Empty Seats a Reality

[Ghostsof1915]

If the Vancouver Giants have the weekend packages again for tickets, I know that's where I'm putting my money.

Why?

1) It's the WHL so even if the Giants are down 5-0 they are still trying until the final whistle blows.

2) Way cheaper.

3) Real hockey fans. These fans aren't into if the WHL is "cool" or not. They just like good hockey.

4) I get to see the stars of the future today.

Don't get me wrong. I love the Canucks, and nothing would make me happier to see them win a Cup. But I am tired of the lack of urgency, and drive this team has picked up.

[DonaldBrashear]

I just got back from picking season tickets tonight. The Canucks rep there told me that renewals were about 2-3% lower than previous years. Since previous years saw a 97% renewal rate, I think we can assume this year saw a roughly 94% renewal rate, or around there. That's still very high, and I think it speaks to the dedication of the Canucks ticket holders. But at the same time, it's probably the lowest it had been in years. Coincidentally, he also told me that the Canucks had increased the amount of season tickets they were offering. I guess after last year, and seeing the sellout at risk, the Canucks decided to increase their "cap" of 17,000 season tickets.

The increase in season tickets, combined with a lower renewal rate, should mean that the waiting list moves quite a bit this year. But the reality is, there will still only be about 1,000 tickets up for grabs. And there's probably close to 10,000 total tickets on the waiting list.

As for me, I went with the best seats I could find in the cheapest section available. The so called "nosebleeds". But anyone who has been to Rogers Arena knows that it is true - there is no bad seat in the house. My tickets cost me $42.53 each, which includes GST. My experience has been that selling these are much easier if you need to. In the past, the lower bowls have been notoriously difficult to sell. The worst lower bowl seats are approximately 3 times the price of the worst upper bowl seats, and the difference is not that significant IMO. It appears that other people are thinking the same, as higher priced seats seemed mostly taken and there were lots of lower bowl full seasons left. I imagine people on the wait list will get offered the lower bowl non-alcohol seats. Those ones tend to be the most difficult to sell of any.

All in all though, I am very pleased with the team. With two round 1 exists, I feel Aqualini and Gillis have made some good moves. They traded Schneider. They bought out Ballard. And they hired Tortorella. That's three big moves. We got a trade, a buyout and a firing/hiring. I am most excited about seeing Tortorella as our coach, and how the 2014 Russian Olympics will factor into the whole situation. I expect some Luongo drama too. Hopefully the club becomes more open. My biggest dislike of the Canucks has been the hush-hush environment and country club feel of it for so long. I want more openness. I think AV is going to have a rough time in New York if he tries to do what he did here there. That's all........

[CanucksJay]

I just got back from picking season tickets tonight. The Canucks rep there told me that renewals were about 2-3% lower than previous years. Since previous years saw a 97% renewal rate, I think we can assume this year saw a roughly 94% renewal rate, or around there. That's still very high, and I think it speaks to the dedication of the Canucks ticket holders. But at the same time, it's probably the lowest it had been in years. Coincidentally, he also told me that the Canucks had increased the amount of season tickets they were offering. I guess after last year, and seeing the sellout at risk, the Canucks decided to increase their "cap" of 17,000 season tickets.

The increase in season tickets, combined with a lower renewal rate, should mean that the waiting list moves quite a bit this year. But the reality is, there will still only be about 1,000 tickets up for grabs. And there's probably close to 10,000 total tickets on the waiting list.

As for me, I went with the best seats I could find in the cheapest section available. The so called "nosebleeds". But anyone who has been to Rogers Arena knows that it is true - there is no bad seat in the house. My tickets cost me $42.53 each, which includes GST. My experience has been that selling these are much easier if you need to. In the past, the lower bowls have been notoriously difficult to sell. The worst lower bowl seats are approximately 3 times the price of the worst upper bowl seats, and the difference is not that significant IMO. It appears that other people are thinking the same, as higher priced seats seemed mostly taken and there were lots of lower bowl full seasons left. I imagine people on the wait list will get offered the lower bowl non-alcohol seats. Those ones tend to be the most difficult to sell of any.

