as attendance and donations go down. Short sided in the near term and diastrous in the long term.

https://www.facebook.com/CalAthletics/posts/10155984258361900

Dumb with a capital "D". Some investments are worth making. Free tickets (at least for the freshman) is the cheapest way imaginable for Cal to seed the field to grow future donors and fans.

Maybe the new AD can be convinced to stop this. Does Irvine charge students?

Sebastabear said:

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Dumb with a capital "D". Some investments are worth making. Free tickets (at least for the freshman) is the cheapest way imaginable for Cal to seed the field to grow future donors and fans.

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Sebas, has this come up in serious discussions you've had with the Chancellor? I would gladly give to a fund that covered student tickets.

I haven't, but I'm really thinking I need to have this discussion. This is just nonsense.

Mike Montgomery offered to due a benefit so students could attend basketball games free while he was coach. The AD turned him down. They want to charge. They haven't wanted other solutions.

If you always do what you have always done, you will get what you always get. Old and tired but true, especially in this case.

socaliganbear said:

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Sebastabear said:

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Dumb with a capital "D". Some investments are worth making. Free tickets (at least for the freshman) is the cheapest way imaginable for Cal to seed the field to grow future donors and fans.

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Sebas, has this come up in serious discussions you've had with the Chancellor? I would gladly give to a fund that covered student tickets.

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I am ready to donate to a fund to allow at least Freshmen attend the Cal Football games for free.

How much are these idiots in the Athletic Department (headed by the genius who hired the current MBB) charging for Freshmen for a season ticket?

Count me in for sponsoring at least 20 Freshmen.

Go Bears!

So from my understanding, the reasoning behind their pulling selling to freshmen was because freshmen wouldn't actually redeem their tickets and instead sold their tickets to other people, making it so that the atheltics department ran out of money.

If I were athletics, I would just sell tickets to all students for a flat rate of $5.00 or just give them tickets for free until people start showing up regularly.

packawana said:

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So from my understanding, the reasoning behind their pulling selling to freshmen was because freshmen wouldn't actually redeem their tickets and instead sold their tickets to other people, making it so that the atheltics department ran out of money.

If I were athletics, I would just sell tickets to all students for a flat rate of $5.00 or just give them tickets for free until people start showing up regularly.

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Easy. Don't give students actual tickets. Should run off your student ID like meal points.

socaliganbear said:

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packawana said:

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So from my understanding, the reasoning behind their pulling selling to freshmen was because freshmen wouldn't actually redeem their tickets and instead sold their tickets to other people, making it so that the atheltics department ran out of money.

If I were athletics, I would just sell tickets to all students for a flat rate of $5.00 or just give them tickets for free until people start showing up regularly.

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Easy. Don't give students actual tickets. Should run off your student ID like meal points.

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Student tickets are already tied to SID. That's not the problem. The problem is that Athletics lets you sell your ticket to another student. You can transfer your ticket to another student's ID.

It's great from the consumer's POV frankly.

I think there's something to charging a nominal fee. Receiving things for free often cause people to devalue them. Paying a token amount, even like $5 like the cost of distribution, makes one value their tickets more.

As I understand it, it's already difficulty to sell a student ticket as I was under the impressed that they were tied to IDs and could only be transferred between other students.

packawana said:

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So from my understanding, the reasoning behind their pulling selling to freshmen was because freshmen wouldn't actually redeem their tickets and instead sold their tickets to other people, making it so that the atheltics department ran out of money.

If I were athletics, I would just sell tickets to all students for a flat rate of $5.00 or just give them tickets for free until people start showing up regularly.

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I like the idea of charging a nominal amount. People hoard free things and then don't use them.

$5 gives them a value, but isn't a high hurdle.

You do want a somewhat accurate count because some games will have more interest than others, and free will not help that at all.

Perhaps they could even give 'priority points' for attending early season games - and base BG tickets on that.

