Awesome, thanks for the numbers!

Posted by pwnicholson from Nashville, TN on 02/16/09 at 03:02 PM ET

Paid attendance is up, they’re likely to hit the 14,000 mark, and giveaways are down by nearly 50%.  I’d say that progress is definitely being made in Nashville.

I was forced to watch the Nashville feed online last Tuesday whent the Wings played the Preds. (Thanks FSN Detroit and your love for the PissDens).

Anyway, I was amazed at the number of promotons being advertised during the game. It seems like every time there was a break in play, the announcers would launch into another “great deal for Preds fans”. It was far beyond anything I’ve ever heard while listening to another team’s broadcast. I’m sure all of those ticket sales are counted as “paid attendance” but, in all honesty, many of them were the next closest thing to a giveaway.

When you’re selling seats for a fraction of their face value, it’s kinda hard to say that a whole lot of “progress” is being made. I think the only way the Preds will survive in Nashville is to sell their seats at their true face value.

Posted by OlderThanChelios from Grand Rapids on 02/16/09 at 03:10 PM ET

The Preds are running a host of promotions this month, because they’ve got 10 home games in the 28 days of February, a tight bunching to sell tons of seats in.  They’ve also announced that the team projects to make a small profit this year, so it seems like their strategy is working.

Posted by Forechecker from Nolensville, TN on 02/16/09 at 03:24 PM ET

When you’re selling seats for a fraction of their face value, it’s kinda hard to say that a whole lot of “progress” is being made. I think the only way the Preds will survive in Nashville is to sell their seats at their true face value.

I agree there are a lot of promos, but some of what you heard was probably actually paid for from a 3rd ‘company’. A support group here in town has bought up a bunch of tickets (at face value) and did a buy-on-get-one-free promo. If you buy a ticket for Game X then they give you a ticket for Game Y, but the Preds have sold them all at face value.

There are of course other promos, but they are usually limited to smaller groups (military, students, etc).

The Preds have actually gone out of their way not to just start selling tickets on the street for $5 like some other franchises (*cough*Atlanta*cough*) so as to piss off their season ticket holder base that are paying close to full price for tickets.

There are frequent promos of one kind or another, but the vast majority of tickets sold are still at or close to face value.

The last, true test of how solid the franchise is will be when they can sell these numbers (or higher) without as many promos (which will also bring in more revenue), but the franchise still isn’t there. That’s just a reality right now. But these numbers show that improvements are being made - major ones based on the number of tickets that used to be given away in past years compared to now - and those are positive signs for the Preds and for hockey in general.

Posted by pwnicholson from Nashville, TN on 02/16/09 at 03:28 PM ET

Hey G&M: Suck on that one and like it, hah? 

Posted by AJ in Nashville from Nashville, TN on 02/16/09 at 04:23 PM ET

So I guess the free Phoenix game coming up doesn’t count eh ?  If you bought a ticket to the last Phoenix game in Nashville, or the last St Louis game, for each ticket purchased you received one FREE ticket to the upcoming Phoenix game towards the end of the month.  They’ve been advertising that since the last Calgary game, which was on Centre Ice, which was seen nationwide and all across Canada.  For those bashing on Atlanta, sounds like the pot calling the kettle black to me….

Mr Forechecker, those “profit” numbers were after the revenue sharing was paid to Nashville, so IMO thats not really a profit, its someone else paying your bills….

There was an article about the ownership here buying up their own tickets, it was in the Tennessean, and made it across the country to all the hockey writers.  Bettman said on TV that it was a blatent lie, even though Nashville themselves released the information to the press…

All these efforts just to make the required numbers needed to get the full handout from the teams that do actually turn a profit…... How is that progress ???

Posted by yzerman19 from Nashville on 02/16/09 at 06:25 PM ET

The Preds have increased the number of paid tickets per game by over 125 per game over last year, and dropped the number of giveaways per game to 23 down from 1815. How can you not say that’s progress? It isn’t the pinnacle or the eventual goal, but it is certainly progress. ESPECIALLY when they have done it in the middle of a severe economic downturn.

As for the Phoenix game, if you bothered to, ya know, read my earlier comment or listen to the radio promos: those aren’t being given away by the club. Those are being bought by a group of local business owners know as “Our Team Nashville”. You buy one ticket, they buy you the ‘free’ ticket. All are full price tickets as far as the revenue collected by the club.

I’m sure the club is counting on the revenue sharing to turn the “profit” they are bragging about, but that’s still far better than the Devils or Islanders are doing on their bottom line.

Posted by pwnicholson from Nashville, TN on 02/16/09 at 06:50 PM ET

(Obviosly that should have said 823 giveaways per game, not 23)

Posted by pwnicholson from Nashville, TN on 02/16/09 at 06:51 PM ET

Mr Forechecker, those “profit” numbers were after the revenue sharing was paid to Nashville, so IMO thats not really a profit, its someone else paying your bills….

Mr Yzerman 19 (I’m guessing that’s not your picture), thanks for reviving one of my favorite misguided criticisms of small market teams.  Nashville doesn’t have to apologize for accepting revenue sharing funds. The revenue sharing plan is the NHL’s means of providing for a relatively narrow band of team salaries.

1. The owners wanted a cap
2. The players wanted a floor
3. When setting the boundaries for #1 and #2, they agreed to a system in which team salaries would only vary by as much as $16 million, knowing that many teams would find that unaffordable, while many others would be able to easily spend much more. The revenue sharing plan is specifically designed to help the smaller teams support the league-minimum payroll which today stands around $40 million.

Without revenue sharing, you wouldn’t have the floor, and you wouldn’t have the cap. If they wanted to reduce revenue sharing, they could widen the range, and allow teams to have smaller payrolls.

And again, that article in the Tennessean had Freeman talking about the owners possibly buying tickets if they needed to, there’s been no word that they’ve actually been doing it.

Posted by Forechecker from Nolensville, TN on 02/16/09 at 07:55 PM ET

And again, that article in the Tennessean had Freeman talking about the owners possibly buying tickets if they needed to, there’s been no word that they’ve actually been doing it.

Actually there has been word and it is a definitive “no, they have not bought any tickets to meet revenue sharing numbers and do not foresee the need to do so.”  The original TN’n article picked up by TSN was that the club was discussing the possibility, but had not done so. 

While it’s true the owners have discussed the possibility of buying up tickets if necessary to reach the 14,000 paid-attendance mark needed for full NHL revenue-sharing benefits, management does not believe it will face that situation.

Freeman and Ed Lang, the team’s president of business operations, say that based on both current ticket sales and sales forecasts, the Predators believe they will top the 14,000 mark without the owners opening up the wallets.

http://www.tennessean.com/article/20090203/SPORTS02/902030342/1002/SPORTS

Of course the article written by Glennon three days after Cass did his best to smear the franchise did not get picked up by TSN.

Posted by SLake from Mount Juliet, TN on 02/19/09 at 12:17 AM ET