Attendance

[The Mighty Mite]

The problem is the White Sox fanbase on a whole has more excuses and complaints than any fanbase around. They didn't go supposedly because the seats were the wrong color. So they changed them. Read the guys on WSI and their excuses. Honestly this is true..the video board isn't big enough., the ushers don't smile at them, there isn't enough food options, they changed the song they play in the intro, and these are supposed hard core fans.

 

The other argument was the policy of upper deck ticketholders having no access to the lower deck. They definitely have loosened this on lightly attended games this year, but the WSI guys when it is pointed out on Sundays or for the K-Zone, you now can get a lower deck ticket for $20 or less, then cry the seat location isn't good enough. The White Sox fan will always move the bar. Like you said, 2012 was an example. Winning didn't draw people. Many said they didn't believe in the team and knew they would fade, so much to their relief in late September the team faded and thus apparently showed they didn't deserve the support the entire summer of the White Sox fan.

 

I think the mentality will eventually change. But it is going to take a lot of winning, for a decent period of time.

 

Excellent post, I pray that you are correct.

[ptatc]

The problem is the White Sox fanbase on a whole has more excuses and complaints than any fanbase around. They didn't go supposedly because the seats were the wrong color. So they changed them. Read the guys on WSI and their excuses. Honestly this is true..the video board isn't big enough., the ushers don't smile at them, there isn't enough food options, they changed the song they play in the intro, and these are supposed hard core fans.

 

The other argument was the policy of upper deck ticketholders having no access to the lower deck. They definitely have loosened this on lightly attended games this year, but the WSI guys when it is pointed out on Sundays or for the K-Zone, you now can get a lower deck ticket for $20 or less, then cry the seat location isn't good enough. The White Sox fan will always move the bar. Like you said, 2012 was an example. Winning didn't draw people. Many said they didn't believe in the team and knew they would fade, so much to their relief in late September the team faded and thus apparently showed they didn't deserve the support the entire summer of the White Sox fan.

 

I think the mentality will eventually change. But it is going to take a lot of winning, for a decent period of time.

Exactly, look at the attendance after the WS title. It was good for a few years even with teams that didn't make the playoffs.

They either need to win from the beginning of the season for a few years or get another WS title to really get decent attendance.

[shakes]

Hey pal, I didn't start this thread so what's the problem with my throwing my 2 cents in. I can't believe how some of you can get so downright personal with other members instead of addressing the problem that the OP brought up.

 

You get on your high horse about moving the team, when the team is still profitable. Just a bit of an overreaction?

 

There have been a hundred reasons listed in this thread why the attendance is what it is. If you've followed this team or read the thread it's not surprising to anyone here who goes to games. There are legitimate financial and logistical concerns why the games are difficult to attend.

 

The Sox don't have a huge out of town attraction like the Cubs, who Rickets himself has said around 40% of their attendance is from out of state visitors. That isn't going to happen so until season tickets rise, their will be lower attendance.

[The Ultimate Champion]

I think it's pretty likely that most baseball "fans" in general aren't hardcore fans, they are just these breathing things that meander around indiscriminately and eventually if hit with enough social stimuli will find their way into the park to buy something. Maybe the Sox need to have a Justin Bieber celebration night or something to connect with all of those kids who will force their parents to take them out to the game and buy them a bunch of crap. Sox maybe should forget about baseball some of the time, just do whatever they have to do to get a bunch of these morons in the seats. I mean like, don't even think about them as baseball fans or even real people, just think of them as rodents, but instead of trying to get rid of them you are trying to attract them. Sprinkle some seed around, throw out a block of cheese, giving them a few hiding places, and let's bring in the rats. Then the Sox can raise the payroll and put out a better product, and I can watch/listen to that higher quality product from the comfort of my own home.

[ewokpelts]

Attendance is going to be bad because season ticket sales are probably as low as they have been this century. With dynamic pricing, walk up sales are usually pretty weak. I read an article a couple years ago or so ago which stated the Sox were expecting a walk up of around 2500 for some game (this is when they were at least decent) and it was by far the highest walk up of the season. I remember half price Monday and Tuesdays with the Pepsi can. The lines at the ticket windows were huge. Those days are OVA! You get some same day sale with the K-Zone for Sale. But that is only when he starts.They should come up with a section for Abreu, for a daily thing. Maybe the back half of the bleachers or something, see if he can reach them. That would help day of game sales, but the fruits of this season attendance wise, if it winds up being successful, won't really be felt until next season when a few more season ticket plans are sold.

Most "walk up" sales are done online right now. And more often than not on stubhub

[GGajewski18]

We should make a SoxTalk outing this summer. Someone set it up.

[Dick Allen]

Most "walk up" sales are done online right now. And more often than not on stubhub

Right, but Stubhub isn't walk up. Its resale. The White Sox sell very few tickets the day of game anymore. Like I stated earlier, 2500 was considered gigantic.

[ewokpelts]

You guys forget that all the comps from April and rainouts this year do not count in the attendance. Like farmer says every nights, it's PAID attendance.

 

Sox can give out 40k free seats for tonight and have one paid ticket. The official attendance figure will be 1.

