Ohio Football Topic
Topic: Dispatch article on lower attendance at games
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Pataskala
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Posted: 9/27/2014 11:28 AM
The Dispatch ran an interesting article this morning on what colleges (especially O$U) are doing to attract fans to games. It has a discussion about Ohio's efforts. http://buckeyextra.dispatch.com/content/stories/2014/09/2...
LuckySparrow
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Posted: 9/27/2014 12:17 PM
Ohio can pack the students in pretty well now. But the next task is making them stay past halftime.
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Posted: 9/27/2014 5:30 PM
LuckySparrow wrote:expand_more
Ohio can pack the students in pretty well now. But the next task is making them stay past halftime.
Most of them seemed to stay at least into the fourth quarter today.
Alan Swank
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Posted: 9/27/2014 6:11 PM
Pataskala wrote:expand_more
Ohio can pack the students in pretty well now. But the next task is making them stay past halftime.
Most of them seemed to stay at least into the fourth quarter today.
If by most you mean more than 50% of that side, that's true. If the powers that be could find a way to get the time of the game down under 3 hours, more folks would stay. 3:30 is just way too long.
Pataskala
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Posted: 9/27/2014 6:57 PM
Alan Swank wrote:expand_more
Ohio can pack the students in pretty well now. But the next task is making them stay past halftime.
Most of them seemed to stay at least into the fourth quarter today.
If by most you mean more than 50% of that side, that's true. If the powers that be could find a way to get the time of the game down under 3 hours, more folks would stay. 3:30 is just way too long.
Shorten the TV timeouts or have fewer of them. But that'll never happen.
Beat Michigan
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Posted: 9/27/2014 9:07 PM
Won't be long they will have to add seats.
Mike Johnson
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Posted: 9/27/2014 9:37 PM
Alan Swank wrote:expand_more
Ohio can pack the students in pretty well now. But the next task is making them stay past halftime.
Most of them seemed to stay at least into the fourth quarter today.
If by most you mean more than 50% of that side, that's true. If the powers that be could find a way to get the time of the game down under 3 hours, more folks would stay. 3:30 is just way too long.
Hey Alan,

When I drive a roundtrip of 330 miles to games, I plan on a full day. So, for me, 3.5 hours is just fine. And I do stay till the clock reads 00.00.
@tomicrodge1804
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Posted: 9/27/2014 10:05 PM
Beat Michigan wrote:expand_more
Won't be long they will have to add seats.

True that!! Ladies and Gentlemen...... We have a program.
In other news, TOS to UM?
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Posted: 9/27/2014 10:48 PM
Beat Michigan wrote:expand_more
Won't be long they will have to add seats.
I think we need to seriously talk stadium expansion, demand has consistently remained high for several years.
71 BOBCAT
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Posted: 9/28/2014 8:39 AM
Thanks to Frank Ohio is bucking the trend.






GO BOBCATS
TheBobcatBandit
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Posted: 9/28/2014 9:51 AM
No question we need to expand. We consistently fill Peden to the brim and yesterday we direly needed more seats. The stadium was uncomfortably packed and a lady behind me fainted from the heat.

Edit: All while playing a lower division school. That Kansas game in two years will be crazy.
Last Edited: 9/28/2014 9:52:44 AM by TheBobcatBandit
Ohio69
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Posted: 9/28/2014 10:10 AM
If demand is down, I assume ticket prices, concession prices, and parking prices will go down. Right economics majors?
Mark Lembright '85
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Posted: 9/28/2014 10:18 AM
TheBobcatBandit wrote:expand_more
No question we need to expand. We consistently fill Peden to the brim and yesterday we direly needed more seats. The stadium was uncomfortably packed and a lady behind me fainted from the heat.

Edit: All while playing a lower division school. That Kansas game in two years will be crazy.
Yeah I'm not so sure stadium expansion's needed. Attendance typically falls off dramatically after the Homecoming game. The late October through November games seem to only draw 15,000-18,000 people.
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Posted: 9/28/2014 10:22 AM
Ohio69 wrote:expand_more
If demand is down, I assume ticket prices, concession prices, and parking prices will go down. Right economics majors?

As for concessions, once the fans are at the game, they continue to be a captive market, and have only one place to buy concessions, so demand will continue to be inelastic, just at a lower level. Costs for the stand are relatively fixed, and costs need to be covered, so prices may actually rise as costs are spread over smaller volume. What you probably would see happen is that, if attendance falls, there would be fewer stands. As an example of this, at the EMU game that I attended last year, there was only one concession stand open at all on the Ohio side, and it closed at the half.

As for tickets and parking prices, yes, falling attendance should lead to lower prices for those. Since they don't like to reduce the face amount, you would probably see more promotions.
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Posted: 9/28/2014 10:39 AM
Mark Lembright '85 wrote:expand_more
Yeah I'm not so sure stadium expansion's needed. Attendance typically falls off dramatically after the Homecoming game. The late October through November games seem to only draw 15,000-18,000 people.

