ESPN owns all but one of the 38 bowls and is doing well.....more folks have watched on TV then ever. Ratings have ESPN feeling pretty good.
The stadiums have become immense TV production studios....that is the way that bowl games are moving..
Folks are just not going to plunk down a couple of thousand bucks to travel to a far off city to watch a meaningless game when it can be accessed on the big screen TV.
Texas bowl leads all non playoff bowls in tickets sold
Forum rules
NOTICE: Please be sure to check the CFP Message Board Rules and Regulations and the Read Me page before posting.
NOTICE: Please be sure to check the CFP Message Board Rules and Regulations and the Read Me page before posting.
Re: Texas bowl leads all non playoff bowls in tickets sold
“If short hair and good manners won football games, Army and Navy would play for the national championship every year.”
-
Spence
- Administrator
- Posts: 21230
- Joined: Wed Dec 28, 2005 11:52 pm
- Location: Chillicothe, Ohio (Ohio's First Capital)
- Contact:
Re: Texas bowl leads all non playoff bowls in tickets sold
ESPN is the one bemoaning the poor attendance.I don't think there will be bowl games in 10 years.
"History doesn't always repeat itself but it often rhymes." - Mark Twain
Re: Texas bowl leads all non playoff bowls in tickets sold
ESPN is not moaning about poor attendance...ESPN talking head announcers are noticing it.
"That's because even though ticket demand is relatively low for lesser bowls, millions of viewers keep watching, even if it's the Camellia Bowl in Montgomery, Ala., a game that drew just 20,256 fans last week but attracted an average television audience of 1,114,000, according to ESPN.
Last season, schools and conferences again struggled to sell their bowl ticket allotments and were required to pay for a record $23.8 million in unsold tickets, according to NCAA financial records. Many bowl games in recent years also have tried to offload tickets on discount sites such as Groupon.
But on television, bowl games are a sure thing, having drawn much larger audiences than other sports programming, not to mention other content on other channels. And that's what really matters these days.
"Fans are voting with their remotes and with their eyeballs," said Ilan Ben-Hanan, ESPN's vice president for programming and acquisitions. "I take issue with the notion of judging what's a good idea based on how many people are in the stands. There are a lot of sports out there that would kill to have tens of thousands of people in the stands."
By owning the games, Charlotte-based ESPN Events can sell tickets and sponsorships to the games and not have to pay an unaffiliated company for TV broadcast rights. It's an investment that usually pays off with a big live TV audience attractive to sponsors.
"We've built a very viable business that we're really pleased with," said Pete Derzis, senior vice president and general manager of ESPN Events.
ESPN declined to reveal financial figures, but the comparative viewership figures show why there's a bull market for bowl games. Consider ESPN's first day of bowls last Saturday. ESPN broadcast four games, including three owned by ESPN Events: the New Mexico Bowl, the Famous Idaho Potato Bowl and the inaugural Camellia Bowl.
All drew at least 1.1 million television viewers on average, even though the stadium attendance didn't top more than 29,000 for any of those three games. Air Force beat Western Michigan Saturday in the Famous Potato Bowl 38-24, a game that drew an announced stadium crowd of only 18,223. On television, ESPN said the game still drew an average of 1.45 million viewers.
"That's because even though ticket demand is relatively low for lesser bowls, millions of viewers keep watching, even if it's the Camellia Bowl in Montgomery, Ala., a game that drew just 20,256 fans last week but attracted an average television audience of 1,114,000, according to ESPN.
Last season, schools and conferences again struggled to sell their bowl ticket allotments and were required to pay for a record $23.8 million in unsold tickets, according to NCAA financial records. Many bowl games in recent years also have tried to offload tickets on discount sites such as Groupon.
But on television, bowl games are a sure thing, having drawn much larger audiences than other sports programming, not to mention other content on other channels. And that's what really matters these days.
"Fans are voting with their remotes and with their eyeballs," said Ilan Ben-Hanan, ESPN's vice president for programming and acquisitions. "I take issue with the notion of judging what's a good idea based on how many people are in the stands. There are a lot of sports out there that would kill to have tens of thousands of people in the stands."
By owning the games, Charlotte-based ESPN Events can sell tickets and sponsorships to the games and not have to pay an unaffiliated company for TV broadcast rights. It's an investment that usually pays off with a big live TV audience attractive to sponsors.
"We've built a very viable business that we're really pleased with," said Pete Derzis, senior vice president and general manager of ESPN Events.
ESPN declined to reveal financial figures, but the comparative viewership figures show why there's a bull market for bowl games. Consider ESPN's first day of bowls last Saturday. ESPN broadcast four games, including three owned by ESPN Events: the New Mexico Bowl, the Famous Idaho Potato Bowl and the inaugural Camellia Bowl.
All drew at least 1.1 million television viewers on average, even though the stadium attendance didn't top more than 29,000 for any of those three games. Air Force beat Western Michigan Saturday in the Famous Potato Bowl 38-24, a game that drew an announced stadium crowd of only 18,223. On television, ESPN said the game still drew an average of 1.45 million viewers.
“If short hair and good manners won football games, Army and Navy would play for the national championship every year.”
Re: Texas bowl leads all non playoff bowls in tickets sold
Spence wrote:ESPN is the one bemoaning the poor attendance.I don't think there will be bowl games in 10 years.
No one argues that TV may being doing well now. But the cities and the schools will withdraw. Think the Idaho Potato Commission is going to dump money into that bowl? Think the city will continue with it? And how long will the Duck Commander Independence Bowl have a sponsor? (There is a single line commentary on college football....Duck Commander Independence Bowl) Tostitos, (Pepsico) where they too are in the business of making money refused to pay ESPN's price for sponsorship.
