Dont worry dallas, we over at Gillette stadium will keep you company with your sad numbers. The other teams are just haters. Dallas, New England....we're full of tradition, and theres nothing better than a cozy attendance of 8,000. Where else in the league can you yell out and have everyone hear you? That's an unbeatable experience. While Seattle lets in the rif raff and hobos to fill their bottom line (it's all about the money), we have pride in our team and select our audience. We dont want screaming children in the stadium, only 5,000 hardcore + their personal guests. Thats how soccer is meant to be experienced.
I was at RBA and to me it seemed that by the second half, if you included the many people walking about the concourses and at the concession stands, that more than 20k were at the stadium. Still, I believe MLS's policy is to report tickets sold, so clearly there were no shows. Still, there were more people there than it appeared. How to fix that? I don't know. Maybe the first few games will attract a lot of curiosity seekers or people who go there because of the stadium novelty and aren't as interested as us in seating down, but as the season goes on most of the attendants will be there for the soccer. We shall see.
That picture should be stapled to the office door of every employee of HSG by Garber. That's bad. That's really, really bad. I feel for the hardcore fans who've supported all these years - I supported soccer around southern Ontario before TFC and know what empty stadiums are like - but that can't be sustainable. Worse, it could be permanently poisoning the market for at least a generation. I know people hold out hope that selling FCD to a more interested owner could result in a Mark Cuban Mav's style resurrection but anyone who wants to try it is going to be sailing into extremely difficult headwinds.
I don't think other team are haters, we just would love see some big crowds in Dallas and New England And by the way, you are doing a great job by supporting your team, I only wish more people had some of your dedication
Repped. There's a reason the Midnight Riders and Inferno get along so well together. Every FCD employee was there. They saw that same picture in giant, technicolor, super-HD real life.
Time for something drastic with FC Dallas. Make all tickets the same price, say $12 for any game that has a national television audience and only sell tickets for the TV side. Once those are sold out, then release the other sections. Issue refunds to season ticket holders for the difference. They've had this issue for years now. Whatever they did/are doing hasn't worked. Heck, make all tickets $12 for all games. its not as if they some super brand where there is inherent value in an FC Dallas ticket. also, I've always thought that the clubs need to make their players more accessible. Give the players sharpies after each game and encourage them to go out to the fans and sign stuff and meet people. With the exception of warmups at an MLB game, where else would you get that? Create a connection between the fans/players because obviously there are a few clubs that don't have a connection with the community.
Well, Chivas increased their ticket sales after struggling at the gates for a few years. I am sure Dallas can do the same
They could sell the tickets for $5 apiece and it wouldn't make a difference. Price ain't the problem.
This is based on what, one game? This year's opening date? Watch the sales plummet if CDCUSA is as listless as the first game suggested.
It seems like a confluence of (negative) factors came into play at Dallas. To wit: 1) an afternoon game going up against youth soccer throughout the region; 2) the Dallas Cup opening up the following day drawing a lot of attention away from MLS; 3) the CBA negotations going badly for so long with the threat that most of the Dallas FO and sales staff were going to lose their jobs, hence they did not sell and promote the opening game as much as they could or should have. They got two weeks now to turn it around a bit, with the Crew coming in on the 10th. Hopefully they can get those numbers headed northwards.
Not really. It's just that the Galaxy's dominance in the market always made them seem even smaller then they were. And don't worry, I hate them too.
The LA Chivas has a bad 2007 season when their average attendance dropped to 14,305. In september that year they appointed a guy with over 20years in sports marketing, ticket sales and corporate partnerships. In 2008 they raised their average attendance to 15,114 and last year with the bad economy they dropped only a little bit to 15,091. They opened the 2010 season with 18 K, I hope they can keep up those kind of numbers.
Only by having another team have worse attendance than Dallas. And then it would turn into a Bash The New Worst Attended Team thread. Such is life in online communities. I generally ignore them after Tuesday or so. Not really sure why I keep looking at this one.
Hey Dustin, Curious here. If you were GM of Dallas, what would you do to increase attendance? And what's a reasonable attendance goal for Dallas? I don't ever recall Dallas being a league attendance leader, so would an attendance of, say 14,000 per year be a good target in the next two years?
Ditto on selling the Crew. HSG just doesn't seem to get how an MLS franchise should be run. I'd much, much prefer an ownership group like KC's OnGoal.
I'm not bashing anybody. The Week 2 games are: Salt Lake @ Houston Chivas USA @ Los Angeles Chicago @ Colorado New England @ DC United New York @ Seattle So why is this thread clogged with the same old Dallas stuff?