BC Lions & Whitecaps fudge attendance numbers

[J5V]

Vancouver Whitecaps refuse to release attendance numbers
Pro teams have overstated figures by 500,000 since refurbished BC Place reopened in 2011

July 4, 2016, 3:29 p.m.
Sports & Leisure
By Bob Mackin
BC Place: home to the BC Lions and Vancouver Whitecaps | Chung Chow

The Vancouver Whitecaps’ chief operating officer has refused to publish the team’s actual home game attendance, despite an adjudicator ordering BC Pavilion Corp. (PavCo) to provide the figures under Freedom of Information.


“We always focus on publishing our assigned seat numbers because it’s the best reflection of the number of seats that are allocated for every game, and it reflects how the market is responding,” Rachel Lewis said in an interview. “We’ll plan to continue to announce that way.”

Since BC Place Stadium reopened from its $512 million renovation in September 2011, the Whitecaps and BC Lions have overstated attendance by a combined 500,000 fans. But, after a three-year legal battle, the Office of the Information and Privacy Commissioner (OIPC) ordered stadium management to release the actual counts.

The total announced by the Whitecaps at games from October 2011 to March 2016 was 1.67 million. Figures released by PavCo, and analyzed by Business in Vancouver, show the actual attendance count by the stadium’s staff was 1.41 million for the 84-game period. The BC Lions claimed 1.38 million over 47 games, but drew 1.14 million.


Both teams insist on announcing the number of tickets distributed rather than the number of people who come to games and have their tickets scanned at the gates. OIPC adjudicator Celia Francis rejected the teams’ joint submission because they had no proof that their businesses would suffer if the public knew the true attendance numbers.

“By the Whitecaps and BC Lions’ own admission, in such situations, ‘it is readily apparent that not all seats are occupied’ and ‘it is obvious to the public that the announced attendance does not purport to be actual attendance’,” Francis wrote. “If these things are obvious to the public, I conclude that they are also obvious to the sponsors and broadcasters about whom the BC Lions and the Whitecaps expressed concern.”

The Whitecaps enjoyed their best Major League Soccer (MLS) year in 2015, averaging 17,649 and drawing an actual total of 384,334. That was less than the 446,536 announced.

The club announced 38 crowds of 21,000 or better between October 2011 and March 2016, but it broke that threshold just once in each of the 2014 and 2015 regular seasons and again in its first MLS home playoff game: a 24,485 crowd last November 8 when the Portland Timbers visited.

The Lions drew 126,994 to the four post-renovation regular season games in 2011, an average of 31,748. The team won its sixth Grey Cup at home in front of 50,830, which had been announced as 54,313.

Last season, the club was forced by the FIFA Women’s World Cup to play its home exhibition game at Thunderbird Stadium, and it suffered further at the gate when the league scheduled two Thursday home games in August. It struggled to a 7-11 record and drew 144,545 over nine regular season games, a full-season average of 16,060.

The rejuvenated Lions are aiming for a comeback in 2016 with the return from retirement of Canadian Football Hall of Fame coach Wally Buono, stylish new Adidas (ETR:AG) uniforms and a $5 children’s ticket promotion for the June 25 home opener.

The PavCo service plan report said increased attendance drives higher food and beverage sales at the stadium. Management began an “attendance-building” initiative in 2014-15 by joint marketing with the Lions and Whitecaps and updating the food and beverage menu. From 2011-12 to 2014-15, PavCo lost more than $37 million on operations at BC Place and the Vancouver Convention Centre. It forecast another $7.5 million in red ink for 2015-16. PavCo targeted 1.258 million BC Place attendees for 2015-16, the fiscal year that included the Women’s World Cup, but budgeted for a decrease to 1.086 million by 2017-18.

