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MLB Attendance Declining

Discussion in 'Sports and News' started by LanceyHoward, Jun 23, 2018.

  1. Hermes

    Hermes Well-Known Member

    The parks I go to tend to be Wrigley, Progressive Field and Great American Ballpark. Those three are all pretty good about not having too much seizure-inducing stuff on the boards. Wrigley especially.

    I've been listening to every type of music REALLY, REALLY loud in bars, clubs, car stereos and headphones for about 27 years now. You can't faze me with music. I can't hear anymore, but it's just been blaring into my skull for so many years now that I'm not going to be annoyed by it. Even if it's terrible.

    And I learned to stop being cynical about the hot dog races and the ball under the helmet games and the wave. I've got to. If I ever have a kid, I can't be an asshole about little things like that. My parents were. And look how I turned out. I was the guy at 12 who refused to look up from the game because I had to keep a perfectly clean scorecard and didn't talk to anyone. Fuck that. I can put up with some mascot buffoonery and Onion always winning the race in Cleveland.
     
  2. Della9250

    Della9250 Well-Known Member

    Two regular priced adult tickets, medium popcorn, medium soda where I am is $32.
     
  3. Michael_ Gee

    Michael_ Gee Well-Known Member

    Many businesses dealing with unsold inventory (that's what seats are) respond by cutting prices through sales, discounts, rebates, etc. I wonder if any MLB team will go that route after the All-Star Break. The one year I lived in the Bay Area in 1973, the A's had every Monday game as Half-Price Night. Tickets, concessions, parking, everything was half off. You could buy a bleacher seat and get bombed on beer for less than $10. So the bleachers would be full, and the rest of the Coliseum empty as usual.
     
  4. Hermes

    Hermes Well-Known Member

    I've got to think the subscription plan will catch on more. I know clubs have dabbled in it.
     
  5. HanSenSE

    HanSenSE Well-Known Member

    The Giants (as I imagine other clubs do) have "dynamic pricing." A seat that may cost you, say, $15 against the Reds or Phillies will be $50 against the Cubs or Dodgers.
     
  6. Azrael

    Azrael Well-Known Member

    That's the date night price! (Unless you're in New York City. Then the 3-D date night price is north of $60 - even if you share the popcorn and the soda.)

    I was doing a straight-up comparison to that MiLB family night out figure, so add two kids' tickets and another popcorn and soda (if they'll share.)

    Close to $50.
     
  7. Della9250

    Della9250 Well-Known Member

    for me, that total would be be $57, so there is a negligible difference between the night out at the movies or the ballpark.
     
  8. Azrael

    Azrael Well-Known Member

    Movie attendance is down, too.

    I wonder what the night out dollar cutoff is now for most folks.
     
  9. Della9250

    Della9250 Well-Known Member

    For me, with someone or not, I'll go to the movies now to see certain showings -- the marvel stuff, jurassic world -- but will wait the couple months for a lot of stuff I'd see in a theater for when it is released on redbox. I'd imagine there's a lot of people who do the same.
     
  10. Buck

    Buck Well-Known Member


    See that, I knew people were going to get screwed when they got rid of net neutrality.
     
  11. Buck

    Buck Well-Known Member

    Median household income is $59,000.
    If you work with rough ideas of 50% for fixed costs and 20% for savings, you have 30% disposable.
    These are rough, aspirational numbers, though. Few people have their hard costs down to 50% of income and, sadly, few are saving 20%.

    Anyway, you've got $17,700 'disposable.'
    That is $1,475 per month.
    Pay your fees for the kids' sports and dance lessons. Pay your cable or direcTv.
    You've got gaming subscriptions for WoW and a Netflix subscription, maybe a Hulu subscription, too.
    You subscribing to your newspaper, maybe; you get a magazine or two, so does the spouse, maybe the kids.
    There are a lot of nights when no one has time to or wants to cook, so you order pizza or some other take-out.
    Or delivery, so now you have to tip.
    You gotta have a frou-frou coffee multiple times per week, so does the wife, so do the kids.
    By the end of it, a $60-$70 trip to the movies or a minor league sporting event is still a pretty big expense for a typical household.
    People do it, and that's great. Part of the reason most of us work as hard as we do is to have enough income for our families to enjoy themselves, to exist beyond mere subsistence.
    But marketing something as cheaper than major-league sports doesn't mean it is actually inexpensive in relation to a typical household budget.
    It's just less expensive.

    Basal skin cancer might be preferable diagnosis to melanoma. Doesn't make it good, just better than melanoma.
     
    jr/shotglass likes this.
  12. TigerVols

    TigerVols Well-Known Member

    @BTExpress to the white courtesy phone; @BTExpress to the white courtesy phone. Thank you
     
    Donny in his element likes this.
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