Canucks attendance hits lowest since 2001, fans are not buying tickets

[shiznak]

7 hours ago, cyoung said:

Lower the price and maybe more people can go.. 

Canucks tickets are one of the lowest price tickets amongst the Canadian teams.

 

This isn't an American market, where you see special deals on tickets as low as $100, trying to sell new fans to come to games.

 

 

[tas]

7 hours ago, fanfor42 said:

Are you a season ticket holder like me?  How many years? 

I live in a different province. 

[Baggins]

9 hours ago, fanfor42 said:

Are you a season ticket holder like me?  How many years? 

Good for you if you`re one of the faithful that stay with the team through thick or thin. Unfortunately that does not change the fact many here are fair weather fans that don`t. You may take offense to that (for whatever reason) but the attendance numbers speak for themselves. When this team isn`t winning, large numbers stop buying tickets.

[-DLC-]

Rather than dole out warnings, I'm going to issue a reminder for everyone to refrain from personal attacks.  Things like "shut up" or "idiot" are not acceptable and do nothing to help your case.  Please stick to arguing your point without these sorts of statements.  Warnings will be issued if any further insults are hurled.  Thank you.

[Toews]

3 hours ago, Baggins said:

Good for you if you`re one of the faithful that stay with the team through thick or thin. Unfortunately that does not change the fact many here are fair weather fans that don`t. You may take offense to that (for whatever reason) but the attendance numbers speak for themselves. When this team isn`t winning, large numbers stop buying tickets.

Not buying tickets does not in any way make you a "fair weather fan". When the product on the ice is poor and when fans are unhappy with decision making at the higher levels of the organization they are going to stop buying tickets. The owners have put their bottom line ahead of this organization's needs and nobody should feel obligated to support that. Just because people do not buy tickets does not mean that they are not watching the games or they care any less. They are simply voting with their wallets.

[Baggins]

Just now, Toews said:

Not buying tickets does not in any way make you a "fair weather fan". When the product on the ice is poor and when fans are unhappy with decision making at the higher levels of the organization they are going to stop buying tickets. The owners have put their bottom line ahead of this organization's needs and nobody should feel obligated to support that. Just because people do not buy tickets does not mean that they are not watching the games or they care any less. They are simply voting with their wallets.

Of course it does.

 

"I only support the team when they're good."

 

It's the very definition of a fair weather fan.

[Toews]

Just now, Baggins said:

Of course it does.

 

"I only support the team when they're good."

 

It's the very definition of a fair weather fan.

Francesco Aquilini, is that you?

[Alflives]

6 minutes ago, Baggins said:

Of course it does.

 

"I only support the team when they're good."

 

It's the very definition of a fair weather fan.

Doesn't "fair weather fan" kind of depend on your definition of support?  What if someone loves the team (as evidenced by all the posters here) by showing their disappointment with the management's direction (or lack there of) by not buying tickets? 

[-DLC-]

Not buying tickets is just a reality for some (like me), who scrape to get by and don't have an extra $100+ for fun.  I'd LOVE to buy more tickets, but can't.  I've raised kids as a single Mom and that means little left over for extras.  I'm getting on my feet a bit more now, but also have to be responsible and save for retirement down the road.

 

If I had extra disposable income, it'd be different.  But I am a die hard fan and even refer to the schedule before I make plans (did I really forego Thanksgiving dinner for the first game of the year?....I did).  I never miss a game...the first one in years was a few weeks ago, where I had to opt out as I was at someone's bedside as they passed away.  So that's about what it takes to keep me from seeing my team play.

 

Buying seasons tickets doesn't mean "better" fan, it mostly means a little better off financially.  With that, I also know STH who plan on selling off as many tickets as possible to lower their prices overall and it's a strategic move financially for them.  It's more about being able to buy tickets than wanting to buy tickets.  

[Baggins]

35 minutes ago, Alflives said:

Doesn't "fair weather fan" kind of depend on your definition of support?  What if someone loves the team (as evidenced by all the posters here) by showing their disappointment with the management's direction (or lack there of) by not buying tickets? 

So a five to seven year waiting list disappeared and rather long sellout streak came to an end as a show of unified disappointment in management? Coincidentally coinciding with missing the playoffs.

 

Every time this team starts losing the fans disappear here. There's a history of it. Didn't happen in Edmonton or Calgary during a lengthy period of sucking. But happened here immediately after missing the playoffs. It's a head scratcher Alf. I don't know about you Alf, but to me hop on when the team is winning then hop off when they're losing seems the very definition of a fair weather fan. And there's a lot of them here.

 

Every team goes through their ups and downs. The die hard fans keep their seasons tickets, or like me continue buying tickets. The fair weather fans just stop until they're good again. Sadly I haven't been able to afford season tickets for well over a decade. But the past three years I've continued going to games. That won't change as long as I'm breathing.

[cyoung]

14 hours ago, shiznak said:

Canucks tickets are one of the lowest price tickets amongst the Canadian teams.

 

This isn't an American market, where you see special deals on tickets as low as $100, trying to sell new fans to come to games.

 

 

Ya and it's still ridiculous. We have some of the highest living expenses in North America, people are struggling to pay rent let alone go to an overpriced game. 