 

 

Sox have been on the offensive this year with comps.

[Y2Jimmy0]

20,000 to watch Sale go up against Scherzer. Piss poor.

Something is seriously wrong up there, a big market team and we are averaging 19,000+ a game. 28th in MLB in attendance. We have a nice team with a great new star in Abreu and one of the best pitchers in MLB, the team does not give up and deserves some support.

Right now if I owned the Sox and the stadium contract was up I would move this team to somewhere were it would be appreciated. Chicago does not deserve the White Sox. I want all of you to know that I'm a 68 year old die hard White Sox fan who has lived and died with this team since 1953, I still get up in the middle of the night and check the Sox score on my I Phone and for me the to say this is sacreligious. I know the Sox have addressed some of the pricing issues but Sox fans seem like they have just lost interest in the team. I have lived in Florida for over 20 years but I supported the team the 48 years I lived up there and would still do so, every year when the Sox come to Tampa you will see me at the Trop. I worked evenings when we lived up there but always tried to make one game every home stand.

I also belong to another Sox Board and there were 3 threads about last nights game. That's sad coming from a membership of 8,000.

 

 

I agree with a lot of this. I was there last night. White Sox fans suck. There might have been 18,000 people in the park to watch Sale vs Scherzer on a Thursday Night. Great park. Great food. Nice night. Great pitching matchup. White Sox fans are a bunch of fickle bastards. It's been covered here over and over. We are a bunch of excuse makers.

[LittleHurt05]

Hey pal, I didn't start this thread so what's the problem with my throwing my 2 cents in. I can't believe how some of you can get so downright personal with other members instead of addressing the problem that the OP brought up.

 

When you insinuate that you are an all-time great fan and everyone else sucks and doesn't deserve a team, you are gonna get people upset with you.

[ewokpelts]

Right, but Stubhub isn't walk up. Its resale. The White Sox sell very few tickets the day of game anymore. Like I stated earlier, 2500 was considered gigantic.

But most people making last minute decisions are not going to whitesox.com. They are buying at the stubub rate, even if those tix are other than what the box office has.

[ewokpelts]

We should make a SoxTalk outing this summer. Someone set it up.

I think it's tonight

[Dick Allen]

But most people making last minute decisions are not going to whitesox.com. They are buying at the stubub rate, even if those tix are other than what the box office has.

And that is the problem with dynamic pricing raising prices instead of lowering them for unsold tickets as the game draws near. I would use Stubhub myself. It is a reason many season ticketholders, at least those with the smaller plans bailed. They can save money by having others take a bath.

[Quin]

My throne in Florida? Grow up.

 

Says the 68 year old man who thinks that because he checks his iPhone he's more of a Sox fan than all of Chicago.

[Dick Allen]

Says the 68 year old man who thinks that because he checks his iPhone he's more of a Sox fan than all of Chicago.

Even though he never stated that, it is probably true.

[southsider2k5]

And that is the problem with dynamic pricing raising prices instead of lowering them for unsold tickets as the game draws near. I would use Stubhub myself. It is a reason many season ticketholders, at least those with the smaller plans bailed. They can save money by having others take a bath.

 

I compare stubhub and whitesox.com and buy from the better deal.

[witesoxfan]

Relevant: http://deadspin.com/which-mlb-fans-are-the...ners-1590452742

 

[Y2Jimmy0]

In Chris Sale's 6 home starts other than opening day, the team has averaged 18,600 fans per game. Pretty much all that needs to be said.

[bmags]

Honestly, who cares. There is clearly nothing anyone in here can do about this. I have gone to numerous games this year, and I've enjoyed the hell out of this season. I don't feel like pining about why there aren't more fans.

 

Maybe it's that baseball is like the least popular sport among teens now.

[Thad Bosley]

I think the mentality will eventually change. But it is going to take a lot of winning, for a decent period of time.

Then that might require new ownership, because Mr. Reinsdorf & Co. are in Year #34 of their control of this team, and they have yet to build a sustainable winning ballclub in that period of time. No White Sox team under their rule has made it to the playoffs in consecutive years. And outside of 2005, there have only been four other playoff appearances since 1981 when they took over, and the combined number of victories in those four appearances is four. An absolutely dreadful record of performance. So if improving attendance is predicated on sustainable success, then perhaps its time to bring in an ownership group that could actually figure out how to make that happen.

[Eminor3rd]

I think it's pretty likely that most baseball "fans" in general aren't hardcore fans, they are just these breathing things that meander around indiscriminately and eventually if hit with enough social stimuli will find their way into the park to buy something. Maybe the Sox need to have a Justin Bieber celebration night or something to connect with all of those kids who will force their parents to take them out to the game and buy them a bunch of crap. Sox maybe should forget about baseball some of the time, just do whatever they have to do to get a bunch of these morons in the seats. I mean like, don't even think about them as baseball fans or even real people, just think of them as rodents, but instead of trying to get rid of them you are trying to attract them. Sprinkle some seed around, throw out a block of cheese, giving them a few hiding places, and let's bring in the rats. Then the Sox can raise the payroll and put out a better product, and I can watch/listen to that higher quality product from the comfort of my own home.

