Season Ticket Sales Count?

[Greg Auman]

We didn't get a season ticket update from USF until August last year, so not sure you'll get a number anytime soon ...

[Hem]

 

I doubt many would move from Jj's seats. Had the honor to sit next to him (and his son) with my father in law for the UConn Bball game...couldn't get better seats unless I had a jersey on and Heath was calling me in.

I think we're talking football here.

 

I'm quite sure his football seats are just as good as his basketball seats.

[Skingraft]

I'm just hoping its not as bad as we are feeling it will be

[jjlovecub]

I might shed some light on this.

So, take my last year at USF .. there was just me and John, we each basically had half the accounts.

We would make emails and reminders to our accounts about the renewal deadline. Then usually right at the deadline (and sometimes before it) we would start calling unrenewed accounts and try to get them to renew. Some would renew, some would tell us they weren't renewing ... the vast majority would ignore the messages we would leave (if they didn't answer the phone and we left a message). We would keep calling the list over and over, often making 4, 5, or 6 calls plus maybe 10 email reminders. At some point the seats from the people who never returned our calls or replied to our emails would get opened up. There was no set date for this to happen. Heck, one year it didn't happen until late October.

During the same time, we would be working to do seat upgrades and relocations and adds. We worked really well together (including Angelo and other past sales people who moved on) ... in that, if season ticket holder X needed section 108 Row Z seats 21-24 to get all of his seats together, we would tell each other to make more calls to the person who had those seats and didn't renew, in hopes they would answer the phone and say yes or no ... so we could help or deny season ticket holder X.

I think I heard that unrenewed seats have already been opened, which would be the earliest time in the last 8 or 9 years. Possibly because of the new dynamic of having IMG selling tickets.

As a rep, I always wanted those seats opened up early as possible because it allowed me to help my clients who did everything right by renewing on time. Opened up prime inventory to sell new tickets and prevented people from assuming they could renew the thursday before the first home game. Plus, as soon as they were opened I could stop calling the accounts in limbo and work on new sales.

But to understand the counter argument, when you open seats from ticket holders who have not responded .. you risk losing people who might have renewed because their seats are no longer available for them.

Here is the strange timing of this. When the team is winning and tickets are in high demand, then we can open seats earlier because people are more responsive when they value the tickets more .... when tickets are plentiful and the team is struggling then people have less urgency to renew on time. So I would think this might be an year we didn't open seats until October.

Seat location is also a factor, someone who loves their seats fear losing them .. someone who has seats that they feel are easily replaceable may not have any urgency to renew by any school deadline.

Great insight Mike. Thanks! And you are right it was always August or later in the past before I was told No. Hopefully we get back into the winning ways soon to get demand back up. I appreciate the insight too on how you worked hard for those loyal fans who did the right thing. Good customer service is so underrated but goes a long way - at least with me.

[MaltLiquorBull]

At least this year the count won't be artificially inflated by FSU fans who bought season tickets for ONE GAME.  Then for the other 5 games, the seats were left empty or filled by fans who paid $5 for them on stubhub.

[Bull Martin]

Δ-4 from me (I'm moving out of state, but kept 2 of 6 for the sake of keeping some)

 

I don't think it's going to be good.  Every year it had been growing they released numbers or commented that it's doing better than previous.

[Bulls Are We]

-8 here.  Between the FSU fans who purchased season tickets last year and the Holtz hangover, I think we will be looking at a significant drop.  My guess is we end up well under 20K, in the 17-18K range.    

[MaltLiquorBull]

We need to start winning again.  That fixes everything.  Going to the games should not be a miserable experience. People don't want to pay for that.  The University should be very thankful that there are enough insane diehards out there who will still pay.

[Joe]

I think the problem isn't team losing as much as it is the Bucs. They've slashed ticket prices, and if you give Tampa the option they'd rather pay $2200 for 4 Bucs tickets (10 games) than 1000 for 4 USF tickets.

[Triple B]

I think the problem isn't team losing as much as it is the Bucs. They've slashed ticket prices, and if you give Tampa the option they'd rather pay $2200 for 4 Bucs tickets (10 games) than 1000 for 4 USF tickets.

 

Seriously doubt you're going to have people that only bought Bulls tickets giving them up to spend over twice as much on Bucs tickets ...