And Now Some GOOD News - Season Ticket Sales

[USFMikeB]

Plus, they are in the midst of running an advertising campaign, so maybe that will drive some more sales.  It is sad to see that of the 1.4 milion people in the Tampa Bay area, we've only managed to pull a bit over 1% in season ticket participation.  We need to win consistently to get the fairweather Tampa fan to buy season tickets.

[Knight_Light]

am i being too optimistic or are we not doing enough to attract our graduating students?

That's the $64,000 question.

USF has had almost 50,000 graduates since 1999, but season tix are still down.

Both UCF and USF have had a hard time getting recent alumni, who either didn't have a football program for long (USF) or with UCF had down years and/or played mostly minor schools (aka MAC), how does one tap into this HUGE market of tens of thousands of Alumni at either school that don't seem that interested in spending $$$$ at their Alumni program?

Sports Illustrated did a feature story almost 20 years ago on student "apathy" (even at top programs across the country) that if you don't turn on the students to sports DURING their collegiate lifetime...it will be almost impossible to turn them on AFTER they graduate.

That's why student attendance/support is SOOOO important at each school...and with almost 30,000 full-time students at each school (part-timers and grad students attend sporting events at a much lesser rate), both schools know that how goes student attendance....is how future attendance will/will not grow.

KL

PS. Maybe both Athletic Depts should spend more $$$$$ on involving current students...instead of throwing marketing $$$$$ to alumni...who were never interested in sports when they were students.

[E.T.]

Good Point.

[BullyPulpit]

I think that targeted marketing is the best approach. Something like sending a season ticket special out to all of those on the Bucs season ticket wait list. I mean there is waiting list of over 100,000 fans.....first of all that is amazing. Second of all, there must be some in there that are just rabid sport/football fans who wouldn't mind getting a great deal to BCS football.

In the end the leason we have learned in Tampa Bay is that in order to get any sort of support, you must be a winner. The Bucs and the Lightning both saw amazing leaps in fan support by winning. I think the same will hold true after USF's first trip to a BCS bowl. Next year????

[USFMikeB]

Bully, see other threads where the 100K Bucs waiting list myth is debunked.

[E.T.]

And my thoughts on the NFL fan is that they are not a USF fan .. or they would be at the games already.

I agree about going after current students & corporations. USF will soon be on a more "name" basis and what better way to entertain with sports/football - and realatively inexpensive.

[BullyPulpit]

Okay, so lets say it is only 40 or 50 k, I know someone who just got season tickets after being on the waitlist for 5 or 6 years. That is still quite a few potential fans/season ticket holders. If we were only to get a 2-3% response to that initiative it would still be in the neighborhood of 1000 new season ticket holders. I'm just saying that just putting commercials and billboards out there is nice, but targeted marketing is much more effective.

[Knight_Light]

Okay, so lets say it is only 40 or 50 k, I know someone who just got season tickets after being on the waitlist for 5 or 6 years. That is still quite a few potential fans/season ticket holders. If we were only to get a 2-3% response to that initiative it would still be in the neighborhood of 1000 new season ticket holders. I'm just saying that just putting commercials and billboards out there is nice, but targeted marketing is much more effective.

But will the Bucs give/sell that list to USF?

It might not be as easy as one thinks.

KL

[Bullpride08]

DANG ! I miss that edit button.

Even though it is only about 250 more tix, it's a great sign and hopefully we get more this final week. And who knows, with a great start to the season, maybe some more are sold before the Rutgers game with the FULL Big East schedule yet to be played..

I was told they expect to be at or near 17,000 by game day....and in excess by season's end- providing a decent season of course.

We're getting there...

[USFreak]

am i being too optimistic or are we not doing enough to attract our graduating students?

That's the $64,000 question.

USF has had almost 50,000 graduates since 1999, but season tix are still down.

Both UCF and USF have had a hard time getting recent alumni, who either didn't have a football program for long (USF) or with UCF had down years and/or played mostly minor schools (aka MAC), how does one tap into this HUGE market of tens of thousands of Alumni at either school that don't seem that interested in spending $$$$ at their Alumni program?

Sports Illustrated did a feature story almost 20 years ago on student "apathy" (even at top programs across the country) that if you don't turn on the students to sports DURING their collegiate lifetime...it will be almost impossible to turn them on AFTER they graduate.

That's why student attendance/support is SOOOO important at each school...and with almost 30,000 full-time students at each school (part-timers and grad students attend sporting events at a much lesser rate), both schools know that how goes student attendance....is how future attendance will/will not grow.

KL

PS. Maybe both Athletic Depts should spend more $$$$$ on involving current students...instead of throwing marketing $$$$$ to alumni...who were never interested in sports when they were students.

KL,

I think this is a very good post.  There are certainly different opportunities here, but I do agree that the adoption rate of 'new' graduates will vastly outnumber the old-timers that never had football.  It would be great to attach a metric to it....

Either way, I think that the new graduates may not have the deep pockets of the old timers, but I reckon you could capture a greater percentage of them and, in time, they grow to be a very big part of the progam.

Good post, though.