[News] Update: NHL green lights season-ticket drive for Las Vegas

[CroFlames]

Originally Posted by Locke

I've always wondered what makes people say that Vegas is an 'economically challenged' city.

I go to Vegas about once a year and trust me, if there was a hockey team there I'd go more, but Vegas is far from economically challenged.

You make a good point, the majority of Vegas' wealth is in the hands of a few, perhaps fewer than most cities of comparable size.

But when I was in Vegas I kept hearing people talk about 'Vegas is hurting' and 'profits are down.'

Well...yeah. Imagine Las Vegas as a system, that system was built to withstand unbelievable throughput, not every hotel can be filled to capacity all the time, not every seat at every gaming table can be filled every day all the time, the system is just too big for that.

So when people say 'Vegas is hurting' and 'profits are down' they arent entirely wrong but its relative to their standards.

The Casinos are still raking in cash, they're making astronomical profits but they arent operating at 100% capacity and if thats their standard then yes, they're a long ways from it, but they're in no danger of going bankrupt or anything they're just not making as much money as they can or that their owners would like.

I wouldnt consider that hurting or challenged, thats just life.

And hell, as I was saying about hotel rooms and gaming tables, what do these businesses want? More people.

Guess what a hockey team will bring in?

I think a lot people see parts of north Las Vegas and assume all LV like that, minus the strip.

The reality of LV is that it has affluent & poor neighborhoods, same as any large city. However, LV also has the Strip & oodles of people coming and going to that area all the time, leaving their money there too.

Yes, LV may be hurting in that the economic downturn has affected everyone in the USA, but people there aren't starving. It's all relative. They did get 10,000 season ticket deposits.

[TOTO Flames]

Don't post on here but do often read. This whole issue of the locals not supporting the team is hog wash, I was down in Vegas last week and I made it a point to get the locals take on the possible NHL team. Most wanted it, they said its boring not having any local flavor to cheer for. I spoke with service staff that is seriously contemplating getting season tickets. They are excited for it and said its about time.

[CroFlames]

Originally Posted by TOTO Flames

Don't post on here but do often read. This whole issue of the locals not supporting the team is hog wash, I was down in Vegas last week and I made it a point to get the locals take on the possible NHL team. Most wanted it, they said its boring not having any local flavor to cheer for. I spoke with service staff that is seriously contemplating getting season tickets. They are excited for it and said its about time.

I post often, and I go to Vegas often

I found the same thing regarding local appetite for a team.

[CliffFletcher]

Originally Posted by Locke

I've always wondered what makes people say that Vegas is an 'economically challenged' city.

Presumably it's the low median income of the people who actually live there. The fact some casinos rake in a bunch of money from tourists doesn't mean there's a healthy market of individuals willing to pony up $2,500 to $8,000 for season tickets. There's tonnes of money in Cancun. Doesn't mean it could support a major professional sports team.

The alluring notion that tourists and transplants can support a major professional sports team has yet to be proven.

Originally Posted by TOTO Flames

Don't post on here but do often read. This whole issue of the locals not supporting the team is hog wash, I was down in Vegas last week and I made it a point to get the locals take on the possible NHL team. Most wanted it, they said its boring not having any local flavor to cheer for. I spoke with service staff that is seriously contemplating getting season tickets. They are excited for it and said its about time.

You don't think you would have heard the same thing talking to people in Phoenix, Tampa, and Miami 20 years ago?

[Locke]

Originally Posted by CliffFletcher

Presumably it's the low median income of the people who actually live there. The fact some casinos rake in a bunch of money from tourists doesn't mean there's a healthy market of individuals willing to pony up $2,500 to $8,000 for season tickets. There's tonnes of money in Cancun. Doesn't mean it could support a major professional sports team.

The alluring notion that tourists and transplants can support a major professional sports team has yet to be proven.

You don't think you would have heard the same thing talking to people in Phoenix, Tampa, and Miami 20 years ago?

Originally Posted by Resolute 14

http://www.thehockeynews.com/blog/pr...00-seats-sold/

11,500 seats sold to individuals, 1000 to corporations, 735 in suites.

I dont know, it seems to me that most people know exactly where the majority of the funding for a major professional sports team is going to come from.

Most major professional sports teams make some money from us meatbags that pay for tickets and plunk our meatbutts in their hard plastic seats to go and see these guys play but typically the local businesses and corporate money is what makes them ultimately viable.

Not to mention, these arent a string of Motel 6s or anything.

[polak]

Originally Posted by CliffFletcher

Presumably it's the low median income of the people who actually live there. The fact some casinos rake in a bunch of money from tourists doesn't mean there's a healthy market of individuals willing to pony up $2,500 to $8,000 for season tickets. There's tonnes of money in Cancun. Doesn't mean it could support a major professional sports team.

The alluring notion that tourists and transplants can support a major professional sports team has yet to be proven.



You don't think you would have heard the same thing talking to people in Phoenix, Tampa, and Miami 20 years ago?

Tampa does fine.

[CroFlames]

Originally Posted by polak

Tampa does fine.

I'm not sure about that:

http://www.forbes.com/nhl-valuations...on:asc_search:

To me, this looks like they are steadily losing money.

