PASabreFan Posted October 2, 2013 Report Share Posted October 2, 2013 Season tickets as a status symbol? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cpabob Posted October 2, 2013 Report Share Posted October 2, 2013 Now down to 100 seats or so in the 300's (plus 30 or so singles in the lower bowl) for Friday so it will sell out. Please amend your criticism of the team, management and/or fans to "fans are not buying tickets...fast enough". Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
X. Benedict Posted October 2, 2013 Report Share Posted October 2, 2013 The actual demand for the entire Western New York population to see the Sabres live, is not overwhelming. Relative to where? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
darksabre Posted October 2, 2013 Report Share Posted October 2, 2013 Relative to where? Imaginationland, USA Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
X. Benedict Posted October 2, 2013 Report Share Posted October 2, 2013 Imaginationland, USA That sounds like a dirty theme park. They can't be much interested in hockey there. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ghost of Dwight Drane Posted October 3, 2013 Report Share Posted October 3, 2013 Relative to where? The entire point has been that the Sabres have hold of a small niche of ticket holders. If the product was so overwhelmingly in demand, there is little to no excuse for an extra 2500 tickets to be such a tough sell for 25% of the season at pretty much season ticket prices. I'm just trying to see the logical reasons behind it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
X. Benedict Posted October 3, 2013 Report Share Posted October 3, 2013 The entire point has been that the Sabres have hold of a small niche of ticket holders. If the product was so overwhelmingly in demand, there is little to no excuse for an extra 2500 tickets to be such a tough sell for 25% of the season at pretty much season ticket prices. I'm just trying to see the logical reasons behind it. You are talking about a league where most teams don't regularly fill a barn until after November. So relative to those teams demand is strong. Relative to Toronto......well..... not so overwhelming. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ghost of Dwight Drane Posted October 3, 2013 Report Share Posted October 3, 2013 You are talking about a league where most teams don't regularly fill a barn until after November. So relative to those teams demand is strong. Relative to Toronto......well..... not so overwhelming. And what is their season ticket to capacity ratio? What is their pricing like on individual games versus season ticket sales? For $155, you can get a seat to 5 Value Sabres games, get priority for playoff tickets, get discounts on other games and merchandise, and get priority to renew for seats in the future. With 16,000 season tickets renewed and added off of the waiting list, and a waiting list, I find it nothing short of amazing there are between 1,000 and 1,700 seats available to 8 of 9 Value games....which only had a pool of 2,500 available seats BEFORE New Minipacks went on sale. It has been 2 months. 800 seats to the general public? This is like if there was a bug-collecting society in Buffalo that consists of 150 members, and the biggest known name in the world of bugs was coming here for a series of 4 lectures....and the capacity of the venue was 150. They put prices at $50 a ticket....or you can get all 4 sessions over the year for $180. They cap All-session tickets at 120. They sell 120 All-session tickets and 8 people are on the waiting list for next year's lectures. Meanwhile, they only sell 125 tickets total to each individual session. If the society didn't go ape for the All-session pass, they would have probably lowered the price to $40..,maybe even $30 per session. The numbers don't logically add up, other than companies and people buy up the seats and sell a bunch of them off. This leaves the Sabres gleefully passing on the inventory risk to the middle-man, and the average fan not wanting to bother going to the arena at these price levels or for this entertainment value. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Weave Posted October 3, 2013 Report Share Posted October 3, 2013 And what is their season ticket to capacity ratio? What is their pricing like on individual games versus season ticket sales? For $155, you can get a seat to 5 Value Sabres games, get priority for playoff tickets, get discounts on other games and merchandise, and get priority to renew for seats in the future. With 16,000 season tickets renewed and added off of the waiting list, and a waiting list, I find it nothing short of amazing there are between 1,000 and 1,700 seats available to 8 of 9 Value games....which only had a pool of 2,500 available seats BEFORE New Minipacks went on sale. It has been 2 months. 800 seats to the general public? This is like if there was a bug-collecting society in Buffalo that consists of 150 members, and the biggest known name in the world of bugs was coming here for a series of 4 lectures....and the capacity of the venue was 150. They put prices at $50 a ticket....or you can get all 4 sessions over the year for $180. They cap All-session tickets at 120. They sell 120 All-session tickets and 8 people are on the waiting list for next year's lectures. Meanwhile, they only sell 125 tickets total to each individual session. If the society didn't go ape for the All-session pass, they would have probably lowered the price to $40..,maybe even $30 per session. The numbers don't logically add up, other than companies and people buy up the seats and sell a bunch of them off. This leaves the Sabres gleefully passing on the inventory risk to the middle-man, and the average fan not wanting to bother going to the arena at these price levels or for this entertainment value. Dude, have you seen the demographics for this area? 900k residents, 24% under 18 and 16% over 65. That drops us down to less than 500k as your customer base, $39k median household income. Add in a football team that dominates the sports scene and it is a miracle that they get the number of season ticket subscribers that they do. I am fairly sure that the Sabres did a marginal profit analysis and determined that they get more bang out of current prices at a bit less than a sellout than they would with lower prices and sellouts. