It probably isnt a big enough drop to concern anyone. Wasnt the last week night game 11 something? Considering how dreadful they looked in their last two home games the Thorns r probably relieved the drop was so small.
i was in sec 121, and the crowd looked good to me. people need to remember that there are graduations and proms happening in late may and early june. i'm guessing they'll jump back to 12000+ on the weekends.
That is normal for NJ even in the old WPS, mostly club teams attending the games. Since most of them come only one time, the kids do not know most of the SB players except Rampone and US nationals, but would know Abby and Lloyd. When Portland comes, Alex will be their center of attention.
1129 @ CHI this afternoon. Another teams hits its lowest attendance yet. I think that'd be hard for SEA to do later tonight - their lowest is 1011. Still, I think the mid-season attendance doldrums are likely settling in upon us now.
NWSL needs better marketing in 2014. It will work wonders for Chicago, Sky Blue, and Seattle. The other franchises should be fine (even Boston should get enough support to survive). WNY and the Sahlen family aren't going anywhere. Washington has Spirit, yes they do. Portland is the leader by far. FCKC gets very good support. Boston needs the Riptide in full effect and expanded seating, and that should virtually guarantee them enough attendance to survive. Chicago, Sky Blue, and Seattle, need to increase their marketing efforts in 2014.
Attendances this week: Code: BOS - 2124 POR - 10886 NJ - 2056 CHI - 1129 SEA - 1377 avg - 3515 Even with a POR game, the week's average is below 4k... Totals by team: Code: team_GH__total___avg___med BOS___4___9117__2280__2379__v CHI___4___6568__1642__1292__v KC____4__19396__4849__4274 POR___5__63340_12668_12446__v SEA___5___9376__1875__1377__vv NJ____5___8162__1625__1459__^ DC____4__16709__4178__4298 WNY___4__12082__3021__2945 net__35_144714__4135__2855__vv Not including POR, the average is 2,713 and the median is 2,626. Standard dev for all games is 3805.5 (down a bit), so all non-POR games are still well within 1sigma of the overall average, while 2-sigma above the average is just under 11.8k. Standard dev for all non-POR games is 1455.1 (also down); combined with the falling average, a couple games that were more than 1sigma below are now not, and likewise a couple of games that were not more than 1sigma above now are. The average of averages is 4017 w/ standard dev of 3694.0, and the median of medians is 2662.
Regarding SB, I don’t think SB wants to spend money on advertising. It got its Rutgers game costs down 40% vs. what it was in WPS days ($10K per game) on lower Rutgers staffing based lower attendance assumptions. Remember Tom Hoffsteffer’s comment that lower cost was better than 500 more tickets sold. My conversion with a Rutgers worker couple of games of ago was that Rutgers could ramp up game staffing for higher expected game attendance but the costs to SB would go up. Thus the risk is the advertising spending does not translate to enough additional tickets sold to cover all the extra costs. A month ago many people here were happy when Hoffsteffer said to Beau Dure that SB was then ahead of projections; that was with no advertising. So if he was happy then (the quote was published after 688 on May 8 with Chicago in town), he must be happier now (the game last Saturday at 2056, the highest since the opening game). Unless he had low balled “the projections” or was just blowing smoke to everyone to keep up a good face. If Portland coming to NJ generates a large crowd, great but SB does not have to spend anything on promotion for that, Morgan by herself does that free for SB.
1141 @ CHI, per NWSL game report I guess the previous wins helped - 1141 is low, but it's not their lowest, which was 1129 on Sunday - so for a weeknight, I guess that's a good sign? Still low.
If you want to discuss attendance figures, you have find out the actual PAID numbers. Most of the teams list the number of tickets distributed, not paid or not at the stadium. When I say most, I'm not including Portland, which is in it's own league when it comes to attendance. Portland's listed figures are legit. But if a team draws 1200 to a game, you have to wonder how many are PAID. Probably not many. Also, you can't automatically assume the team gets a % of concessions. And, you have to assume that Facility Rent isn't FREE either. When you put it all together, you probably operating at a loss...unless you have a million dollars in cash sponsorships, which probably isn't likely either. I'm just pointing out the facts here. It doesn't do any good to discuss what's good and what's bad attendance without looking at all of the factors. 3 out of the 8 teams are averaging less 2000...1 team is at 2300 and another team is just over 3000......NOT GOOD!!!
