Sabres ticket sales still pretty dismal

[PromoTheRobot]

Take a look at Ticketmaster.com. Aside from the Rangers home opener (full but not a sellout,) the rest of September is looking like last year. 4-6K unsold seats per game. And I'm taking about box office, not resales. (Resale tickets are wayyy down.)

This is the Calgary game:

 

Edited September 29, 2023 by PromoTheRobot

[SDS]

4 minutes ago, PromoTheRobot said:

Take a look at Ticketmaster.com. Aside from the Rangers home opener (full but not a sellout,) the rest of September is looking like last year. 4-6K unsold seats per game. And I'm taking about box office, not resales. (Resale tickets are wayyy down.)

This is the Calgary game:

 

This seems bad.

[PerreaultForever]

You're not going to see fans back until they win. Too many years of next year next year and failed promise. They have to show it on the ice. If/when they do the building will fill up again. 

[PromoTheRobot]

Just now, PerreaultForever said:

You're not going to see fans back until they win. Too many years of next year next year and failed promise. They have to show it on the ice. If/when they do the building will fill up again. 

Eventually this excuse will not hold up. Pretty close to there now. Then it will be cup holders and floor cracks.

[Taro T]

7 minutes ago, PromoTheRobot said:

Take a look at Ticketmaster.com. Aside from the Rangers home opener (full but not a sellout,) the rest of September is looking like last year. 4-6K unsold seats per game. And I'm taking about box office, not resales. (Resale tickets are wayyy down.)

This is the Calgary game:

 

2 years ago they had about 4000 STHers.  Last year, would estimate it at ~8000.  If there are 6k seats open for a non-optimal game that puts STH equivalents at about 12k.

That seems like a pretty decent increase from last year IMHO.

[PerreaultForever]

Just now, PromoTheRobot said:

Eventually this excuse will not hold up. Pretty close to there now. Then it will be cup holders and floor cracks.

I don't think so. People on this board are die hard fans but the public ticket buyers are less committed and it takes more to win them back. But they also have to provide more colourful marketing promoting a new era. This is why I think Kane signing helps things lot. Whether he's good or not you can use him as a marketing tool. People need to believe it's not the same old same old. 

[RochesterExpat]

Casual fans will take longer to come back. Hell, even the Bills attendance dropped during their irrelevance era.

[Taro T]

1 minute ago, PromoTheRobot said:

Eventually this excuse will not hold up. Pretty close to there now. Then it will be cup holders and floor cracks.

And during the criminal's hey day they had maybe 14k STHers but would guess it was closer to 12k.

The Golisano years post lockout were the outliers due to those 2 nearly magical seasons.  STH's were way down in '03.  And they were still down in the '05 portion of '05-'06.  The barn really started to get filled nightly after the Bills season was over and the team really started rolling.

Once the waiting list was created, they artificially managed to keep ticket sales up even though the teams weren't as good as those 1st 2 post lockout teams.  Would be interesting to see how the roster and how attendence would've progressed had Boychuk not taken out Vanek's knee in the playoffs the year they won the division.

The corners for a Thrashers game mid-week in October were ALWAYS empty back in the criminals era.  Could ball park guess attendance walking towards our section because if they were only expecting 12k or so, the beer vendor near our section wasn't set up.

[LTS]

They'll need to rely on upping the STH count, and the team is not good enough for that, not yet.  That's when your almost die hard fans justify buying in for the season. That's when they can feel confident that a Tuesday night game in January will sell on the resale market except...

Factor in an crap economy, an ever increasing cost of attending a game, a lower tier arena experience, and I think people are content to sit at home and watch the game.

 

[JoeSchmoe]

Right now the mindset is you can still get a better deal on the secondary market... and there's no benefit in purchasing way ahead.

Until enough people get stung by not getting their tickets upfront you'll see the box office tickets sitting there. That will happen at least a month or so after this team is a legit playoff team AND the Bills/Sabres fans go into full hockey mode after the Superbowl.

[dudacek]

34 minutes ago, Taro T said:

2 years ago they had about 4000 STHers.  Last year, would estimate it at ~8000.  If there are 6k seats open for a non-optimal game that puts STH equivalents at about 12k.

That seems like a pretty decent increase from last year IMHO.

I’m with this, a Thursday game against a vanilla opponent in October still 3 weeks away has already sold 11-12,000 tickets?

That seems way ahead of where they’ve been.

[LabattBlue]

I wonder how much ST & box office prices have gone up in the last 5-6 years?   After 12 years of crap, fans need more than “look at all our prospects”.  
 

Only winning will bring the fans back in numbers.  

Edited September 29, 2023 by LabattBlue

[Night Train]

Say HELLO to this great economy. Tickets aren't cheap. 

[Scottysabres]

I just priced 300 lvl's, x 2, on both ticket Master and vivvid. 232 and 249 respectively. YIKES!!!!

I also looked at section 106? 6th row, 400 something each, as well as 200 lvl, which were just over 800 each.

That is insane.

Edit, this was for the season opener Ranger game.

Edited September 29, 2023 by Scottysabres

[Doohickie]

58 minutes ago, PerreaultForever said:

You're not going to see fans back until they win. Too many years of next year next year and failed promise. They have to show it on the ice. If/when they do the building will fill up again. 