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ghost of Dwight Drane Posted October 3, 2013 Report Share Posted October 3, 2013 Dude, have you seen the demographics for this area? 900k residents, 24% under 18 and 16% over 65. That drops us down to less than 500k as your customer base, $39k median household income. Add in a football team that dominates the sports scene and it is a miracle that they get the number of season ticket subscribers that they do. I am fairly sure that the Sabres did a marginal profit analysis and determined that they get more bang out of current prices at a bit less than a sellout than they would with lower prices and sellouts. You are missing the point as well. The point that PA called "The Drane Conundrum". Status Quo is brought upon by a select group of patrons who continue to buy tickets no matter what. People CLAIM the same thing about the Bills, but even in the SuperBowl years, the Bills were nowhere near the % of season ticket holders the Sabres currently have. The Sabres organization is doing just fine with their strategy...... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
X. Benedict Posted October 3, 2013 Report Share Posted October 3, 2013 And what is their season ticket to capacity ratio? What is their pricing like on individual games versus season ticket sales? . So Buffalo relative to Buffalo? You've been predicting a ticket decline for years. Let me know if you figure out how to short sell the things. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
beerme1 Posted October 3, 2013 Report Share Posted October 3, 2013 Season tickets as a status symbol? And first dibs on concerts too! Well only in the Club level you understand. Status baby! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ghost of Dwight Drane Posted October 3, 2013 Report Share Posted October 3, 2013 So Buffalo relative to Buffalo? You've been predicting a ticket decline for years. Let me know if you figure out how to short sell the things. No you are correct....I was...and I am wrong. Now it's time to understand why. Still, you can get into a game for under face value the majority of time on stubhub if you want a club seat. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Eleven Posted October 3, 2013 Report Share Posted October 3, 2013 OK....so you want to make cash for games where the FNC gets a Canuck invasion and free-ride for a few others. So.......those few others would be the VALUE games. Why not pay the $30 for 5 or 10 games? You have just proven pretty much everyone's point here. 1) Nobody REALLY wants to go to a Sabres game except for a select few. 2) The secondary market is selling these season tickets which leads to 8-12 away game atmospheres a year. 3) Well....there's really no 3. I don't blame you.....I did the same thing in 2006-07. It just sucks that the fans are stuck with status quo because these guys sell season tickets. I figured by now people would get sick of taking $50-70 for 20 games of club seats......but I guess not yet. Interesting statement. Thanks for pointing it out....made me look into it. Pittsburgh is like Buffalo in that they cap season tickets. However, they do not offer value games. Looking at the Sabres value games, there are plenty of seats available at $31. There are between 1,000 and 1,700 tickets available to all value games. Comparing it to Pitt.....the Pens play Phoenix on a Tuesday in March. As of now there are 800 seats left. The cheapest seat available is $66. The Penguins sometimes run promotions to games and offer 30% off window price. That still puts the cheapest seat at $46, which has not been offered on this game as of yet. All of the lower bowl pricing in Pittsburgh is 60% higher than what Buffalo charges for a gold game. So where Buffalo has 1,700 tickets available from $31 to $118 in the clubs for value games.....Pitt charges between $66-119 in the upper deck, and $156-$264 in the lower bowl. For the opener tomorrow.......same price levels.....there are 200 seats in the upper deck available starting at $66, and 300 tickets in the lower bowl starting at $156 in Pitt. The Sabres have similar numbers in the upper deck for their opener, but just a scattered few in the lower levels. However let's look at next week. The Sabres have 1,300 upper deck seats available for Columbus, many at $31. 1,200 left for Minnesota and the former captain.....and 500 left for Tampa, which I stand corrected, 8 of the 9 value games have between 1,000-1,700 tickets left. Pittsburgh on the other hand plays Carolina on next Tuesday as well. They have 250 seats available in the upper deck starting at $75........and 500 seats starting at $136 in the lower bowl. In fairness to the Sabres, both teams cap season tickets at 16,000 but the Sabres have 300-500 extra capacity depending on what numbers you use. Pitt has a similar price variance between individual game and season ticket prices as the Sabres when it comes to "gold level" games.....but the Sabres offer 25% of the season at season ticket cost pretty much through value games. Many of the Pens season tickets are sold as half seasons where the Sabres don't do that. So that's my biggest question.....why not just get 5 games at $31 in a mini-pack and pick up the better chance at playoff tickets and other small benefits through the Sabres? Again...sorry for the run-on paragraph. And what is their season ticket to capacity ratio? What is their pricing like on individual games versus season ticket sales? For $155, you can get a seat to 5 Value Sabres games, get priority for playoff tickets, get discounts on other games and merchandise, and get priority to renew for seats in the future. With 16,000 season tickets renewed and added off of the waiting list, and a waiting list, I find it nothing short of amazing there are between 1,000 and 1,700 seats available to 8 of 9 Value games....which only had a pool of 2,500 available seats BEFORE New Minipacks went on sale. It has been 2 months. 