All in all though, I am very pleased with the team. With two round 1 exists, I feel Aqualini and Gillis have made some good moves. They traded Schneider. They bought out Ballard. And they hired Tortorella. That's three big moves. We got a trade, a buyout and a firing/hiring. I am most excited about seeing Tortorella as our coach, and how the 2014 Russian Olympics will factor into the whole situation. I expect some Luongo drama too. Hopefully the club becomes more open. My biggest dislike of the Canucks has been the hush-hush environment and country club feel of it for so long. I want more openness. I think AV is going to have a rough time in New York if he tries to do what he did here there. That's all........

Thank you for your update. It was very informative and pretty much resulted in what I thought would happen (a large movement in season ticket wait list and the ownership waking up and realizing demand in their product is falling). My question is, what was the season ticket cap last year and what is it this year?

Could they be masking a large movement in waitlist by saying they are increasing the season ticket cap but maybe they only increase the cap by like 500 but movement in the waitlist might be like 3000?

Also, I find the 2-3% decrease in renewal rates questionable (I believe you've been told this but I am questioning whether the rep was lying)

The last thing you want to do as a seller is alienate your current customers by making them think they are the only ones to purchase a product because in reality people are like sheep. If I am spending 10 Gs on tickets and am a little sour about it, if I see that no one else is buying these tickets, I prob would not as well. However, if I am told that lots of demand is still there, it re-assures me about my purchase so I buy it.

I actually use this tactic whenever I sell anything on Kijiji. My best line is, I've already had 2 guys interested but they can't make it until tomorrow but I want to sell it now. If you come today, I will just sell it to you. (Those guys are usually at my house within an hour.)

I think the best way to have an accurate analysis would be to find out how much season ticket cap has actually gone up this season and then compare it to the movement in the lines.

From what I am reading and hearing also, a lot of season and half season owners are downgrading their packs. That means management has to sell to twice the amount of customers to have the same amount of sales.

If someone from the back line of the waitlist can let us know how far they moved up this year, that would be great. If you are offered icepacks, etc, please let us know. It would be interesting if say waitlist # 5000 is offered icepacks because if that is the case, that means there was actually a HUGE movement in non renewals.

[TimberWolf]

There's that mysterious "owners buy unsold tickets" thing again.

Yet no one can link me any real investigative piece on this. It's just an opinion that became fact because of being repeated on this forum enough as far as I can tell.

I am interested, though. Can anyone show me anything definitive? I have looked and cannot find it.

[Cyril Sneer]

Bandwagoners

[CanucksJay]

There's that mysterious "owners buy unsold tickets" thing again.

Yet no one can link me any real investigative piece on this. It's just an opinion that became fact because of being repeated on this forum enough as far as I can tell.

I am interested, though. Can anyone show me anything definitive? I have looked and cannot find it.

Lol what are you talking about?

Besides the few posts from a while back, has anyone recently claimed this?

[TimberWolf]

Lol what are you talking about?

Besides the few posts from a while back, has anyone recently claimed this?

It's worse then that.

I didn't realise that this is an older thread necrobumped and I repeated a point I made already on the first page. Hooray!

In the end though, I guess I can point out that no one ever did provide a shred of evidence, so we can close the book on that theory.

[CanucksJay]

It's worse then that.

I didn't realise that this is an older thread necrobumped and I repeated a point I made already on the first page. Hooray!

In the end though, I guess I can point out that no one ever did provide a shred of evidence, so we can close the book on that theory.

I agree with you.

I also don't believe ownership buys tickets to continue sell out.

I'm pretty sure all the empty seats are spoken for by scalpers and other season ticket holders who couldn't sell those games.

I think the main proof is the 50% sale in the playoffs.

Those seats were truly unspoken for and ownership would have bought those tickets up if that was normal practice for them like people claim. Instead, they had to embarrassingly offer them at 50% off.

[jovocop55]

if canucks make it to the playoff this season, hope the owner learn not to jack up the price again..