And you would do this how, Brian? And we don't know which ones do which. They're private businesses that don't let us see their books. You could - if the club uses a public facility - presumably make a Freedom of Information Act request to get the "drop count" (which still would only tell you how many people were there, not how many paid), but it's recently been ruled that states don't have to comply with FOIA requests from out of state, so it could be problematic. I'm not saying they are or they aren't. But how would you know? Portland is certainly an organization that attracts far more people than most (max capacity for every MLS game, leading NWSL and the PDL in attendance), no one can dispute that. But how do you know their figures are "legit" when you've just said above that you have to find out the actual PAID numbers (though you offer no way to find out this information)? You do have to wonder that. And we're still wondering. Because we don't know. And we're not going to know. That is a very true and astute paragraph, one that touches on points most people miss. It's very very likely that all these teams are losing money, though some are very likely losing less than others and they may all (or mostly) be doing better financially with the star players' salaries off their books. But all we can make are general, 10,000-foot-view estimates of general health because we're not going to see the books. We're not going to get the number of PAID admissions (or how much they paid, either) unless someone sues someone and it is testified to in court (and therefore public record) or someone for some reason decides to release their figures (which I've never seen done publicly in this sport). The announced numbers aren't good in most league cities. The league projects - right now, if everybody holds their averages - to 4,004 for the season. That's ( a ) better than the last two years of WPS but ( b ) heavily influenced by Portland, which should finish with a higher announced average than any women's pro team since the 2001 Freedom. Given how little time there was to put all this together and how gun-shy some fan bases likely are after what they've been through, I'd be willing to just be glad if they get through the season without numbers completely falling off the table and with no teams folding before next year. You have to figure all three federations are pointing towards 2015, so unless disaster strikes, there's no real point in obsessing over each number each week for the next two years. You'd hope to see growth, but this year the objective should be just to draw what you can and push hard for 2014.
The Breakers have announced they are down to SRO tickets only for Sunday. We had massive rains this week, so they aren't opening up the new stands, but that means the primary stands are sold out. I don't remember them announcing this since perhaps their first game in WPSL Elite. Pretty good considering it's Fathers Day and we won't have Canadian or USWNT players (and the USWNT plays in Foxboro on Saturday).
way to stay coherent for two consecutive paragraphs . . . oh . . . whoops. Go troll away someplace else. By the way, sports teams often lose money regardless of the league or sport (and if they don't, many screw with their books so at least they are losing money on paper). You may not realize that since (according to your dive into the - implied by you - incredibly profitable business of concession sales to small crowds) you don't seem to understand what you are looking at anyway. A woman named Lindy West covered this ground very well right here
I'm told the NWSL attendance-reporting rules are stricter than those of past leagues. I can also vouch for the Freedom's Spirit's attendances. Seats full, hundreds of people sitting on the hill or standing. Many of them in the beer garden. (Edited, obviously. Knew I would do that sometime.)
Steven Goff @SoccerInsider As of this morning, Washington Spirit had sold 4,300 tickets for tonight's match vs WNY Flash #nwsl
So, team are reporting what the sell? I figured that with USSoccer and its' large sponsors putting their names on the line. They can't afford teams fudging numbers.
From the USSF USYouth Soccer web site, I counted the number of USYouth Soccer clubs within 10 miles and within 20 miles of each WPSL stadium zip code. Number of players per club is a huge piece of missing information. What do you think the information means, if anything, for attendance at the WPSL? Team_Stadium Location_Clubs in 10 mi_Clubs in 20 mi_Average Attendance Portland Portland_________3 12 12668 Sky Blue Piscataway _______5 18 1625 Washington Boyds MD______5 19 4178 FCKC Overland Park_______8 20 4849 WNY Rochester__________10 14 3021 Boston Somerville_________11 19 2280 Chicago Lisle____________11 22 1642 Seattle Tukwila___________16 40 1875
Beside the actual number of tickets sold, its the quality or mix of those tickets. Season tickets are higher priced than group tickets. At NJSB, ticket prices range from group at $10 each, bleachers at $14, central field seats with backs at $22, and on-field at $60 each. SB's former general manager back in WPS days had complained on BS how that clubs haggled on discounts. SB now rather sell fewer cheap tickets and make that up in a lower rent to Rutgers.
I guess you mean the NWSL Maybe there are fewer competing activities/events in Portland than in NJ, Chicago or Boston areas?
I guess you mean the NWSL Yup, oh well, too late to fix it now. I don't re4ally need the do-over; Maribel Dominguez, however........... RE; number of clubs: Could it be that the youth soccer infrastructure in Portland and near Boyds, MD consists of bigger, stronger clubs, which indicate a substantive soccer base in the population?