800 seats to the general public? This is like if there was a bug-collecting society in Buffalo that consists of 150 members, and the biggest known name in the world of bugs was coming here for a series of 4 lectures....and the capacity of the venue was 150. They put prices at $50 a ticket....or you can get all 4 sessions over the year for $180. They cap All-session tickets at 120. They sell 120 All-session tickets and 8 people are on the waiting list for next year's lectures. Meanwhile, they only sell 125 tickets total to each individual session. If the society didn't go ape for the All-session pass, they would have probably lowered the price to $40..,maybe even $30 per session. The numbers don't logically add up, other than companies and people buy up the seats and sell a bunch of them off. This leaves the Sabres gleefully passing on the inventory risk to the middle-man, and the average fan not wanting to bother going to the arena at these price levels or for this entertainment value. 1. Whoever bought you a new "return" key in between the first two posts and the last, deserves all of our thanks. 2. You are stretching to find flaws. Bigtime. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ghost of Dwight Drane Posted October 3, 2013 Report Share Posted October 3, 2013 1. Whoever bought you a new "return" key in between the first two posts and the last, deserves all of our thanks. 2. You are stretching to find flaws. Bigtime. Sorry. Again...not finding flaws with the Sabres organization. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
spndnchz Posted October 3, 2013 Report Share Posted October 3, 2013 1. Whoever bought you a new "return" key in between the first two posts and the last, deserves all of our thanks. 2. You are stretching to find flaws. Bigtime. He doesn't return things he just re-gifts. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ghost of Dwight Drane Posted October 6, 2013 Report Share Posted October 6, 2013 StubHub for next week's games is starting to look like the floor of the stock exchange in October 1929.... #BlackTuesdayTurdBurger Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Andrew Amerk Posted October 6, 2013 Report Share Posted October 6, 2013 31 posts into the thread, it was necessary to repeat the title? Wow. You can count. Impressive. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PASabreFan Posted October 6, 2013 Report Share Posted October 6, 2013 StubHub for next week's games is starting to look like the floor of the stock exchange in October 1929.... #BlackTuesdayTurdBurger If the secondary market goes, what follows? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Eleven Posted October 6, 2013 Report Share Posted October 6, 2013 StubHub for next week's games is starting to look like the floor of the stock exchange in October 1929.... #BlackTuesdayTurdBurger Maybe, but I just sold seven games in three days. Apparently, there's demand out there. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PromoTheRobot Posted October 6, 2013 Author Report Share Posted October 6, 2013 If the secondary market goes, what follows? The secondary market is the"canary in the coal mine" for sports teams. The people who buy season tickets as resellers insulate teams from the ups and downs of the market. The resellers create the appearance of scarcity. The Sabres do their part by making the box office price significantly higher then the season ticket price. So a reseller can undercut the box office and still make a profit, even if you include Stub Hub fees. But this season is different. I have never seen prices so low this early. There are games selling in the teens. I think the Sabres had a sense this would happen. That's why they converted more seats to season tickets this year. Don't be surprised if they try to increase season tickets again, but if the resellers take a big loss this year the season ticket base is in for a huge drop. PTR Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ghost of Dwight Drane Posted October 6, 2013 Report Share Posted October 6, 2013 Maybe, but I just sold seven games in three days. Apparently, there's demand out there. In all honesty, because of your situation I debated about even making my post. You had them all sold though. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wjag Posted October 6, 2013 Report Share Posted October 6, 2013 Maybe, but I just sold seven games in three days. Apparently, there's demand out there. In all honesty, because of your situation I debated about even making my post. You had them all sold though. I agree with GoDD. That is the community helping a member of the community out. The stub hub prices are stunningly low. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Taro T Posted October 6, 2013 Report Share Posted October 6, 2013 The secondary market is the"canary in the coal mine" for sports teams. The people who buy season tickets as resellers insulate teams from the ups and downs of the market. The resellers create the appearance of scarcity. The Sabres do their part by making the box office price significantly higher then the season ticket price. So a reseller can undercut the box office and still make a profit, even if you include Stub Hub fees. But this season is different. I have never seen prices so low this early. There are games selling in the teens. I think the Sabres had a sense this would happen. That's why they converted more seats to season tickets this year. Don't be surprised if they try to increase season tickets again, but if the resellers take a big loss this year the season ticket base is in for a huge drop. PTR A big part of the discrepancy (IMHO) is that almost all games are on weeknights. There's only something like 6 weekend games this year. There is necessarily less demand for weeknight games vs weekend. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Eleven Posted October 7, 2013 Report Share Posted October 7, 2013 I agree with GoDD. That is the community helping a member of the community out. The stub hub prices are stunningly low. I only sold one pair here, but ok. I have not looked at stubhub. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Archived
This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.