what it COSTS to lower prices. a carefuly though out priceing proposal, with the right assumptions, and a realistic model of how consumers in this market react, plus the required marketing strategy (more costs) to get the word out an capitalize on this 'incetive' program might convince me that dropping price is the best thing to do. also, not one person can answer any of the multiple questions i've asked about key metrics in deciding weather or not you should hire more people, cut prices etc. In fact, i'm still waiting to hear if the team is finacially better off now, or worse off. is thier per fan profit/loss better? worse? anyone? sure the WUSA could spend 100m to get a 7k or whatever average attendance. seems like they spared no expense to grow the league. maybe bring in WUSA mgmt to run the revs? i think not. so instead of thinking " wouldn't it be cool if kraft lowered prices so more of my buddies could come to games and toot thier soccer horns in unison" try thinging about this like you were spending your own money, and you need to make every penny count. because if you don't, there will be many more 'soccer people' let go. like maybe even the players.
Ok, then, what 'remedy' do you think would be effective? Or, do you feel that the status quo is fine and nothing needs to be done?
you and i both don't have enought info to come up with 'remedys'. i still await answers to my questions about the fundamentals of the business. you and magpie, and others have asked me multiple time for my "solution'. i have yet to hear the basic assumptions and currnet financial status of the team. what is the status quo??? the only evidence of how the team is doing is the # fans is down. incomplete. only a fool would spout off suggestions when they don't know what problems they are trying to fix. so, here goes... if the only problem is lower attendance, and in your world, money is no object, pay 61k people 100k each to go to each game. send limos to everones home to pick them up. have the staduim catered by the finest chefs in the land, all free of charge. have the rolling stones play every halftime. fireworks after the games. bobble head dolls made in each fans likness hand carved out of marble delivered to your seats by the end of the game. hire joe cummins and b'od. fire sunil. have the krafts sell the team to ... pele. he will build a sss that is a copy of old trafford. what else? if that plan doesn't work for you, feel free to answer my questions about the 'status quo'
Only those with open eyes can actually see things right in front of them FINALLY, rev-okE posts something that makes some sense. I suppose if a head pops out of the sand often enough a ray of light might eventually be seen. Of course, that assumes that either JC or BOD would be willing to come back and work for the Krafts again. I doubt that BOD would, but JC might. It wuld at least represent a step in the right direction. As for complaining about a $5 increase in parking as being the cause of all off-field ills, you must have me confused with someone else. It is just one mole on a mountain of reasons.
Maybe, but what do you call someone who rips everyone's suggestions apart without any clue as to whether they're right or not? Your hero? And, to be consistant, I would assume that you won't be happy with any game or player analysis by anyone who hasn't had in depth talks with the coaching staff, hasn't attended all of the practices, and isn't privy to all of the instructions fron the coach to the players? I would also expect that similar info would be needed to comment on issues such as player acquisitions and the draft? That would cut back on the annoying idle chatter...
I think increased concessions sales to a larger crowd would make up the loss in per ticket revenue. However, Revoke has raised an interesting idea. Maybe the Krafts are ok with the status quo. Maybe it is working financially now? Is that possible?
a big fat jerk. i'm a big fat jerk. and stupid. well, since you can watch the game, i'd say thats fair to analyze. but if you haven't talked to the coaches, and attended practices, well then your opinion should take that into consideration. and it is fair to say that we know more or less if the team is doing well on the field. we know 'where the goalposts are'. off the field, we (i) don't know what they are trying to achieve. so it is hard to say if they have met thier 'goals' or not. it may not be to grow attendance. it could be to deacrease losses. or be profitable. or something. as for player aqusition & the draft, if you know the players in question, you can comment, and i'm all ears. if you follow these things, then have at it. i for one am not usually up on up and comming college players, so if i was to give a suggestion on who to draft out of college, it would be disingenuous, and baseless. as for player aquistions, the same rule applys. if you are familiar with the player, i'd love to hear what people say. i'm actually quite consistant. usually i 'lurk & learn'. i learn quite a bit on these boards, there is much good info & opinions... and i don't always agree with peoples opinions. but i accept them. when some of the more outlandish, illogical stuff comes out, ocasionally, i emerge from the shadows. the voice of reason, to balance the BigFrustrateds of the world.
i think you might be right... though i recall reading an anecdote somewhere on here about the 'lack of enthusiasm' that the consession vendors have for working the rev games? probably depends on how/who makes the consession moneies. eric - acknologing that i have raised an interesting idea is appreciated. thanks for seeing my point in an objective manger. however it is also heresey. ;-) that said.... this is the missing link.