PavCo chairman Stuart McLaughlin and CEO Ken Cretney did not respond to interview requests. Stone claimed in a May 7, 2015, budget estimates hearing that actual attendance is “always disclosed” annually by PavCo, but the fine print in its report says that the attendance figures are the sum of what is announced by show managers.At an April 28 committee hearing, Stone would not discuss the state of negotiations to renew the Lions’ and Whitecaps’ contracts, citing “commercial confidentiality.”

The new contracts will eventually be subject to public disclosure. The OIPC ordered the release of the Lions’ contract in early 2015. It showed PavCo charges the Leos nothing for the first $9 million of net ticket sales but charges royalties ranging from 10% to 20% on subsequent increments of $1 million.

Figures released under FOI show the Lions paid $986,112 rent to host games in the stadium since the renovation, averaging $20,981 per game. The club also paid $1 million to use level-three suites. The Whitecaps were charged $1,279,884 for game rental for the same period, a $15,237 average, plus $774,000 for suites.

By comparison, in 2013, the non-profit BC Secondary Schools Football Association was charged $20,181 to rent the stadium for the annual November 30, 2013, Subway Bowl championship game.

[J5V]

Just shows you how far the Lions have fallen in regards to fans in the stands. So much of it self inflicted with moronic ticket pricing (albeit starting to improve this season.)

[footballtom]

Just shows you how far the Lions have fallen in regards to fans in the stands. So much of it self inflicted with moronic ticket pricing (albeit starting to improve this season.)

Lions and whitecaps need to build there own stadium together like the Argos are at bmo field , with new owners on the horizon in the next couple of years get the caps and lions out of that pitiful place no wonder the lions and whitecaps do not make any money . Buying there own stadium together is the only way to go .

[DanoT]

Just shows you how far the Lions have fallen in regards to fans in the stands. So much of it self inflicted with moronic ticket pricing (albeit starting to improve this season.)

Lions and whitecaps need to build there own stadium together like the Argos are at bmo field , with new owners on the horizon in the next couple of years get the caps and lions out of that pitiful place no wonder the lions and whitecaps do not make any money . Buying there own stadium together is the only way to go .

Wasn't BMO field built by government funding and not private money? Where do you think the Lions and Whitecaps will get the funds to build a stadium?

[Belize City Lion]

This is nothing new in sports. Every team that does not sell out fudges their "announced attendance" numbers. That's exactly why the media always reports that data as "announced attendance". In the old days when they literally had to add up turnstile clicks you could give the teams a little wriggle room because they were trying to get the attendance tallied while the game was still underway. Now that tickets are scanned there is no excuse for inaccurate attendance figures.

As for the comment above about the Lions and Whitecaps building their own stadium... that ship sailed many years ago when the Whitecaps were considering building their own waterfront facility and did not want to partner with the Lions. Ultimately a very short sighted City Council dashed any hopes of building a privately funded soccer stadium anyway. Today the Lions and Whitecaps are lucky to play in a beautifully refurbished BC Place, arguably one of the nicest stadiums in North America today. Is it a bit too big? Yes. But the curtained off upper deck greatly improves the atmosphere. You can't compare the "new" BC Place with the cavernous old Roger's Centre (that is first and foremost a baseball stadium). The Argos had to get out of that place if they wanted a chance to survive. The Lions on the other hand can do just fine at BC Place if the on-field product is good and the ticket prices are not too high.

[Mane]

During last weeks Ti-Cat game it was announced several times during the broadcast that it was a sell out, but it was pretty evident that there were lots of empty seats in some areas of the stadium.

[chwk_lionsfan]

Announced attendance is based on tickets sold, not how many people are scanned through the gates.

[B.C.FAN]

It's normal in sports to announce ticket sales as attendance. No-shows are commonplace, especially during the summer. I probably won't know until game time on Thursday whether two of my season tickets will be used but they're paid for. In some past years, the Lions distributed 5,000 end-zone tickets for each game to 7-Eleven or Safeway for resale in pairs. The 5,000 seats were considered sold for attendance purposes, even though they were rarely filled.

