Culvers Camp Randall Hockey Classic: Michigan vs UW.. Brrrrrrrr!

[WisconsinWildcard]

Re: Culvers Camp Randall Hockey Classic: Michigan vs UW.. Brrrrrrrr!

Nice to see you all have taken on nicknames for Floppy McFlopperson.

Not all, just VW.

[sweatpants]

Re: Culvers Camp Randall Hockey Classic: Michigan vs UW.. Brrrrrrrr!

Well... they thought they were going to sell out to the tune of 89k fans... instead, they're going to wind up around 50k.

I've got 39,000 reasons the Athletic Department won't try this again for a decade or five.

Well, a perfect storm of things happened that won't make it a sell out which the Athletic Dept did/didn't have control over:

1. Not being permitted to have the game vs. Minnesota
2. Tickets were too expensive
3. Michigan and Michigan St. finalized an agreement to have an outdoor game next year just a few months after this deal was finalized. This is gonna keep a majority of Michigan fans to stay home and wait til next year.
5. Being mediocre for 3 seasonss diluted some of the bandwagoners.
6. It was scheduled too close to the Lambeau game.
7. The BC-BU has really no effect on ticket sales IMO, but it does lose some of its luster.

What they should of done IMO:

1. The UW ath. dept. should of looked more into what Michigan was going to do next year. If they would've known they had their own outdoor game with MSU in the works, I don't think Wisconsin schedules them.

2. Instead of Michigan(because of their own game next year), I would've picked Notre Dame or North Dakota(non-conference) since they only play them twice this regular season. North Dakota fans travel extremely well and for something like this-even more so. Notre Dame is a "name" school has a large alumni base and media market close by in Chicago. Playing Minnesota five times during the regular season seems a bit much imo.

3. Set the price at $12. If they really wanted to set an attendance record why the heck did they make the tickets so high?

[FueledByRamen]

Re: Culvers Camp Randall Hockey Classic: Michigan vs UW.. Brrrrrrrr!

Well, a perfect storm of things happened that won't make it a sell out which the Athletic Dept did/didn't have control over:

1. Not being permitted to have the game vs. Minnesota
2. Tickets were too expensive
3. Michigan and Michigan St. finalized an agreement to have an outdoor game next year just a few months after this deal was finalized. This is gonna keep a majority of Michigan fans to stay home and wait til next year.
4. The BC-BU has really no effect on ticket sales IMO, but it does lose some of its luster.

What they should of done IMO:

1. The UW ath. dept. should of looked more into what Michigan was going to do next year. If they would've known they had their own outdoor game with MSU in the works, I don't think Wisconsin schedules them.

2. Instead of Michigan because of their own game, I would've picked Notre Dame or North Dakota(non-conference) since they only play them twice this regular season. North Dakota fans travel extremely well and for something like this-even more so. Notre Dame is a "name" school has a large alumni base and media market close by in Chicago. Playing Minnesota five times during the regular season seems a bit much imo.

3. Set the price at $12. If they really wanted to set an attendance record why the heck did they make the tickets so high?

You hit it on the head with the last point. Also, is anyone clued into the extra costs associated with doing the game at Camp Randall vs. a weekend at the Kohl? Obviously its alot more, but by how much?

In my mind, the athletic department thought this was an 89k slam dunk, and took it for granted that it would be. The success of previous outdoor games, was, in my humble opinion, the beginning of the cluster**** that is/will be the CRHC. Sorry to sound bitter, but I just can't help thinking about what this COULD have been.

[RedFreak]

Re: Culvers Camp Randall Hockey Classic: Michigan vs UW.. Brrrrrrrr!

Let me see if I have this right...we're actually paying $20 for the food and beer, and it's not actually free?!?

I think you've got it.

[GoBucky36]

Re: Culvers Camp Randall Hockey Classic: Michigan vs UW.. Brrrrrrrr!

Hopefully Goody starts this game. If Belly flop Bennett is in there I might puke.

Amen to that. I get nervous every time I see Bennett at goal.

[GoBucky36]

Re: Culvers Camp Randall Hockey Classic: Michigan vs UW.. Brrrrrrrr!

3. Set the price at $12. If they really wanted to set an attendance record why the heck did they make the tickets so high?

because you are paying to watch 2 games. $25 for 2 games isnt expensive. Im sure most people couldnt care less about watching the women though.

[Gurtholfin]

Re: Culvers Camp Randall Hockey Classic: Michigan vs UW.. Brrrrrrrr!

because you are paying to watch 2 games. $25 for 2 games isnt expensive. Im sure most people couldnt care less about watching the women though.

Nobody's paying for two games. The women's game is a tack on and they'll be lucky to have 2000 people there for it.

Obviously, since the game is 35,000 short of a sellout, $25 is too expensive for this game.

Simple Economics

Our Athletic Department messed up and it's a shame because having so many empty seats will reflect poorly on this sports community.

[sweatpants]

Re: Culvers Camp Randall Hockey Classic: Michigan vs UW.. Brrrrrrrr!

Nobody's paying for two games. The women's game is a tack on and they'll be lucky to have 2000 people there for it.

Obviously, since the game is 35,000 short of a sellout, $25 is too expensive for this game.

Simple Economics

Our Athletic Department messed up and it's a shame because having so many empty seats will reflect poorly on this sports community.