 

With that being said, I will be going to the van Pitts game Nov 4th haha. 

[shiznak]

5 hours ago, cyoung said:

Ya and it's still ridiculous. We have some of the highest living expenses in North America, people are struggling to pay rent let alone go to an overpriced game. 

 

With that being said, I will be going to the van Pitts game Nov 4th haha. 

Well, if you're lucky enough you could get tickets as low as $20.

 

You just might have to miss the first half of the first period.

 

Grab something to eat at International Village, wait it out, and eventually scalpers will get desperate to sell their tickets. 

[McBackup]

For the record, I'd like to point out that the old Winnipeg Jets had abysmal attendance numbers, and the team actually moved. Yes the Canadian dollar didn't help, but neither did the fans.

 

http://www.hockeydb.com/nhl-attendance/att_graph.php?tmi=9024

 

Yet now that the Jets have come back, everybody talks about how amazing Jets fans are. They're the best in the league. While conveniently forgetting that they lost their team to the freaking desert.

 

The exact same thing happened in Minnesota. They don't even have a weak Canadian dollar to blame.

 

http://www.hockeydb.com/nhl-attendance/att_graph.php?tmi=6876

 

Yet now Minnesota is called the "State of Hockey" and hockey is probably the most popular sport in the region. 

 

I really don't want to come across as hating on Winnipeg or Minnesota, because I do think they have great fanbases. The point I'm trying to get at is that every fanbase, whether you like it or not, has rough patches. No fanbase is perfect and there are a million other things that factor into something like attendance. You can point out that during our sellout streak there were some lean years in there too, but people don't want to consider that. You can point out that the Canucks are the 6th most valuable NHL team, despite never winning a cup. You can point out that hockey is thriving in BC, with a really high amount of professional players coming from the city and province, but that is of course completely unrelated whatsoever to the prominence of an NHL team. But you can point to a city like Toronto with twice the population of Vancouver and an arena with lower capacity consistently selling out, and of course that proves that Leafs fans are superior to Canucks fans.

 

The only thing I think that separates Vancouver from any other fanbase, is how self-hating it is. You have an endless slew of people on here complaining about how Canucks fans are the worst fans in the league, yet that description doesn't apply to them for some reason, they're somehow fans of the team yet not a terrible fan. And they never offer an explanation as to why Canucks fans are so bad. It just boils down to them being bad people. Deep down at their core, they're rotten and evil. The day you start following the team is the day your descent starts.

 

Or maybe they do include themselves and have really poor self-esteem. I think these people really need to find another team to cheer for though, its endlessly annoying to hear, and it can't be good for their mental health to be lumped in with such wretched human beings.

[189lb enforcers?]

20 hours ago, Baggins said:

Of course it does.

 

"I only support the team when they're good."

 

It's the very definition of a fair weather fan.

Watching on TV is free.

[Baggins]

25 minutes ago, 189lb enforcers? said:

Watching on TV is free.

You must live with your parents.

[CanuckinEdm]

This is my take the people that were able to afford to purchase season tickets that have now cancelled their tickets due to a poor on ice team are fair weather fans, and the thousands that were on waiting lists that now were able to get tickets and decided not to due to a poor on ice team are also fair weather fans. Obviously there are circumstances that make the purchase of tickets now unattainable now like loss of job, family commitments, ect. but fact that they went from a 5 year waiting list to 4000 empty seats its a issue with fan support from the people that can afford to go.  For example Edmonton went through a far worse rebuild then us and they were at about 90% capacity every game. 

 

[DonaldBrashear]

Pending some huge miracle (unlikely), tonight's game against Pittsburgh, on a Saturday night, is not going to be a sellout. There's only 5 hours until gametime and there's hundreds of seats available still on ticketmaster. That speaks volumes. Last time Canucks blamed poor attendance on weekday games... but how do you explain not selling out when the CUP CHAMPIONS and SIDNEY CROSBY come to town on a Saturday?????????????

[TheGuardian_]

1 minute ago, DonaldBrashear said:

Last time Canucks blamed poor attendance on weekday games... but how do you explain not selling out when the CUP CHAMPIONS and SIDNEY CROSBY come to town on a Saturday?????????????

The good job Linden and Benning are doing?

[DonaldBrashear]

Just now, TheGuardian_ said:

The good job Linden and Benning are doing?

Seriously though I think all 29 other arenas will sell out when the Penguins come to town. Even Carolina will probably sell out when the Penguins come to town. lol

[86Viking]

3 minutes ago, DonaldBrashear said:

Pending some huge miracle (unlikely), tonight's game against Pittsburgh, on a Saturday night, is not going to be a sellout. There's only 5 hours until gametime and there's hundreds of seats available still on ticketmaster. That speaks volumes. Last time Canucks blamed poor attendance on weekday games... but how do you explain not selling out when the CUP CHAMPIONS and SIDNEY CROSBY come to town on a Saturday?????????????

they also raise the prices for teams like pittsburgh. There should be not fluctuation in price for who the opposition is. If anything it should make it just a faster sell out thus hopefully leading to a louder better atmosphere.