[TOTO Flames]

Originally Posted by CroFlames

I post often, and I go to Vegas often

I found the same thing regarding local appetite for a team.

I was quite shocked, I go every May to celebrate my birthday, and I can count on 1 hand how many hockey conversations Id have. This year everyone wanted to talk hockey.

[polak]

Originally Posted by CroFlames

I'm not sure about that:

http://www.forbes.com/nhl-valuations...on:asc_search:

To me, this looks like they are steadily losing money.

I was going by attendance.

9th. Ahead of "Traditional" Vancouver.

http://espn.go.com/nhl/attendance

I don't know why they're losing money and there's never any talk about them moving or anything either...

[heep223]

All I know is that there's no way an NHL team in Vegas could be a bigger joke than what's happening in Phoenix right now. Move them asap.

[CroFlames]

Originally Posted by polak

I was going by attendance.

9th. Ahead of "Traditional" Vancouver.

http://espn.go.com/nhl/attendance

I don't know why they're losing money and there's never any talk about them moving or anything either...

Likely because they give away seats for free, or nearly free.

[Locke]

Originally Posted by heep223

All I know is that there's no way an NHL team in Vegas could be a bigger joke than what's happening in Phoenix right now. Move them asap.

To be honest, when you look at their initial interest in terms of season ticket sales I could see them being a stronger market than many in the NHL.

[Hemi-Cuda]

Originally Posted by CliffFletcher

You don't think you would have heard the same thing talking to people in Phoenix, Tampa, and Miami 20 years ago?

Tampa has consistently been in the top 10 in the league attendance wise since they won the cup, and Florida had a lot of fan support for a time following their lone cup final appearance, but their inept management has pissed all of that away with year after year of failure. I'll wait to see how their support grows if they can continue to build around Ekblad and finally make the team competitive

No arguing with Phoenix, they've had recent success but still no one cares

[CliffFletcher]

As has been pointed out, the Florida teams give away tickets to fill the seats. I'd like to see Tampa's season ticket base.

[Cleveland Steam Whistle]

People get way to focused on attendance and also attendance with a winning team when discussing viability of a market. Attendance doesn't mean crap if the tickets are cheap, and markets need to also be able to sustain the ebbs and flows of winning and losing, you can't expect to have a perennial winner to build a business case around.

Thought process like that lead to Tampa being called a hockey market cause they can sell out their building when the reach the cup final and have $10 tickets that come with free pop corn and a drink (some hyperbole there) and people actually raising eyebrows in Calgary when in the middle of a rebuild we don't sell out the building on a Tuesday night against Buffalo but still manage 18K plus in the stands paying 5% YOY ticket price increases on an average ticket price of $100 with arena pricing on drinks and food.

[Jay Random]

That's the thing: anybody can fill a building if they make the tickets cheap enough.

According to Forbes, the Lightning lost $11.9 million in their most recent fiscal year, in spite of a big increase in revenue. That big increase still left them as one of the eight NHL teams with revenues less than $100 million.

No doubt they'll end up with a profit this season, but you can't build a business plan on the assumption that you will make the Stanley Cup finals every year.

[Rollin22x]

Originally Posted by CliffFletcher

As has been pointed out, the Florida teams give away tickets to fill the seats. I'd like to see Tampa's season ticket base.

I thought I read somewhere, the Panthers stopped giving away tickets. It isn't going over very well with the fans that pay for season tickets, then have the guy next to them walk in for free. Diluted their own market.

[FlamesAddiction]

There will always be teams that lose money because there will always be owners that are willing to operate teams at a loss. They see it either as a play thing for them, or a business that loses them money on the surface, but still generally has value because it helps their other enterprises or increases in value over time.

The problems only occur when a team needs to stop losing money and can't pull out of it. I don't know much about Tampa's ownership group though or what their motives are.

[Armchair Quarterback]

Originally Posted by polak

I was going by attendance.

9th. Ahead of "Traditional" Vancouver.

http://espn.go.com/nhl/attendance

I don't know why they're losing money and there's never any talk about them moving or anything either...

They're only ahead of Vancouver in absolute numbers (ranked by "Average"), which is a terrible indicator given that the arenas are not all the same size. By that ranking Tampa Bay is also ahead of Edmonton which has a smaller arena but sells out most home games (even though they suck).

If you look at percentage of attendance (which is what you should be looking at given that the arenas are not all the same size), Tampa Bay falls to 19th and 4 spots behind Vancouver. Point is, looking at those numbers by percentage will give a better idea of why some franchises are failing (Arizona is third last for example).

[Armchair Quarterback]

Originally Posted by Hemi-Cuda

Tampa has consistently been in the top 10 in the league attendance wise since they won the cup, and Florida had a lot of fan support for a time following their lone cup final appearance, but their inept management has pissed all of that away with year after year of failure.

No. The only season they were in the top 10 percentage-wise was 06-07, which makes sense. But since that season, right up to a couple of years ago, TB was consistently in the bottom third of league attendance according to the report (according to % of seats filled). Still a healthy attendance record for the most part but definitely not top 10.