[JeremyCuddles]

I didn't even know Canucks faithful got out to games. If winning the division and re-tooling is dark times I guess you weren't around in the late 90's. It was so bad, people almost gave basketball a shot.

Glad to see i'm not the only one with perspective, when was the last time edmonton made the playoffs? Fans still attend their games. How about Toronto, got dicey there but close to a decade of no playoffs does that to a city, yet they still have fans. Only the bandwagoners will ditch the Canucks if they, god forbid, only make the playoffs at 6th or 7th. Keep it in perspective guys come on.

[higgyfan]

Glad to see i'm not the only one with perspective, when was the last time edmonton made the playoffs? Fans still attend their games. How about Toronto, got dicey there but close to a decade of no playoffs does that to a city, yet they still have fans. Only the bandwagoners will ditch the Canucks if they, god forbid, only make the playoffs at 6th or 7th. Keep it in perspective guys come on.

Attendance has been down in Edmonton until recently. TO is a far bigger fan base than Van, as is MO.

If the Canucks start to fall in the standings, you will definitely see a drop in attendance. Vancouver has always had a high number of what some call 'bandwagoners'. People don't want to bother with hockey if it is not high calibre; especially not at the ridiculous prices.

This is a good thing. If Aquilini wants to make $, he has to ensure that the Canucks are a decent team. Endlessly supporting a losing team only begets more losing.

[CanucksJay]

Attendance has been down in Edmonton until recently. TO is a far bigger fan base than Van, as is MO.

If the Canucks start to fall in the standings, you will definitely see a drop in attendance. Vancouver has always had a high number of what some call 'bandwagoners'. People don't want to bother with hockey if it is not high calibre; especially not at the ridiculous prices.

This is a good thing. If Aquilini wants to make $, he has to ensure that the Canucks are a decent team. Endlessly supporting a losing team only begets more losing.

Great point. On ice performance and ticket prices are directly correlated.

Despite the so called bandwagon fanbase, there are still enough loyal and dedicated fan base that would support a losing team if the ticket prices were lower.

I find it funny when people scoff and sit on their high horse looking at other fans who complain about not going to the games because of the price vs on ice product.

They then talk about the real "dark times" when we were perennial losers and compare that to where we are now.

Guess what?

If Frank Griffiths charged Acquilini prices (adjusted for inflation), the franchise would not be in existence today because no one would have gone to watch the games.

With ticket prices at a fraction of what it costs today, they still didn't sell out. What do you think would have happened if they continually jacked it up like current ownership?

The Canucks have a strong and loyal fan base and ownership should thank their lucky stars that they have such a solid group of fans.

I honestly don't understand the people that feel good about knocking down other fans and calling them band wagoners.

Congratulations for being a blind sheep.

[DonaldBrashear]

Thank you for your update. It was very informative and pretty much resulted in what I thought would happen (a large movement in season ticket wait list and the ownership waking up and realizing demand in their product is falling). My question is, what was the season ticket cap last year and what is it this year?

Could they be masking a large movement in waitlist by saying they are increasing the season ticket cap but maybe they only increase the cap by like 500 but movement in the waitlist might be like 3000?

Also, I find the 2-3% decrease in renewal rates questionable (I believe you've been told this but I am questioning whether the rep was lying)

I'm not sure about the increase in season tickets. I assume they increased it to whatever they could. It did seem like people were downgrading seats, going from full seasons to less. Someone even asked if they could drop seats in general. As for them lying about the renewal rate, I doubt it. The guy mentioned it casually when I brought it up. But who knows. A 94-95% renewal rate is nothing to be happy with though. The canucks used to be brag about a consistent 97-98% rate. Besides, last year as an anomaly. It wasn't just the canucks poor play, it was also the lockout that caused a lot of people to drop tickets. After the last lockout the same thing happened, a big drop in season ticket holders.