Disney will milk the bowls for all their worth and when the short runs stops, they're gone. 5 years. 4 Power conferences 16 team playoff and we'll still be at war in the Middle East.
Statistics are the Morphine of College Football
Re: Texas bowl leads all non playoff bowls in tickets sold
The sponsors put money into the bowl for air time promotion...it is advertising for the Potatoes of Idaho...whether people actually stay at the local Hilton is of concern to the Chamber of commerce...more than it is to the sponsors.
Just like Tostito's sponsored the Fiesta Bowl...it didn't matter what the turn out was, it was the millions seeing "Tostito" plastered on their TV's.
Just like Tostito's sponsored the Fiesta Bowl...it didn't matter what the turn out was, it was the millions seeing "Tostito" plastered on their TV's.
“If short hair and good manners won football games, Army and Navy would play for the national championship every year.”
Re: Texas bowl leads all non playoff bowls in tickets sold
Sponsors have always come and gone...and new ones come in their place...it is the American way of sales.
The Emerald Nut Bowl was...until it wasn't. The Poulan, Tostito, Weedwhacker..or whatever. As long as we have television advertising, we will have sponsors.
The smaller bowls, since we moved up from a double handful, have never, ever been a draw. And never will. They are, and have been, a TV event.
The Emerald Nut Bowl was...until it wasn't. The Poulan, Tostito, Weedwhacker..or whatever. As long as we have television advertising, we will have sponsors.
The smaller bowls, since we moved up from a double handful, have never, ever been a draw. And never will. They are, and have been, a TV event.
“If short hair and good manners won football games, Army and Navy would play for the national championship every year.”
Re: Texas bowl leads all non playoff bowls in tickets sold
You're probably right. I'm just trying to force myself to continue to like college football...I live too much in the past.
Statistics are the Morphine of College Football
Re: Texas bowl leads all non playoff bowls in tickets sold
I love college ball...past, present, and as much future as I have left.
The past is dead and gone...and also like Kristofferson wrote, tomorrow's out of sight...
Nostalgia is the disease of living.
I sometimes get nostalgic about my summer of 1965 sequestered away in Honoraville, Alabama. Then I shake it off like a dog after a bath.
I spent part of a summer there when I was eighteen, 49 years ago, at the old Courtney place (my great grandparents original homestead). I found it by pulling up to an old country one pump gas station/store that had two ancients sitting on a bench outside. I politely asked directions and they looked at me blankly, than one replied, “that boy means the old Coteney (pronounced as coat-nee) farm”.
My memory sometimes still goes back to the red clay banked road, the old house with cracks in the floor where you could see chickens running under the house, the hot, breathless nights, and the rural isolation.
The Trappist monks could not have found a sanctuary more removed from worldly wants, a place of more solitude. Banished from my home for a summer to a place of less temptation for a boy who had pushed some limits, little did I know how that sentence of penance would reverberate down through the years.
That September of 1965, I shipped off for Parris Island and the USMC. That summer was the last of boyhood innocence, and in a way, the last of an American innocence. Norman Rockwell’s vision of America died with Vietnam, the assassination of MLK, and the cities burning.
I was a different person at 18 than I was just a few years later, and the country was far different as well. Much of the change was for the better, far better. But, I still wander back to Honoraville and the summer of ’65. When the Beach Boys sang about surfing on the AM radio, and women were the great mystery.
Now more experienced in life, I find it somewhat comforting to find constants. Women are still the great mystery.
The past is dead and gone...and also like Kristofferson wrote, tomorrow's out of sight...
Nostalgia is the disease of living.
I sometimes get nostalgic about my summer of 1965 sequestered away in Honoraville, Alabama. Then I shake it off like a dog after a bath.
I spent part of a summer there when I was eighteen, 49 years ago, at the old Courtney place (my great grandparents original homestead). I found it by pulling up to an old country one pump gas station/store that had two ancients sitting on a bench outside. I politely asked directions and they looked at me blankly, than one replied, “that boy means the old Coteney (pronounced as coat-nee) farm”.
My memory sometimes still goes back to the red clay banked road, the old house with cracks in the floor where you could see chickens running under the house, the hot, breathless nights, and the rural isolation.
The Trappist monks could not have found a sanctuary more removed from worldly wants, a place of more solitude. Banished from my home for a summer to a place of less temptation for a boy who had pushed some limits, little did I know how that sentence of penance would reverberate down through the years.
That September of 1965, I shipped off for Parris Island and the USMC. That summer was the last of boyhood innocence, and in a way, the last of an American innocence. Norman Rockwell’s vision of America died with Vietnam, the assassination of MLK, and the cities burning.
I was a different person at 18 than I was just a few years later, and the country was far different as well. Much of the change was for the better, far better. But, I still wander back to Honoraville and the summer of ’65. When the Beach Boys sang about surfing on the AM radio, and women were the great mystery.
Now more experienced in life, I find it somewhat comforting to find constants. Women are still the great mystery.
Last edited by billybud on Mon Dec 29, 2014 9:37 am, edited 1 time in total.
“If short hair and good manners won football games, Army and Navy would play for the national championship every year.”
Re: Texas bowl leads all non playoff bowls in tickets sold
I believe what you say. I know I have issues in some areas, mostly with those I enjoyed as a child. I embrace change on a daily issue. I am amazed at what change has done for us in so many areas and see the issue without accepting it. I don't like change when it changes to experience.
Statistics are the Morphine of College Football
Return to “General Discussion”
Who is online
Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 46 guests