Season tickets not actually full?????

sonnygarcia

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This was in the STrib today, anyone care to translate??

The university is in the midst of the seat selection process for season ticket-holders that started March 30 and runs through early June. Maturi said the process is about 16 percent complete. The current season-ticket base is 29,110 -- excluding students -- and there is a waiting list of about 2,000 that is expected to translate to at least 5,000 tickets.

Next up: Student season-ticket sales start April 25. The university will sell up to 8,000 season tickets to students this spring, holding an extra 2,000 for incoming freshmen and transfers this fall.

The goal is to sell at least 40,000 season tickets, including student sales, for next fall. Capacity for the new stadium is about 51,000.


--- Sounds like to me the people on the waiting list should be fine?? Who knows?? I just want to be secured by USC tiks for 2010!!
 

Basically, they stopped the sale at a point and said that was the number of people guranteed to get tickets. They started a waitlist to see where they would be at the end of the process and will give those seats out as they know exact numbers.
 

The waitlist will get tickets.....its just a matter of when. The waitlist won't be able to get them until probably June or July, but they will get them.
 

Basically, they stopped the sale at a point and said that was the number of people guranteed to get tickets. They started a waitlist to see where they would be at the end of the process and will give those seats out as they know exact numbers.

Sort of…you are close. They stopped it at the point where everyone could get a seat that didn't cost extra. There are approx 10,000 seats that require a donation. Math time:
51,000 total - 10,000 students = 41,000
41,000 – 3,000 visitor seats = 38,000 seats
38,000 – approx 10,000 “preferred” seats = approx 28,000 seats

The current season ticket base is 29,110. The U couldn’t assume that everyone would pay extra so that’s where they capped the sales and started the wait list last season.
 

So... some tickets will be available this summer. But it is only going to be for people who:

1. Are cool with taking what's left (last pick, worst seats)
2. Are okay with sitting alone
3. Don't mind making a sizable annual donation.

That type of proposition requires different marketing than we saw last Fall.

I think the U has done a killer job with this process. Avoiding the garuntee of seats only to end up forcing to make the annual donation or break up their original block is just one example of how flawless it has been.
 


They will most likely not be donation seats. Roughly 2/3 of people have chosen to take donation seats so far, unless that changes drastically, the donation seats will be long gone by then.
 

So... some tickets will be available this summer. But it is only going to be for people who:

1. Are cool with taking what's left (last pick, worst seats)
2. Are okay with sitting alone
3. Don't mind making a sizable annual donation.

That type of proposition requires different marketing than we saw last Fall.

I think the U has done a killer job with this process. Avoiding the garuntee of seats only to end up forcing to make the annual donation or break up their original block is just one example of how flawless it has been.

I agree that the U has handled this about as well as they could. I think it would have been better if they had been clearer about how much seating was left before now, but that may have been intentional too.

Some thoughts on your 3 points above:
#1: The nice thing about TCF is that there really aren’t “worst seats”. I’d be happy watching a game from the “worst seats” (though I won’t complain that I don’t have to :)). Hopefully the U finds a creative way to make this point when marketing the last remaining seats this late summer/fall.
#2: I don’t think leftover single seats will be a huge problem. The U has been clear that some slight reordering of seat locations will be done to prevent singles whenever possible and I think the # of these seats will be very small as a result.
#3: This is probably true. IMHO, a decent number of the last remaining seats will probably come from the $250 or $500 preferred seats. As you say, a completely different marketing approach would be needed for these seats as an on the fence Joe Schmo probably isn’t going to plunk down extra cash to get season tickets.
 

They will most likely not be donation seats. Roughly 2/3 of people have chosen to take donation seats so far, unless that changes drastically, the donation seats will be long gone by then.

I sure hope this is the case. Marketing the remaining tickets will be much easier if the vast majority of them do not come with a yearly fee attached.
 

They will most likely not be donation seats. Roughly 2/3 of people have chosen to take donation seats so far, unless that changes drastically, the donation seats will be long gone by then.

I am assuming that the selection of donation seats will slow based on this info that old chap posted a couple days ago:

Stats as of 4/13 (4/8)

Total Seats - 4,745 (3,213)

Gopher Side - 63% (66%)
Visitor Side - 37% (34%)

$500 - 33% (39%)
$250 - 24% (22%)
$100 - 3% (3%)
None - 40% (36%)

Upper - 24% (25%)
Lower - 76% (24%)

% of 500/250/100 seats gone - 45% / 27% / 17%

Not surprisingly, as the selector's point total falls they are less likely to pick donation seats. Based on that, I think there is a good chance some $500 and $250 donation seats will be around for people who are high on the waiting list.
 






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