Pathetic attendance

bigfoot · Post #1 » by **bigfoot** » Tue Jan 7, 2014 2:52 pm

Despite their 20-12 record, the Phoenix Suns' bandwagon has been slow to fill up in the 2013-14 season.

Perhaps it's due to the low expectations set at the outset of the season, the lack of big names on the roster or a hangover from three playoff-less seasons, but the Suns attendance was the worst in the Western Conference in the 2013 portion of the 2013-14 season.

http://arizonasports.com/41/1689885/Pho ... Conference

Utterly disappointing. Wish the Suns would cater to fans by selling reasonably priced tickets. Instead businesses buy the majority of the lower bowl and courtside seats and give them away as compensation to clients or occasionally give them to employees. Those tickets end up unused all to often.

INFORMER-93 · Post #2 » by **INFORMER-93** » Tue Jan 7, 2014 2:58 pm

So that's what you think is the root cause? Over-priced tickets?

NapoleonII · Post #3 » by **NapoleonII** » Tue Jan 7, 2014 4:26 pm

It'll pick up.

Last year is still etched into the everyday fan's mind.

Last year was a nightmare.

DirtyDez · Post #4 » by **DirtyDez** » Tue Jan 7, 2014 5:39 pm

Unless I have great seats I'd rather watch on TV. If I'm high up there or behind the basket it's a better viewing experience at home and there's not 20 dudes in my bathroom pissing on the floor. Guess I'm a #badfan.

ak7 · Post #5 » by **ak7** » Tue Jan 7, 2014 6:15 pm

bigfoot wrote:
Despite their 20-12 record, the Phoenix Suns' bandwagon has been slow to fill up in the 2013-14 season.

Perhaps it's due to the low expectations set at the outset of the season, the lack of big names on the roster or a hangover from three playoff-less seasons, but the Suns attendance was the worst in the Western Conference in the 2013 portion of the 2013-14 season.

http://arizonasports.com/41/1689885/Pho ... Conference

Utterly disappointing. Wish the Suns would cater to fans by selling reasonably priced tickets. Instead businesses buy the majority of the lower bowl and courtside seats and give them away as compensation to clients or occasionally give them to employees. Those tickets end up unused all to often.

This.

I'm a basketball fan first and a Lakers fan second, and being stationed in Tucson, I try to make it to about 5 Suns games a year to get my NBA basketball fix, and the overpriced seats are kind of a turn off.

A perfect example of this is the Lakers this year. For whatever reason they offer small "discounted" tickets for the month of January, except when the Kobe/Nash less Lakers come to town (i understand the business behind it, the Suns make a great deal of money from those Lakers games). Lower level seats were going for ridiculous prices (even more so than what I paid to watch them in PHX last year with a healthy Kobe and Dwight). Even on ticketmaster these prices are ridiculous and while they are starting to come down, why not do that before the Holidays when people have set aside the cash to spend?

TL;DR... it's their own fault, IMO for the attendance issues.

LukasBMW · Post #6 » by **LukasBMW** » Tue Jan 7, 2014 6:19 pm

DirtyDez wrote:Unless I have great seats I'd rather watch on TV. If I'm high up there or behind the basket it's a better viewing experience at home and there's not 20 dudes in my bathroom pissing on the floor. Guess I'm a #badfan.

No, I'm the same way. It's nice to be able to watch the game at home in HD and not worry about driving/parking/crowds AND paying a crazy ticket price.

This may be a big problem for sports teams with the newer "anti-social" generations.

Of course as mentioned above, high ticket prices and cooperate buyers are also part of the problem.

NaturalBuns · Post #7 » by **NaturalBuns** » Tue Jan 7, 2014 7:32 pm

Cardinals games didn't look like sell outs early on in the season when we were going like 500. Not until like November is when the red sea came into effect.

I think its safe to say we have fair weather fans

bigfoot · Post #8 » by **bigfoot** » Tue Jan 7, 2014 8:43 pm

INFORMER-93 wrote:So that's what you think is the root cause? Over-priced tickets?

Last year Phoenix had the 6th highest average ticket price ($60). That won't touch a seat in the lower bowl. So if you want two seats to a game in an area that is semi-watchable plan on dropping close to $400.