Yes but:  I think they *will* win and while ticket sales may start slow, they will be quicker to grow than last year.  Also, the Bills are the hot ticket right now, distracting from the Sabres and pulling entertainment dollars from hockey.

[mjd1001]

9 minutes ago, Scottysabres said:

I just priced 300 lvl's, x 2, on both ticket Master and vivvid. 232 and 249 respectively. YIKES!!!!

I also looked at section 106? 6th row, 400 something each, as well as 200 lvl, which were just over 800 each.

That is insane.

Edit, this was for the season opener Ranger game.

I follow the team on this board all the time and I watch most of the game, but to a certain extent I am closer to a casual fan than a Die-hard (don't own much merch, if the team is bad I'll watch half the games and find something else to do instead, etc).

I'm pretty happy watching the games at home. To get me to go to a game, it has to be a Fri, Sat, or Sunday game. I don't need the best seats but I don't want to be in the 300's or behind the net.  So I'm kinda-picky-but-not-too-picky.  

I just looked at a couple of options for 2 tickets, don't care about the opponent. For me to go to one game, 2 tix with feels are approaching $300. Not including of course parking and any food or drink I could get there.  I love that people enjoy going to the games and I want the place to be full....but after seeing that I'll stop complaining about MSG plus for $30 or month or upping my cable package from the basic tier to get the one with MSG on it for about $30-$40 more per month.

If I paid $400 to see a Sabres game for 2 of us (tix plus parking and something to eat, either at the arena or just before the game), and I saw a game they lost and only scored a goal or two..I'd be beside myself for a while.

[tom webster]

1 hour ago, PromoTheRobot said:

Take a look at Ticketmaster.com. Aside from the Rangers home opener (full but not a sellout,) the rest of September is looking like last year. 4-6K unsold seats per game. And I'm taking about box office, not resales. (Resale tickets are wayyy down.)

This is the Calgary game:

 

13K to 15K a game would be a huge improvement over last year, especially for October. The team has always struggled selling tickets till football season ends.

[LabattBlue]

2 minutes ago, Doohickie said:

Yes but:  I think they *will* win and while ticket sales may start slow, they will be quicker to grow than last year.  Also, the Bills are the hot ticket right now, distracting from the Sabres and pulling entertainment dollars from hockey.

Agree. 

[tom webster]

31 minutes ago, LabattBlue said:

I wonder how much ST & box office prices have gone up in the last 5-6 years?   After 12 years of crap, fans need more than “look at all our prospects”.  
 

Only winning will bring the fans back in numbers.  

I don’t remember the last 5-6 years but since 2005, my seats have gone from $39 each to $108.50 each

[North Buffalo]

1 hour ago, PromoTheRobot said:

Take a look at Ticketmaster.com. Aside from the Rangers home opener (full but not a sellout,) the rest of September is looking like last year. 4-6K unsold seats per game. And I'm taking about box office, not resales. (Resale tickets are wayyy down.)

This is the Calgary game:

 

It is just gonna take awhile of show me... football season hurts too, but I fully expect it to turn this season.

[Pimlach]

1 hour ago, PromoTheRobot said:

Eventually this excuse will not hold up. Pretty close to there now. Then it will be cup holders and floor cracks.

Eventually.  But there is an entire generation of potential fans, now with money, that have never seen a good Sabres team.   Right now the Bills are a contender and they take up a large amount of the fun dollars too.  

[Ctaeth]

I think this is why they are showing interest in zegras and Kane.  Not because either is a good move for the team, but because the team needs to sell tickets

[PromoTheRobot]

2 hours ago, PerreaultForever said:

I don't think so. People on this board are die hard fans but the public ticket buyers are less committed and it takes more to win them back. But they also have to provide more colourful marketing promoting a new era. This is why I think Kane signing helps things lot. Whether he's good or not you can use him as a marketing tool. People need to believe it's not the same old same old. 

Worst reason ever to sign a player.

1 hour ago, JoeSchmoe said:

Right now the mindset is you can still get a better deal on the secondary market... and there's no benefit in purchasing way ahead.

Until enough people get stung by not getting their tickets upfront you'll see the box office tickets sitting there. That will happen at least a month or so after this team is a legit playoff team AND the Bills/Sabres fans go into full hockey mode after the Superbowl.

Not really. Take a look at how few pink dots there are. The Blue dot Sabres box office tickets are less. 

[PromoTheRobot]

1 hour ago, dudacek said:

I’m with this, a Thursday game against a vanilla opponent in October still 3 weeks away has already sold 11-12,000 tickets?

That seems way ahead of where they’ve been.

That's just one example. Every game except the Ranger looks like that.

[msw2112]

I think the two biggest reasons ticket sales are lower are a) it's still football season and the Bills are contenders again; and 2) the Sabres, although much better last season, are still not a playoff team.  If they can play consistently at a playoff level, the fans will come back.  These two reasons have been stated multiple times above in this thread.

If the Sabres are playing well and on the right side of the playoff race after the Super Bowl in early February, they will be filling up the house most nights.  Maybe not on a random Tuesday against Calgary (or another "unexciting" opponent), but weekend games and games against rivals will be sellouts or close to it.  Even the random Tuesday games will have a decent crowd - larger than what we've been seeing in the recent past.

I believe that the Sabres will play to that level and the attendance will increase substantially.