Also, during the speech they informed everyone that you could buy an extra seat this year (without going on the blue line waiting list). I heard they did this in the past, but didn't know they were doing it now. However, you could only go from an even number to an odd, and ONLY where tickets were in an odd block E.g., if you saw 3 tickets in a row you could take 1 of them on the end, leaving a pair. Otherwise you needed to go on the list. This meant you could go from 2>3 tix or from 4>5 tix. I remember a while ago hearing them implement the "4 tickets max" rule, and even remember someone on here complaining about their 5 seats in a row being broken up. But I guess they have changed how it works. I could have picked up a 3rd full season easily, but there's no point since they are much more difficult to sell.

[DonaldBrashear]

By the way, I think for a good study of what would happen to Canucks tickets, we can look to none other than the Calgary Flames.

They just missed the playoffs for the 4th year in a row. Iginla is gone. Kiprusoff is gone. It can't get much worse than this. And they still are sold out on season tickets with what appears to be a decently long waiting list. Here is a post from the Calgary Forums (posted in March, 2013):

"The problem is The Flames have this huge waiting list for seasons tickets. It does not matter if some fans are getting sick and tired, if they leave there are plenty to replace them. It won't show much in the Flames bottom line. I suspect a lot of those season ticket holders are company entertainment writeoffs rather than the fan who might bail on a couple of poor seasons. Even a bunch of the season ticket holders here on this forums said they wouldn't drop their season tickets over another lockout because they are to important to them."

You can argue that Calgary Flames fans are more loyal than Canucks fans, but I am not sure about that. The market hasn't been tested in Vancouver since around 2000. A lot more fans have joined since then, and Vancouver has grown in population significantly. Never underestimate the fact that the population here is surging, and the arena isn't getting any bigger. Also, Rogers Arena is going to be majorly renovated this year with condos added around it. In other words? It's only an 18 year old arena, and it will be around for another 30-35 years at least. Even if a newer one were built it wouldn't be much bigger. Maybe 20k seats. So demand will only increase. My guess is, the sell-out streak never ends in Vancouver (it's too big to let it go now) and there's a waiting list forever.

[pimpcurtly]

I also believe a decline is in the works...but that doesn't mean I'm going to stop supporting the team. That's bandwagon talk. If your looking for someone to buy your tix, PM me.

[CanucksJay]

By the way, I think for a good study of what would happen to Canucks tickets, we can look to none other than the Calgary Flames.

They just missed the playoffs for the 4th year in a row. Iginla is gone. Kiprusoff is gone. It can't get much worse than this. And they still are sold out on season tickets with what appears to be a decently long waiting list. Here is a post from the Calgary Forums (posted in March, 2013):

"The problem is The Flames have this huge waiting list for seasons tickets. It does not matter if some fans are getting sick and tired, if they leave there are plenty to replace them. It won't show much in the Flames bottom line. I suspect a lot of those season ticket holders are company entertainment writeoffs rather than the fan who might bail on a couple of poor seasons. Even a bunch of the season ticket holders here on this forums said they wouldn't drop their season tickets over another lockout because they are to important to them."

You can argue that Calgary Flames fans are more loyal than Canucks fans, but I am not sure about that. The market hasn't been tested in Vancouver since around 2000. A lot more fans have joined since then, and Vancouver has grown in population significantly. Never underestimate the fact that the population here is surging, and the arena isn't getting any bigger. Also, Rogers Arena is going to be majorly renovated this year with condos added around it. In other words? It's only an 18 year old arena, and it will be around for another 30-35 years at least. Even if a newer one were built it wouldn't be much bigger. Maybe 20k seats. So demand will only increase. My guess is, the sell-out streak never ends in Vancouver (it's too big to let it go now) and there's a waiting list forever.

Most Calgarians use Calgary Puck for hockey discussions.

This thread is about Flames fans' take on the price gouging going on by the ownership in Vancouver.

Even the people in Calgary who are fortunate enough to be living in an economically strong city thinks Vancouver ownership is being absurd and greedy.

http://forum.calgarypuck.com/showthread.php?t=127503

Calgary also happens to have sportchek zone (300 level seating) which only costs $20 per game which IMO is not all that difficult to attain, as well as Co-op zone (200 level seating) that costs $35 per game which is moderately more difficult to attain.

What options do Van fans have for lower priced seats? Watching at home?

