and now you join Ken in the bad research department. You should probably stick to topic you have a clue about. here, for instance, is the Information on BYU's ROC pass (formerly the all sports pass), which is TOTALLY elective and can be purchased by any BYU student or guest. I dont know how you qualify as a guest, but there is no talk anywhere about the fees being included in your tuition. And there is no hint anywhere that it is wrapped up in tuition fees. It doesnt even say you have to be a tuition paying student in fact, it says the contrary. a guest can buy one). Pricing varies by what plan and seating you choose. http://byutickets.com/content/roc-pass and here is a tweet by BYU womens soccer reminding students they need to buy a pass.. But thanks for illustrating Kens, and now your, lack of knowledge or research on the topic. every student ticket is paid for on an elective season/yearly pass basis, whether you want to admit it or not.. BYU is leading the NCAA in attendance, BTW, so you both are eliminating a paid for attendance that will probably put BYU above all but 30 soccer venues in the country of any type on kens list http://www.kenn.com/the_blog/?p=5602 their entirely paid and elective attendance would put them at 26 right now. At Portland, you check a box when you register. the option is yours, but it is still elective, and the Majority of the Butts in the seats for all sports go to women's soccer.
congrats, you've got 2 schools out of 350 or so...research huh? Maybe you should take the WCC or Big XII or whatever, and see what schools have what policy. Or you can cherry pick an outlier and name call. It's all good. Also, isn't that basically a football season ticket pass that includes all other sports for free?
I would think any potential owner would look at any available data point. But the track record of converting strong college attendance to pro teams isn't very good - and not just for soccer. Didn't Paulson's success come from the soccer culture in Portland (which UP is also a beneficiary of) and a strong, coordinated sales program across platforms? I'd think THAT demand drove his involvement more than attendance at UP . . .
I've said it before, I'll say it again. I think Portland is an exception. Who else routinely sells out a 5000 seat stadium for big games? After Portland, then who? Texas A&M and then? Once you get past the top 2 or 3, you're talking about average attendances that are no more than 500 or 600 more than the 15th or 20th placed school. It's just not enough to make a difference. KC, Washington, and Western NY did fine in attendance this year. What's the big hotbed in women's college soccer in KC?
now who has jumped the shark? who is name calling? the shark is your intro into the discussion. it is incumbent upon the person who puts out the attendance list to show diligence, not somebody who points out the flaws in the research. I pointed out quite clearly that the list is a sham. thats all I need to do. the list is proven now(by your admission,) to be wrong. it claims to be comprehensive (it isnt) and the defense that it is only professional teams is also clearly in error. this is exactly what I am talking about. your claim and Kens are not research, they are biased assumptions. do the damn research and then make a claim. you are just making my point that you don't know what you are talking about. there are many schools that charge attendance to everyone after some fashion and they should be counted under the same criteria the Pro and club and PDL and WPSL teams listed. which brings up another point. Ken listed the BYU mens PDL team attendance, but discounts the BYU women's NCAA team on the list (the women outdrew the men) did he check to see if a BYU ROC card gets you into a Men's game or if any PDL teams allow free admission? bet he didn't.
So far as women's soccer is concerned, so far as I can recall, except for the Carolina Courage in WUSA, the professional women's teams have not been located where there is strong college attendance. Except for Portland. (I'm not counting MagicJack since I'm not sure what kind of team they were.) Anyone know how the Courage did with attendance?
Two ns, boys. If you notice, I don't do college attendance. I'm not into college attendance. If it gets you guys off to include college attendance when the vast majority of (paying or otherwise) customers go to a school and live within walking distance of the stadium, thus are a built-in audience, be my guest. Make whatever list you like. My lists are lists of teams in the pro leagues and the PDL and W-League. I am not about to research who pays for what at which schools because I don't really care. If you do, well, gosh, Wilbur, you got one over on me! You, who've never sold a ********ing ticket in your life! You want to include college, be my guest. Kind of a different animal (as BYU's men's team is...I don't know exactly why listing BYU's PDL attendance in a list of, you know, PDL attendance figures requires me to list BYU's women's team attendance), but do your own ********ing list and don't be a dipshit about mine when most of you couldn't get within two time zones of reality when it comes to WoSo.
