3 things I see.
1. The local economy has been hit hard in this town. Our unemployment rate is still very high compared to the National average and even the Provincial average.
2. When I go to games, I find the nose bleeds tend to be the most commonly empty/unsold. So at the very least, the more expensive lower bowl seats are typically full. It just doesn’t help that a relatively large, out of date capacity arena has swaths of empty, undesirable seats (PL’s) that affects its “sell out” data.
3. Lastly, attendance looks like it’s down across the board. The NHL is a gate driven league and I find millennials are less interested in attending actual games and instead prefer more inexpensive options like streaming or skipping out on the league’s product entirely. I worked with quite a few millennials as a part time gig and in that age group, no one there gave a rats ass about hockey or the Flames. Also doesn’t help that this city is filled with migrants from other provinces/countries who didn’t grow up Flames fans and thus, aren’t interested in paying for games unless their team comes to town.
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