Give more for showing up before kickoff, a lesser amount for showing up, and negative for buying and not showing up (or transferring to a fellow student).

Well, in my day, mumbledy mumble years ago - we bought an AP (Athletic Privilege) card and took it to the football or basketball games where it was punched. The cards were not supposed to be transferable, but you could just give it to someone else. You couldn't really "sell" it, because you needed the card back for the next game. I think the only time we had actual tickets was for Big Game at Stanfurd.

packawana said:

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socaliganbear said:

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packawana said:

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So from my understanding, the reasoning behind their pulling selling to freshmen was because freshmen wouldn't actually redeem their tickets and instead sold their tickets to other people, making it so that the atheltics department ran out of money.

If I were athletics, I would just sell tickets to all students for a flat rate of $5.00 or just give them tickets for free until people start showing up regularly.

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Easy. Don't give students actual tickets. Should run off your student ID like meal points.

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Student tickets are already tied to SID. That's not the problem. The problem is that Athletics lets you sell your ticket to another student. You can transfer your ticket to another student's ID.

It's great from the consumer's POV frankly.

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Right, and in saying they should be free, so no value in selling to another student.

+1. And I'd allocate the sponsorship cost to local food vendors (like old Armadillo pizza or dominos) in conjunction wiht a discount coupon. Get local businesses involved - its in their interest. Give some free pizza 1 hour before kickoff and in the 4th quarter.

MilleniaBear said:

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+1. And I'd allocate the sponsorship cost to local food vendors (like old Armadillo pizza or dominos) in conjunction wiht a discount coupon. Get local businesses involved - its in their interest. Give some free pizza 1 hour before kickoff and in the 4th quarter.

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I like this idea, pay $10 for ticket, which also hooks you up with a hot dog and water/drink if redeemed before kickoff, the end of the first quarter, or the end of the game. $40 for the entire season.

The plan that the consultants favored was a yearly charge to ALL students and free admission to all sporting events. Would raise more money that per ticket or per sport fees, and would encourage attendance. (they suggested $30-50/year)

any kid under 12 accompanied by a paying adult should be free.

I posted this on insider board from consulting report. I think it's a great idea. Include small fee in all student registrations... if people object to free, charge $2 for football and basketball and $1 or free for other sports (some already free):


Student Fees: Although likely to be controversial, an exploration of a student fee assessment for Intercollegiate Athletics may be worth examining. The fee would allow students free access to all home athletics events and is a common practice among many Division I institutions across the nation.

At Cal, fees are already assessed for various student activities not engaged by every undergraduate. With this precedent in place, a modest fee to support IA would contribute to Intercollegiate Athletics Department's total revenues and remove financial barriers that discourage students from attending athletic events.

As an example, a modest fee of $30-50 per student per year would generate between $900k and $1.5m in annual income. This is $500k to $1.1m more than was generated through student ticket sales in 2016-17. In return, students would receive free access to all home athletics events.

In addition to investing students in financially supporting IA, the goal would be to increase student attendance and to improve the gameday experience with all of the ancillary bene ts that go with it (e.g. home field advantage, student-body engagement, entertainment, etc.)

Cal could pay the student $5 to come to the games, and the sections would never fill.

oskidunker said:

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as attendance and donations go down. Short sided in the near term and diastrous in the long term.

https://www.facebook.com/CalAthletics/posts/10155984258361900

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The campus is so entrenched with what has been done in the past. The ASUC, UC Auxiliary, have received money for football since the dinosaurs. Changing anything on campus takes a huge effort. Hopefully, the new AD Will see the light., but more than likely they'll need a sponsor to compensate the ASUC for the $.

HoopDreams said:

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I posted this on insider board from consulting report. I think it's a great idea. Include small fee in all student registrations... if people object to free, charge $2 for football and basketball and $1 or free for other sports (some already free):


Student Fees: Although likely to be controversial, an exploration of a student fee assessment for Intercollegiate Athletics may be worth examining. The fee would allow students free access to all home athletics events and is a common practice among many Division I institutions across the nation.