What is being argued here is whether Kraft should be expected to create demand for a product most people don't care about. Why should he take that risk? He is probably smart to run a low loss operation, cash in on big non-MLS events, and wait for the sport to sell itself over time, a long long time. Pouring in money to create demand has killed many more ventures than it has saved. MLS is no different.
REV-OKe, I think you are pretty insightful. No one here knows what the core budgetary issues are for the Revs. We don't know the loss-leaders, the golden eggs, etc... There are plenty of ventures that have poured tons of cash into promotion and advertising and failed, ask the XFL. The Revs have 8 years of full-time experience in what has worked and what hasn't for them. Do they still need work in this area? Yes, of course. I doubt there is a business out there that doesn't. But, they probably do have a better idea than any of us in what expeditures and pricing structures should be based upon their research and experience.
Random comments: 1. It isn't $5 more for parking it is the 50% parking increase, the 30% beer increase the x% burger increase etc. The overall price changes add up and make it alot harder to take a family to a game. 2. I think they can leave ticket prices the same but adjust the seating. In the center sections make rows 1-N Cat 1 and N+1 through M Cat 2. This will increase the value of the Cat 2 tickets for the people that are already showing up. It was definitely valuable to me that CAT 2's were available in the center of Foxboro. Meanwhile, move your CAT3 tickets inward toward the center line. Hopefully the people that already show up will continue to show and some people that don't show up will see more value in a new seating arrangement. 3. Go back to discounts at the ticket office on game day for the season ticket holders. They should be able to hire enough staff to support this. There aren't that many walkups right now. 4. Consider dropping parking and concession prices. Maybe not back to Foxboro prices but a little lower than what they have now. Test the demand vs. price. Except that they'd need more $1 bills, how about $12 parking? How about $5.75 for a beer? 5. Consider going back to more promotional tickets. I think that when we saw 20K show up alot of them received promotional tickets. Parking and concession prices may actually be high enough to make people WITH FREE TICKETS stay home. Now, one might not consider them great fans but if they do show up they will probably buy concessions.... I think (don't know) they moved away from promotional tickets after the league had been around for several years. The thing is that with the team winning a little more now and the quality of the soccer up, they are probably in need of some "service recovery." The promotions give them a chance to bring back people that gave up. 6. Reconsider how safe the entry policies really are. I'm not convinced they are making people much safer but they are irritating. Also consider opening a few more gates. There is nothing more frustrating than showing up and waiting in a long line to get in for both casual and rabid fans. And with 4PM starts, kids leagues, etc. showing up earlier isn't really an option.
Obviously, you're not stupid. In fact, having recently spent more time than usual reading the other boards, it's VERY obvious you're not stupid. And, as far as I know, there are no fat people on this board... Again, you're probably more knowledgeable about the financial end of a business than I am. However, I don't think that all of the ideas that you deride are all that outlandish. When I ask you for your ideas, you can't come up with any without looking at the Revs books.Which is fine, I guess, but it's not like I'm paying you for your opinion, or that Bob Kraft's going to haul you into court if he reads your plan on bigsoccer and it doesn't work. But, by the same token, you can't really have enough information to know that the other suggestions are foolish. In fact, I'd bet that the MLS franchises who are growing their fanbase are doing some of the very things that people have been suggesting. In short, if you have suggestions, we'd like to hear them. If you think that an idea's truly bad, go ahead and say so. If you think that the person who makes a suggestion doesn't have enough info to know if it will work, but you don't have enough info to know it won't, ease off on the throttle a little. This is just a suggestion, I'm not telling you what to post, but we don't need any more "georgeplmr" like battles going on.
Some reachout by the organization i run a town soccer club and just got a note from a mike zimbone asking a bunch of questions about the club, who runs it, when does the board meet, where does it meet, how big is it, and does it have a website. interesting, yet some odd, questions at an interesting (let's see, one or two home games left) time. it's been a few years since the club has heard anything from the revs ... in fact, it when when paul keegan came to an end of season event. perhaps the reachout has begun ...