So, according to Kenn's numbers the Courage averaged about 5600 fans over three years. Kenn, since you're here, I have a question you probably are the best person to ask. In looking at the WUSA numbers, in your opinion are they real? As compared to this year's NWSL numbers and also as compared to the WPS numbers which are more in line with the NWSL numbers? I'm asking because the WUSA numbers look high to me.
Can you give me a sense of what would be a reasonable distance to expect reasonable fans to drive to get to the Metroplex? (Not what you or I would drive, but what a more typical fan would drive.) If you can give me that, then I can look and see what schools are within that driving distance and what their attendance is.
There were only three schools where the women's team drew over 2000 fans last year. They were Portland (of course), BYU (Salt Lake City, anyone?), and Texas A&M (no chance, just a college town). UNC has slumped to only 1400 fans per game. http://fs.ncaa.org/Docs/stats/w_soccer_RB/2013/attend.pdf
Um... BYU is in Provo, actually. Right now Google Maps has it as an hour and 20 minutes by car from Salt lake City. Not a lot of people walk to the games from there for either the women's games or the men's PDL games.
I guess I'd look at it as "what's equivalent to the drive DMV folks make to MLB/NBA/NFL/NHL games?" Especially since it's not the distance, it's the drive time. The Plex is tough to get to during the afternoon rush hour, since it's basically right in the heart of the route out of town for the northwest suburbs of DC. That said, a woso fan willing to drive to a Maryland game is going to be willing to drive to the Plex. But will a general sports fan who works downtown and lives in Springfield? That's just a heck of a lot of driving, and I think the difficulty is born out by weekday numbers at the Plex. That said, is there more of a differential between weekday/weekend games for the Spirit than some other teams? I don't think the Plex is so inaccessible on it's own, but the weeknight deal is pretty discouraging if you live on the wrong side of the river.
Sorry, I wasn't here. I think WUSA spent more and had bigger name players (and the new league factor). Given how austere WPS was, it's no surprise their numbers were lower. (A WPS exec told me some owners saw an opportunity to slash expenses, so they did, thinking they'd be better off because their revenues wouldn't drop, only they did, because it costs money to generate revenue.) NWSL is operating in a different environment (not just its business plan, I mean the milieu in which new soccer teams are being hatched now). There's no novelty factor, and there are more modest expectations than in 2001, but there's a whole culture and acceptance of the product as an actual event/competition that I'm not sure was as strong before. They are still a bit hamstrung because (unless things have changed lately, and with Portland and Houston as exceptions) the clubs have small staffs and less-than-robust infrastructure. They just didn't have time to build that infrastructure, given how quickly the league came together in the first place. (Houston is helped by having people already in place who can either do certain tasks or get the Dash's people up to speed quickly.) Without knowing for sure, my guess is that WUSA's numbers were probably puffed up a bit (almost everybody's numbers are, from when time began, it's just a matter of how much), but they spent a lot to try and draw crowds (and it ultimately did them in). My sense is that there were more seats filled in WUSA than in either WPS or NWSL, but it's not a completely fair comparison given the disparate stadium sizes. I'm going to guess that WUSA did sell more tickets than either of the leagues that followed. But that the NWSL seems to be making good progress toward selling a good amount of tickets despite their still-admittedly-small staffs. They've got a great situation in Portland, a promising one in Houston, a pretty good one in Rochester, what looks like a good one in KC (I like their move to a proper venue, despite the inevitable loss in revenue) and potential in Washington. Boston needs to recapture what it once had, I don't know what Seattle's deal is (I think their expectations were way off in year one) and I don't know that Chicago and Sky Blue know what they're doing. But they have some things to build on. If the various federations decide to keep funding this business model after the WWC in 2015 and will be patient, there's a chance to build on the foundation they've laid. If, for some reason, Mexico fails to qualify for the WWC (I don't even know if that's a possibility, I haven't looked at the format), they might be less inclined to continue. I don't know. Canada's already qualified, but they won't have an incentive to fund their national team players post 2015, given how dreadful their usual WWC performance is. Sorry that was a long answer to a short question.