[Belize City Lion]

Announced attendance is based on tickets sold, not how many people are scanned through the gates.

Don't kid yourself... "tickets sold" is an excellent excuse teams use to explain the disparity between butts in seats and the announced attendance. If they want to include no-shows then they should not count anyone who got in for free (a significant number when you consider how many corporate sponsors and others get freebies).

My dad used to be the public address announcer for the NASL Whitecaps at Empire Stadium. I know for a fact that they would add a few thousand to the turnstile count before announcing the attendance at every game that was not sold out. Back then there was no way to know how many no-shows you had. Padding the announced attendance is a long standing tradition in sports.

[J5V]

Pretty sad that the Lions only had 16,000 fans on average at the 9 regular season games last year. The damage done by a number of years (starting at the end of 2011 when they moved into BCP 2) of ridiculous pricing has been enormous. If you look at it, after the 2012 WDF is when the interest in the team really started to drop off.

[sj-roc]

This is nothing new in sports. Every team that does not sell out fudges their "announced attendance" numbers. That's exactly why the media always reports that data as "announced attendance". In the old days when they literally had to add up turnstile clicks you could give the teams a little wriggle room because they were trying to get the attendance tallied while the game was still underway. Now that tickets are scanned there is no excuse for inaccurate attendance figures.

Even some of the particulars in the story J5V posted aren't really new.

I posted on this very topic about three months ago on this site in the All Sports Forum (since it also involved teams outside the CFL) when an article similar to that in the OP appeared in Business In Vancouver:

"Inflated sports attendance figures in Vancouver"

(Perhaps the two threads should be merged?)

The two articles seem to be basically different edits of essentially the same story by the same author (Bob Mackin). The one I discussed also included evidence of crowd inflation by the WHL's Vancouver Giants.

[footballtom]

Just shows you how far the Lions have fallen in regards to fans in the stands. So much of it self inflicted with moronic ticket pricing (albeit starting to improve this season.)

Lions and whitecaps need to build there own stadium together like the Argos are at bmo field , with new owners on the horizon in the next couple of years get the caps and lions out of that pitiful place no wonder the lions and whitecaps do not make any money . Buying there own stadium together is the only way to go .

Wasn't BMO field built by government funding and not private money? Where do you think the Lions and Whitecaps will get the funds to build a stadium?

Thee whitecaps owner wanted to build them a stadium on the water front remember . Why wouldn't the lions and whitecaps get together and build it.
BC place is too big.

[footballtom]

Pretty sad that the Lions only had 16,000 fans on average at the 9 regular season games last year. The damage done by a number of years (starting at the end of 2011 when they moved into BCP 2) of ridiculous pricing has been enormous. If you look at it, after the 2012 WDF is when the interest in the team really started to drop off.

The averaged over 20,000 not 16,000

[LakeLions]

From the article: "Last season, the club was forced by the FIFA Women’s World Cup to play its home exhibition game at Thunderbird Stadium, and it suffered further at the gate when the league scheduled two Thursday home games in August. It struggled to a 7-11 record and drew 144,545 over nine regular season games, a full-season average of 16,060."

But we all know that teams fudge attendance. It's understood that seats that are paid for (be it corporate, personal, whatever) are included in final attendance totals. I really don't have any issues with it, although I understand there are concerns given BC Place is a public building (for lack of a better term)

[Qman]

[quote="


Thee whitecaps owner wanted to build them a stadium on the water front remember . Why wouldn't the lions and whitecaps get together and build it.
BC place is too big.[/quote]

they were going to do this execpt they couldn't find a piece of provincial government land by the skytrain stations down by false creek big enough. they were going to build a IGF type stadium for 250M. They decided to redo BC place for 2x the cost.
In the end, braley made $8M of 2011 grey cup and over $11M of 2014 Grey Cup (although not completely sold out, it was the largest gate in Canadian history thank to big increase in ticket prices) thanks to the capacity at BC place.