At Cal, fees are already assessed for various student activities not engaged by every undergraduate. With this precedent in place, a modest fee to support IA would contribute to Intercollegiate Athletics Department's total revenues and remove financial barriers that discourage students from attending athletic events.

As an example, a modest fee of $30-50 per student per year would generate between $900k and $1.5m in annual income. This is $500k to $1.1m more than was generated through student ticket sales in 2016-17. In return, students would receive free access to all home athletics events.

In addition to investing students in financially supporting IA, the goal would be to increase student attendance and to improve the gameday experience with all of the ancillary bene ts that go with it (e.g. home field advantage, student-body engagement, entertainment, etc.)

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I think you would need to tie this to the campus wellness fee for facility use or potentially include in the fee the ability to play club sports without paying for the equipment (or at least not for the initial equipment). If I remember correctly, a lot of student fees are levied as ballot initiatives and therefore require the vote of a majority of students during ASUC elections.

At $100 for football games, it doesn't take a Nobel Laureate to see why the student section isn't filled for games. Unbelievable.

I guess

As some have said, just add a fee to all students under the "student life enhancement." No tickets. Just show up with StudentID. Give them a chance to attend spontaneously. Forces students to arrive early to popular games lest seats are sold out.

At Stanford, they keep track of how many games you attend before the Big Game and awards BG tickets based on previous games attended..

Ok, so I spoke with Cal and offered to anchor a fund to help pay/defray these student ticket costs. They were appreciative but said that they didn't feel like the free tickets to Freshmen experiment from a few years back was a success. They felt like Freshmen didn't show up in general and the ones who did come didn't value the experience since it was free. I pointed out that from my recollection the free ticket for Freshmen year also coincided with the height (real or perceived) of the "breathalyze the students" years and that they might want to try this experiment again. I also mentioned that there's a lot of daylight between $105 and $0 and maybe just heavily subsidizing these would have the desired effect.

Going to speak with Development about this again on Thursday and see if we can get something going here.

please please do ... did they see the student section last season vs org st. man o man the alumni i sit with were non to pleased

Sebastabear said:

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Ok, so I spoke with Cal and offered to anchor a fund to help pay/defray these student ticket costs. They were appreciative but said that they didn't feel like the free tickets to Freshmen experiment from a few years back was a success. They felt like Freshmen didn't show up in general and the ones who did come didn't value the experience since it was free. I pointed out that from my recollection the free ticket for Freshmen year also coincided with the height (real or perceived) of the "breathalyze the students" years and that they might want to try this experiment again. I also mentioned that there's a lot of daylight between $105 and $0 and maybe just heavily subsidizing these would have the desired effect.

Going to speak with Development about this again on Thursday and see if we can get something going here.

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Appreciate the pushback. Clearly their way isn't working.

Also, what do they mean freshman came but didn't value the experience? So? The point is to get them inside the stadium and let Wilcox do the rest. Their level of appreciation will be determined later when we increase giving, hopefully.

socaliganbear said:

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Sebastabear said:

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Ok, so I spoke with Cal and offered to anchor a fund to help pay/defray these student ticket costs. They were appreciative but said that they didn't feel like the free tickets to Freshmen experiment from a few years back was a success. They felt like Freshmen didn't show up in general and the ones who did come didn't value the experience since it was free. I pointed out that from my recollection the free ticket for Freshmen year also coincided with the height (real or perceived) of the "breathalyze the students" years and that they might want to try this experiment again. I also mentioned that there's a lot of daylight between $105 and $0 and maybe just heavily subsidizing these would have the desired effect.

Going to speak with Development about this again on Thursday and see if we can get something going here.

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Appreciate the pushback. Clearly their way isn't working.

Also, what do they mean freshman came but didn't value the experience? So? The point is to get them inside the stadium and let Wilcox do the rest. Their level of appreciation will be determined later when we increase giving, hopefully.