[Benchsplinters]

Maybe the sun is in your eyes.

As much as it is a solid concerted image of discontent, people are still going to be drinking the Kool-aid that we Canucks fans accuse Leaf fans of doing in the 90's.

These past two seasons have been the worst. I can't remember seeing a team being this content with mediocrity.

The manner in which AV distanced himself from the players resulted in the players running the show with mediocrity. They need to take a deep breath, let Torts light a fire under under their butts and get them back to work. Vacation time is over and they need real coaching leadership to get them properly focused.

[DonaldBrashear]

Most Calgarians use Calgary Puck for hockey discussions.

This thread is about Flames fans' take on the price gouging going on by the ownership in Vancouver.

Even the people in Calgary who are fortunate enough to be living in an economically strong city thinks Vancouver ownership is being absurd and greedy.

http://forum.calgarypuck.com/showthread.php?t=127503

Calgary also happens to have sportchek zone (300 level seating) which only costs $20 per game which IMO is not all that difficult to attain, as well as Co-op zone (200 level seating) that costs $35 per game which is moderately more difficult to attain.

What options do Van fans have for lower priced seats? Watching at home?

Calgary is also a blip on the radar compared to Vancouver. They only have a metro population of 1,214,839. Plus, Alberta has two teams, so they can't even count on support from the occasional Edmonton fan that comes down. Vancouver, on the other hand, has a metro population of 2,313,328 (almost double), and that's not including Abbotsford (170,191), Chilliwack (92,308) and Squamish (17,479). They also get regular support from Victoria, Nanaimo, Kelowna, Kamloops, Penticton, and the rest of BC. And finally, the Saddledome is a much worse arena than Rogers Arena. It's 15 years older, and was not really specifically designed for ice hockey. Where as there's "not a bad seat in Rogers Arena", there's plenty of horrible bad nosebleed seats in the Saddledome (anyone who has been can tell you that).

Bottom line is... the Canucks serve a metro population of about 2.6 million people, and a provincial population of 4.4 million. There's only a capacity of 18,900 total, and about 16,000 actual seats in the arena (excluding suites, executive lounges, etc). Population will only go up every year, and unlike homes, where new ones are being built daily, and new land is being developed, and higher condos are being built, Rogers Arena's capacity will not increase. Forbes recognizes that supply/demand = solid market too, as Vancouver Canucks are ranked 7th overall as the most valuable team. The 6 teams ahead of them? The original six. This makes Vancouver the most valuable non-original six NHL team in the league, which is quite a feat.

[jovocop55]

I'm not sure about the increase in season tickets. I assume they increased it to whatever they could. It did seem like people were downgrading seats, going from full seasons to less. Someone even asked if they could drop seats in general. As for them lying about the renewal rate, I doubt it. The guy mentioned it casually when I brought it up. But who knows. A 94-95% renewal rate is nothing to be happy with though. The canucks used to be brag about a consistent 97-98% rate. Besides, last year as an anomaly. It wasn't just the canucks poor play, it was also the lockout that caused a lot of people to drop tickets. After the last lockout the same thing happened, a big drop in season ticket holders.

Also, during the speech they informed everyone that you could buy an extra seat this year (without going on the blue line waiting list). I heard they did this in the past, but didn't know they were doing it now. However, you could only go from an even number to an odd, and ONLY where tickets were in an odd block E.g., if you saw 3 tickets in a row you could take 1 of them on the end, leaving a pair. Otherwise you needed to go on the list. This meant you could go from 2>3 tix or from 4>5 tix. I remember a while ago hearing them implement the "4 tickets max" rule, and even remember someone on here complaining about their 5 seats in a row being broken up. But I guess they have changed how it works. I could have picked up a 3rd full season easily, but there's no point since they are much more difficult to sell.

doubt many ppl will not renew their tickets unless they are moving or just cant afford them. a few of my coworkers never actually been to any games made money every yr.. during cup run. they made well over 15k on tickets.

[smurf47]

Vancouver Islanders can fly to Phoenix, watch the Yotes, play golf and fly home cheaper than going to the Canucks game !!!