August 31, 2009
Sports bubble watch: Giants, Jets seats still selling slowly
More on the previously reported difficulties the New York Giants and Jets are having selling tickets at their pricey new stadium opening next year, this time courtesy of the New York Times:
The Giants, who still have seats to sell for some games this season, have not found buyers for about 3,000 club season tickets for 2010, some in the best locations at the highest prices.
And the Jets lag behind the Giants. They said they still had "a few thousand" season tickets remaining for 2009 and were advertising half-season packages...
Jim Lites, a senior consultant contracted by the Giants to sell seats in the new stadium, acknowledged that the recession and the higher ticket costs for 2010 were having a chilling effect.
"There is a point at some price that people won't purchase a product," Lites said. "It's still a bit of sticker shock. There has been some pushback on the price."...
Albert Cruz of Hastings-on-Hudson, N.Y., had a similar reaction when he was asked to renew his Jets season tickets for next year. He has sat in the fourth row for 25 years, he said. His tickets cost $90.
For next year, he said, he was offered midlevel seats with P.S.L.'s from $8,000 to $9,000 and per-game prices of $400 to $500.
"They're just too darn expensive," Cruz said. "As a loyal fan, I feel shafted."
Both teams say they'll sell their remaining tickets by next fall, but given that the Giants have already run through what had been a 20-year-plus waiting list, you have to figure they'll need to resort to price cuts or two-for-one deals to get there. And as we've seen before, that tends not to sit well with those who paid full price.
And Santa Clara will only be the 2nd host city to try to sell personal seat licenses. The first being Oakland, whose residents were promised that the seat licenses would pay for the 225 mil in bonds the city took out. Well, now the taxpayers of Oakland are paying 20 mil/year out of their city budget because Oakland couldn't sell enough seat licenses to pay the bond debt. In this economy, it's not surprising that seat licenses aren't selling.
Posted by Santa Clara Taxpayer on September 1, 2009 06:59 PM