The WUSA Washington Freedom definitely had better attendance than the WPS Washington Freedom, but to do it they had to rent out a massively oversized (but well-located) stadium at $100k/game. If a Washington women's team could find a reasonably priced venue with good public transportation, it could get attendance not far below what they got in the WUSA era.
Assuming they made the effort to actually put resources into sales and marketing, sure. WUSA teams spent fairly lavishly on all sorts of things, anticipating much higher revenues than they got.
My thoughts about improving attendance. Data from Kenn's blog: http://www.kenn.com/the_blog/?p=5602 Portland Thorns FC; 11; 146,521: 13,320 Obviously the level to strive for. FC Kansas City; 11; 50,884: 4,626 Just short of the 5,000 per game mark. I expected them to beat 5K in 2014, but they moved to a stadium with FEWER seats than the one they played in last year. What? Western New York Flash; 11; 49,334: 4,485 Also just short of 5K per game. Marketing was substandard last year, attributed to the the short time from the league's inception and the fact that rosters were not settled until the end of February or later. WNY has been quiet this off season. I hope this does not foreshadow a quiet marketing plan for 2014. Washington Spirit; 11; 39,816: 3,620 I thought this was a WIN for the Spirit. In so many places I have read that the Soccerplex was too remote to draw fans. The fans showed up strong, even at the end of the season when the Spirit were out of contention. I predict a major increase in 2014. Boston Breakers; 11; 26,697: 2,427 This was disappointing. The Breakers have a great history as a club. The short pre-season and late roster completion probably affected the numbers. Dilboy may have been a factor, too. They will do better at Harvard Stadium this year, but as I recall the WPS attendance at Harvard was not terrific. May the Mewis family is as big as the Wambach family and that will help. Boston must step up its marketing efforts. Seattle Reign FC; 11; 25,365: 2,306 Very disappointing. I think separating from the Sounders name was a big factor. Again short pre-season and late rosters. The poor record was a problem too. But still disappointing. This year having Rapinoe the whole season and the many good off-season trades and roster changes can be great for marketing, if they take advantage of it. Beating 4K should be achievable; they should shoot for 5K. Chicago Red Stars; 11; 18,817: 1,711 Ouch. As has been frequently discussed here, Chicagoland does not have NWSL-suitable venues. The best, Toyota Park is too big and too expensive. Benedictine capacity is only 3,071 (Wikipedia). This team deserves better. Arnim Whisler is a great asset. They must do better marketing this year. Sky Blue FC; 11; 18,309: 1,664 Now known as the inscrutable franchise. From a marketing perspective I believe they just don't get it. Since WPS days, I have believed they need to market themselves as the NEW JERSEY Sky Blue and take advantage of the Jersey Girls on the team and from visiting clubs in their marketing efforts. They need to go back to sky blue home kits and orange away kits. The Rutgers area has plenty of people to support this team and a solid soccer community; why there is no support is a mystery to me. Yurcak is a nice soccer stadium that holds 5,000; the Sky Blue must shoot to bring in more than 4K a game this year.
I'm sure most of the Breakers attendance issues were due to Dilboy's limited capacity. They finished the year at 89% capacity, according to Equalizer, with a couple of horrible weather matches in there. Here's how they did in WPS at Harvard Stadium in 2011: Women’s Professional Soccer 2011 G Total Average Western New York Flash 9 43,925 4,881 Atlanta Beat 9 43,559 4,840 Boston Breakers 9 39,992 4,444 In 2010, they led the league with 4,490. 2009 was 4,665.
You are right. My memory failed. I was thinking about 2012 WPSL-E attendance being low, but they also played at Dilboy that year.
And the other thing about have a small park that is always near capacity is it ruins walk up...if u didnt get advance tickets and know it sells out a lot, ur not going to drive over to Somerville (?) just to see if there r seats. As to the Reign, if they move to Memorial then the sky is the limit. If they stay at Starfire then they should get closer to the sellout number but still have a top end around 3800.
The only issue is does it still host a lot of HS football meaning football lines on the field. Where Stafire is SSS