It would be tough to justify spending very much on expansion if the seats were only used 2-3 games a year. Still, there are probably some things that could be done at relatively low cost that might work, such as engineering the addition of a few more seats in the process of constructing the academic center. How about engineering it so that indoor skyboxes could be added on the roof, or at the other extreme, some cheap overflow bleachers up there?
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Posted: 9/28/2014 10:51 AM
Ohio69 wrote:expand_more
If demand is down, I assume ticket prices, concession prices, and parking prices will go down. Right economics majors?
Or maybe they'll start flex pricing like O$U does for tickets and the City of Cincinnati is proposing for parking meters. As the seats fill up, the prices go up. Could do the same for parking -- as the lot fills up, the price goes up. Those who buy early and park early get the best deals. Concessions? Dunno.
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Posted: 9/28/2014 11:33 AM
L.C. wrote:expand_more
Yeah I'm not so sure stadium expansion's needed. Attendance typically falls off dramatically after the Homecoming game. The late October through November games seem to only draw 15,000-18,000 people.

It would be tough to justify spending very much on expansion if the seats were only used 2-3 games a year. Still, there are probably some things that could be done at relatively low cost that might work, such as engineering the addition of a few more seats in the process of constructing the academic center. How about engineering it so that indoor skyboxes could be added on the roof, or at the other extreme, some cheap overflow bleachers up there?
I like this idea. A LOT. Bleachers, or club seats in that area seems like a really great idea to me! Beyond that, adding seats to me is simply not justified at this point in my opinion. When the hill is totally full for overflow seating for every single Saturday game, or the attendance numbers on every Saturday game reaches 25k for a couple years in a row, then I can see it. Until then, I'd rather see the money spent on improvements in sound system in Peden, Audio/Visual/scoreboard improvements within the Convo, and concessions/restroom improvements in both.
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Posted: 9/28/2014 11:35 AM
Added thought: It's mind blowing to me that universities charge their students $235 to $280 to go to 5-6 home games.
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Posted: 9/28/2014 11:53 AM
OU_Country wrote:expand_more
I like this idea. A LOT. Bleachers, or club seats in that area seems like a really great idea to me! ...

They wouldn't even have to put either in right now; just engineer it so that they could be added in the future, if warranted.
Last Edited: 9/28/2014 11:56:36 AM by L.C.
Monroe Slavin
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Posted: 9/28/2014 1:20 PM
Win a MAC Championship.

And stay in contention most every year.

Then, you'll have hour demand for more seats. By demand, I mean people actually rather upset at not being able to get seats or 'good' seats.

WIN A MAC CHAMPIONSHIP and then we'll talk.
Alan Swank
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Posted: 9/28/2014 1:41 PM
OU_Country wrote:expand_more
Added thought: It's mind blowing to me that universities charge their students $235 to $280 to go to 5-6 home games.
We charge way more than that - way more than that. Here's the math - an all sports pass for those sports that charge other than football and men's basketball is $40. Add to that a Hoops action pack for $60 and $98 for a season football ticket, and that's only $198 to be able to see every game in every sport. The athletics portion of the student fee is many times that.
Alan Swank
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Posted: 9/28/2014 1:43 PM
TheBobcatBandit wrote:expand_more
No question we need to expand. We consistently fill Peden to the brim and yesterday we direly needed more seats. The stadium was uncomfortably packed and a lady behind me fainted from the heat.

Edit: All while playing a lower division school. That Kansas game in two years will be crazy.
Not sure where you were sitting but there were plenty of seats in five different locations yesterday- the southwest corner of the home stands, the northwest wing, the northeast wing, the southeast corner of the student section and the hill. You could see all of those sparsely populated areas very clearly from the Touchdown Club seats.
BillyTheCat
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Posted: 9/28/2014 2:59 PM
Yesterday was 99% capacity with a crowd of over 23,000, we are averaging over capacity through our 1st two games! We need to expand now! How else will we get into a bigger conference where we belong?
Bobcat Love's Sense of Shame
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Posted: 9/28/2014 3:53 PM
Expansion? Great idea. If there's one place I wanna invest money these days, it's non-power conference college football.
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Posted: 9/28/2014 4:26 PM
BillyTheCat wrote:expand_more
Yesterday was 99% capacity with a crowd of over 23,000, we are averaging over capacity through our 1st two games! We need to expand now! How else will we get into a bigger conference where we belong?

While the sarcasm is thick here, the point is valid. Most likely the opportunity to move to a "bigger conference" will never come, but if it does, such a conference would require the addition of more seats. The point that I was trying to make above was not that seats should be added now (unless the cost was very low), but rather that changes being made anyway, like the academic center, should be done in a way that would be friendly to future expansion, just in case it was needed.
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