 

This is how we look at it in the minor leagues. Not exactly as "rodents," but as though we're trying to get them to come hang out at the park DESPITE the fact that there's baseball. Winning doesn't affect attendance at all; but tonight's "Set the Guinness Record for Most People Wearing Fake Moustaches Night" is sold out (and I just had a mini panic attack about ten minutes ago when I couldn't find the 7,000 moustaches we bought in the promo closet. But it's okay, I found them).

 

Major League teams seems to have really conservative promotional schedules because the players can be the draw, but as the average fan shifts more toward watching the games on TV, it seems to me like the stadium needs to evolve its model to provide more experiences/food/giveaways that you just can't get unless you show up.

[The Ultimate Champion]

This is how we look at it in the minor leagues. Not exactly as "rodents," but as though we're trying to get them to come hang out at the park DESPITE the fact that there's baseball. Winning doesn't affect attendance at all; but tonight's "Set the Guinness Record for Most People Wearing Fake Moustaches Night" is sold out (and I just had a mini panic attack about ten minutes ago when I couldn't find the 7,000 moustaches we bought in the promo closet. But it's okay, I found them).

 

Major League teams seems to have really conservative promotional schedules because the players can be the draw, but as the average fan shifts more toward watching the games on TV, it seems to me like the stadium needs to evolve its model to provide more experiences/food/giveaways that you just can't get unless you show up.

ALL

 

OF

 

THIS

 

You never as a business owner blame your consumer for not making a purchase, for not responding to your advertising campaign, for not giving you his/her attention, etc. And you also never assume you are operating in a vacuum or in some static environment where Monday is Tuesday is Saturday is March is July etc. MLB teams need to get more creative IMO, including ours.

 

To me personally I have enough stuff to do (even though it doesn't seem like it via my posting habits) to where I don't need to see X number of games per year. And the atmosphere is one thing, but I really couldn't care less about any of that. I provide ratings mostly and I buy merchandise, as well as promote the team via word or mouth and so on. As a fan I help fill several of the necessary holes even though I am not a season ticket holder. Not all fans are the same, and MLB teams need to identify every possible way of filling every possible void as quickly and as easily and as efficiently overall as possible. Long gone are the days of well-dressed men and women attending games with cigars in their mouths (not so much the women) golf clapping sacrifice bunts and the like, it's a new set of circumstances entirely and the ethics of the journalists covering the sport will tell you as much immediately, and so adaption is necessary. Blaming the fans is stupid. When you are paying superstars $20-30M per year these days you need to make those funds up somehow, so just put those asses in seats, regardless of whose asses they are and what they smell like or where they've been, there's a reason we bolt the seats down to the concrete and spray them off with powerful hoses after the game, just fill them up however you have to, by any means necessary, and pay those bills.

[demonbluess]

Attendance is going to be bad because season ticket sales are probably as low as they have been this century. With dynamic pricing, walk up sales are usually pretty weak. I read an article a couple years ago or so ago which stated the Sox were expecting a walk up of around 2500 for some game (this is when they were at least decent) and it was by far the highest walk up of the season. I remember half price Monday and Tuesdays with the Pepsi can. The lines at the ticket windows were huge. Those days are OVA! You get some same day sale with the K-Zone for Sale. But that is only when he starts.They should come up with a section for Abreu, for a daily thing. Maybe the back half of the bleachers or something, see if he can reach them. That would help day of game sales, but the fruits of this season attendance wise, if it winds up being successful, won't really be felt until next season when a few more season ticket plans are sold.

 

The K-Zone deal is a pretty cool gimmick. I've seen the section near full in the two Sale starts I have attended. With that said, it's 980 seats or something. This really has very little impact on the overall attendance. If say, half of those fans were planning on attending the game anyway, what are we talking about here? 400-500 attendance bump per Sale start? Small potatoes.

[The Ultimate Champion]

The K-Zone deal is a pretty cool gimmick. I've seen the section near full in the two Sale starts I have attended. With that said, it's 980 seats or something. This really has very little impact on the overall attendance. If say, half of those fans were planning on attending the game anyway, what are we talking about here? 400-500 attendance bump per Sale start? Small potatoes.

By promoting the K Zone the Sox are also promoting Sale specifically and by showing shots of the K Zone they are making the game appear to be more special than just one of the typical 81 home games that exist on the schedule. The Sox specifically promoting Sale every 5th start is like having Elvis night every fifth start or dog day or something, it's at least making an association with something that sounds different and exciting, so if you're watching/listening and there is talk about the K Zone, maybe you don't want to go sit there in that section, but you do want to get a seat somewhere because Sale is pitching and that's going to be a fun experience. Or even if you don't go to the game at all, you still HAVE to watch or listen to the game Sale is starting, because that is different and that is special. Really it goes well beyond the number of seats in that zone.

[caulfield12]

I guess we need a Grand Canyon/El Canon in LF for Abreu in the bleachers, like The Trout Pond or Big Mac Land (tied into McDonald's), etc.