Feb 112010
Many racetracks nowadays offer free admission. I imagine the thought behind this decision is relatively simple: if we can just get people through the gate, they’ll be more inclined to wager at the windows.
The logic for this sits somewhere between the theories of Reciprocity, Expectancy, and Boredom.
But an article on Huffington Post today caught my eye: “Nets Attendance: Barely 1000 Turn Out To See Team Lose Again.” The article was interesting not for the fact that Terrence Williams is a friend, nor because I spent a meet working across the parking lot from the Izod Center the Meadowlands.
Buried in the game notes at the bottom of the article is a really interesting line: “Despite the paltry turnout, the paid attendance for the game was 12,873.” The weather – admittedly – sucked, so the very fact that 1,000 people were able to dig themselves out from the snow should’ve been enough news.
But run the numbers: individual game tickets sell for somewhere between $10 and $1,950 through Ticketmaster … and 12,873 people paid, yet only 1,000 showed. While we don’t know the exact breakdown of tickets sold, no matter how you slice it, that’s happy math for Bruce Ratner and his pool of investors.
The Nets are the worst team in professional basketball. (I’d like to make it a rule that if a professional team with a schedule of more than 15 games in any one season starts it by going 0-and-17, they lose the privilege of being considered a member of a professional league.) Yet 12,873 people spent their hard earned money – in this economy – to watch a team that can’t win … and roughly 11,873 spent the cash only to settle for the TV version instead.
This is shocking to someone who often laments that New York racing can’t see 4,000 people turn out for Wood Memorial Day, which has seen really good weather the past few years and includes the allure of free admission. And I promise you the trip to Izod is as long a drive from NYC as it is to Aqueduct, and the two are about the same aesthetically, to boot.
So is the problem that racing isn’t as mainstream as basketball? Maybe. Is the problem that racing is less straightforward than basketball? Probably. Is the problem that basketball is marketed more effectively than racing? Definitely.
I say we start by doing away with the free admission. We’re tossing the baby out with the bath water from the tub that shares a room with the mirror we’re using to cut our nose to spite our face.
Ok, so I’m guilty of mixing my metaphors – racing’s marketers are guilty of a whole lot more.