SUN · Post #9 » by **SUN** » Wed Jan 8, 2014 12:01 am

It will take time. If we're the same or better next year, we'll get a cult following and more coverage.

mybloodisorange · Post #10 » by **mybloodisorange** » Wed Jan 8, 2014 11:00 am

Is there anything stopping you from buying a cheap nose bleed ticket then just finding some unused seats and just acting like they are yours? The trick is to wait until just after tip-off so you dont take the guys seat who is showing up at the last second. :lol:

It seems like there are large numbers of unused seats in decent sections (whole rows sometimes) in every home game I watch. And lets be honest I doubt they are even being that strict about it; they are probably just happy that the people are coming at all. Phoenix has always been a huge band-wagony town..the low attendence doesnt suprise me.

zerowolf88 · Post #11 » by **zerowolf88** » Wed Jan 8, 2014 11:45 am

sorry but phoenix has some the worst fans in the league.Ive been a suns fan for 20+ years and i dont even live in arizona.If i did i would be a season ticket holder for sure.

i505 · Post #12 » by **i505** » Wed Jan 8, 2014 2:38 pm

mybloodisorange wrote:Is there anything stopping you from buying a cheap nose bleed ticket then just finding some unused seats and just acting like they are yours?

Yes. They check your ticket at each section.

mikefly3113 · Post #13 » by **mikefly3113** » Thu Jan 9, 2014 6:37 am

This is my eighth year as a season ticket holder and towards the begging of the season it was awful, felt like I could count the number of people in the building. But the last home game against the Bucks was a pleasant surprise. It was the most people I have seen all year and the place was rocking just like the good ol days.

Post #14 » by **Qwigglez** » Thu Jan 9, 2014 12:12 pm

The Spurs game I went to when I was in town with LV-Suns was surprisingly not filled. I was rather disappointed, thought there was a fat dude sitting next to me, that pissed me off. Oh and my buddy on the opposite side who also weights 350lbs. I moved seats in the 2nd half haha.

jcsunsfan · Post #15 » by **jcsunsfan** » Thu Jan 9, 2014 4:08 pm

I have lived here since the Suns came to town. It is stupid to blame poor attendance on the fans. This is a business and people here are people just like anywhere else. Look at the Cardinals, they have sold out every game since they have been in the new building. Yet, they were terrible with attendance before that. The Suns went years with constant sell-outs.

The burden is on the team to put a product on the floor and market that product. The Suns have done both poorly. While this young team is fun to watch for those that know basketball, it does not have a star face to gain attention. Goran or Bled might become that, but half the people in this town don't know who Bledsoe is yet. They have been watching the Cardinals since August. All they remember is the embarrassing mess that was last year.

Also, the Suns TV exposure is poor. Marketers have still not figured out that games on TV actually help to promote attendance at this stage. Its been a few years now that the Suns have had no over-the-air tv presence. They went exclusively to cable. Less and less people are buying cable these days with the internet, netflix (and others like it), and expanded offerings on free digital TV. You can get away with having less TV exposure when everyone knows you, loves you, and wants to see the games. But just because someone really wants to see the Suns does not mean they are going to spring for tickets.

The Suns marketing department is failing miserably and it starts with their cable only exposure.

grumpysaddle · Post #16 » by **grumpysaddle** » Thu Jan 9, 2014 7:56 pm

I don't live in PHX and have only been through a couple times on various tours I've gone on, and haven't been able to catch any NBA games (living in San Diego) but here's my two cents...

If attendance is so poor, wouldn't it be prudent to cut prices across the board? Lower ticket prices drastically until people start pouring in because of it. Same goes for concession prices (which I believe are the highest in the league). The more people are there, the more food/drinks they will consume. You might make less money off each person in attendance, but the difference will be made up easily by the sheer number of people in attendance.

Say tickets are $50 and 3 people go because it's a bit steep. Lower that price to $25, which is far more enticing, and you get 15 people to go. 3 x 50 = $150. 15 x 25 = $375. You just more than doubled the money you made, and in the process made the building far more exciting to be in. I really don't understand how franchises struggling with attendance don't see this... It's a super simple solution. Wouldn't you rather sell out the building with cheap tickets and make far more money than have an arena less than half full while making less money?

JTrain · Post #17 » by **JTrain** » Thu Jan 9, 2014 11:29 pm

It's crazy that so many of the lower seat holders don't make more of an effort to sell for games they don't go to. I guess they're too rich to care, but why not sell on craigslist for $30 or $40? Takes about five minutes of effort, and makes the Suns organization look more respectable on TV.