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I would hope they tracked howany freshmen came to the first few games versus the last few and compared it to the same for other years. Or just simply yield of tickets given away versus who showed up.

Could also track how many free freshman came back for year 2, and compare it to the soph->jrs retention rate (excluding CC transfers in the Jrs number).

Sebastabear said:

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Ok, so I spoke with Cal and offered to anchor a fund to help pay/defray these student ticket costs. They were appreciative but said that they didn't feel like the free tickets to Freshmen experiment from a few years back was a success. They felt like Freshmen didn't show up in general and the ones who did come didn't value the experience since it was free. I pointed out that from my recollection the free ticket for Freshmen year also coincided with the height (real or perceived) of the "breathalyze the students" years and that they might want to try this experiment again. I also mentioned that there's a lot of daylight between $105 and $0 and maybe just heavily subsidizing these would have the desired effect.

Going to speak with Development about this again on Thursday and see if we can get something going here.

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This wasn't the 1-12 season by chance, was it?

FuzzyWuzzy said:

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Sebastabear said:

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Ok, so I spoke with Cal and offered to anchor a fund to help pay/defray these student ticket costs. They were appreciative but said that they didn't feel like the free tickets to Freshmen experiment from a few years back was a success. They felt like Freshmen didn't show up in general and the ones who did come didn't value the experience since it was free. I pointed out that from my recollection the free ticket for Freshmen year also coincided with the height (real or perceived) of the "breathalyze the students" years and that they might want to try this experiment again. I also mentioned that there's a lot of daylight between $105 and $0 and maybe just heavily subsidizing these would have the desired effect.

Going to speak with Development about this again on Thursday and see if we can get something going here.

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This wasn't the 1-12 season by chance, was it?

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Ha. Yeah, I wondered the same thing, although I don't think so. Think it might have been right after it though.

add to student fees, and instead of free, offer the first game free to all students, and then charge a nominal ticket price such as $3 for football and $2 for basketball for the rest of the season (maybe $5 for the 'big' games such as vs USC/UCLA, Stanford)

Bottom line is $105 or $125 one time shot is too high for many students, so they don't buy the student pass, and then what?

all I can say, is when I've offered a free ticket to a basketball game during pickup games in the RSF there is always a very appreciative taker (and that's just talking to a group of 9 students I'm playing with, although I admit they do have an interest in basketball)

If you want to use me as an example, I was not a sports fan coming in to Cal and I got my freshman free tickets because my dad convinced me with "why not?" Fast forward to now, I have Stadium Club seats and I donate to multiple academic and athletic programs regularly. Granted, my freshman year was 10-1, but I very easily could have continued to ignore sports altogether.

NeverOddOrEven said:

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If you want to use me as an example, I was not a sports fan coming in to Cal and I got my freshman free tickets because my dad convinced me with "why not?" Fast forward to now, I have Stadium Club seats and I donate to multiple academic and athletic programs regularly. Granted, my freshman year was 10-1, but I very easily could have continued to ignore sports altogether.

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Plus, if there's a compulsory fee, at least some students will feel: I've already paid for this, I might as well use it.

Some data about student sections in the Pac-12 may be useful...

Season ticket prices for the 2016 season:

UCLA - $129
Washington - $135
Washington State - $149
Arizona - $175
USC - $185
Oregon - $367 (for the Pit Crew)

I'm assuming those schools had student attendance rates that we would be happy with - and they didn't give away tickets.

I don't think the low attendance is solely about ticket prices. I was a season ticket holder for 20+ years but haven't had them for the last two. The reasons aren't cost. My reasons: I didn't like not being able to plan ahead because of late kickoff time announcements, and my interest in football is waning based on concussion issues. I think there are many reasons for attendance decline - I just don't know how big a role season ticket prices play.

I love the idea of incentives to get them there on time. And I'd like to keep the prices down. But I don't think charging students to show up is automatically a ridiculous idea, or dumb, or shortsighted.