Also, I believe women's games are still free for students and $2.00 to the open public so they are not the same. At $24.00 I feel a lot of people were very reluctant to buy a bundle of tickets. I know for me, when I thought tickets were going to be in the $10-12 range my plan was to buy 6-7 tickets and give them out to whoever wanted to go. Then most likely they would be buy me a few drinks in exchange. When it got to $24 I was reluctant to buy a large number tickets because it seemed to steep if I had to eat a couple tickets or give out. I think a lot of people were going to do the same. In the end I only bought 3.

Also $24 is fine for a game at the Kohl Center, but not at a place where a majority of seats are gonna have bad sightlines. The athletic department got too greedy with this one. Alvarez has gotten more and more money hungry every year so I'm gonna pin this on him.

[Gurtholfin]

Re: Culvers Camp Randall Hockey Classic: Michigan vs UW.. Brrrrrrrr!

I play with a couple of men's groups ages 20-50 with a mix of guys who played high school hockey and a few who played D-3. Many of us are coaches and/or have children who play.

I asked the other day and no one in either group was going to this game. These are all hockey people here in Madison and they aren't planning on going.

I'm not sure what that says, but I was somewhat surprised even though I'm not planning on going either. Although I still may.

Wish they'd open the upper deck. I want that 50 yard line seat, row 1.

[MadCityRich]

Re: Culvers Camp Randall Hockey Classic: Michigan vs UW.. Brrrrrrrr!

Also, I believe women's games are still free for students and $2.00 to the open public so they are not the same. At $24.00 I feel a lot of people were very reluctant to buy a bundle of tickets. I know for me, when I thought tickets were going to be in the $10-12 range my plan was to buy 6-7 tickets and give them out to whoever wanted to go. Then most likely they would be buy me a few drinks in exchange. When it got to $24 I was reluctant to buy a large number tickets because it seemed to steep if I had to eat a couple tickets or give out. I think a lot of people were going to do the same. In the end I only bought 3.

Also $24 is fine for a game at the Kohl Center, but not at a place where a majority of seats are gonna have bad sightlines. The athletic department got too greedy with this one. Alvarez has gotten more and more money hungry every year so I'm gonna pin this on him.

Could UW be looking at this or am I an idiot....

45,000 X $24.00 = $1,080,000

80,000 X $10.00 = $800,000 (Wasn't "The Cold War" $10.00?)

Would about $15.00 have been "perfect"? At $15, 70,000 seats would be needed to match 45,000@$24. ($1,050,000)

Just a thought, were they "banking' on 45,000 and anything over that a bonus?; not sure where I stand on this.

[Badgers1]

Re: Culvers Camp Randall Hockey Classic: Michigan vs UW.. Brrrrrrrr!

Many people already paid only $15/ticket with group sales. I knew it would be easy to get a group of 20 people together to go for the experience and ordered 20 without knowing who was going. About a thrid of our group are diehard fans, a third may see a game or two a season in person, while the other third are their for the tailgating/experience of an outdoor game.

Temperatures are looking colder then the early week forecast. High of 27 on Accuweather, but with the wind feel like Temp of only 12.

[ExileOnDaytonStreet]

Re: Culvers Camp Randall Hockey Classic: Michigan vs UW.. Brrrrrrrr!

Lest we also forget that the student tickets were discounted as well.

I think two things killed this:

1) Pricing. As has been noted.

2) At the risk of sounding like uw14 or VW, I'm gonna say it: lack of TV exposure. Given the way that the event was promoted through UW Athletics, it seemed like Barry's expectation was that it would sell out simply on the basis of it being at Camp Randall. You'd have to wonder how 80,000 people would decide they wanted to go to see a team that they have a hard time finding on TV.

There aren't exactly a lot of live Badger games on TV this year, and a fair chunk of the live games aren't on readily available channels (WPT, BTN, FSN), but instead on specialty channels (NHLN, FCS, Charter Extra). If you want 80,000 people to show up for something, you're going to have to appeal to populist sensibilities. In the sports world, "appealing to populist sensibilities" includes some sort of a presence in the media- and yes, that means having plenty of games on live TV on channels where most people can see them. Football and Basketball have it at UW. Hockey doesn't. Ergo, no prayer on the sellout.

[ExileOnDaytonStreet]

Re: Culvers Camp Randall Hockey Classic: Michigan vs UW.. Brrrrrrrr!

But the original proposal was just as STATEdude3 described it, and it was a no brainer.
http://host.madison.com/sports/artic...66073a148.html

Thanks a lot, McLeod.

You douuche.

[WeWantMore]

Re: Culvers Camp Randall Hockey Classic: Michigan vs UW.. Brrrrrrrr!

I'm just as disappointed as all of you are about not even sniffing a sell-out and I think the price was a little too high.
However, I'm still rather optimistic. If you look at the attendance numbers for this year, we seem to have rock-bottom base of around 12,000. Take off around 3,000 or so for students and we have a base of around 9000. Assuming most of those bought tickets for the CRHC, and taking off for student's and Michigan fans and others, that leaves- conservatively- 20,000 fans who are going to be at Camp Randall who may not have any familiarity with Badger hockey. Now say 15% of them get "converted" to Badger hockey. That's 3000 people who now want to come to more games, maybe we'll see better attendances for the Mankato and St. Cloud series?

[RedFreak]

Re: Culvers Camp Randall Hockey Classic: Michigan vs UW.. Brrrrrrrr!

Thanks a lot, McLeod.

I agree. Thank you, McLeod

You douuche.

Oh, wait. You meant that as a bad thing.