2017 All Things Lions Marketing & Promotions

[The_Pauser]

I think if I were the Lions Pres. I would proceed with ST sales campaign just as the Lions are doing, knowing full well that the current uncertain ownership and management/coaching situation is a tough sell and make sure the owner knows that ST sales and revenue will be down in 2018.

I'm with you there. I would keep ticket prices stagnant. Would certainly not increase them, but I don't think you can slash them either as that would undermine a potential ownership sale. I still maintain the belief that while the CFL has this great TV deal with TSN that teams like the Lions need to take advantage of this by cutting ticket prices to be more and more people inside the building. Create that atmosphere, build up your fan base, and then slowly increase ticket prices in the future while ideally retaining as many of those fans as possible. We may not get that lucrative TV deal again, so cutting ticket prices in the future won't be as feasible as it is now.

The focus needs to be on building new fans and packing BC Place. Season ticket prices of: $20 per game end-zone seats, $30/game in the corners, and $50 per game between the 30's. Club seats you can charge $70-90 per game for since the people who sit there are likely the more hardcore fans and likely to buy tickets regardless. On top of this, $5/game tickets for children under the age of 18, accompanied by a full priced ticket.

Also get back to single game ticket deals with 7-11 like we had during the early part of the Ackles era. 2 tickets in the end-zone for $50, and throw in 2 hotdogs and 2 slurpees from 7-11. Take advantage of Boston Pizza being right outside the stadium and work out a meal + ticket deal with them.

A joint partnership with the White Caps could be beneficial to both teams. Joint Season Ticket passes for both teams, with a slight discount on what it would cost to purchase season tickets to both teams separately. I'll admit I know next to nothing about the White Caps season ticket base, but wouldn't be surprised if this is something that could be beneficial to them as well.

There are plenty of options. This took me literally 5-10 minutes to come up with. It isn't hard. Yet for some reason the Lions have gotten away from being creative.

[Robbie]

Casey Printers really helped the Lions resurgence in the market. He was a flashy, hot-shot QB who was very exciting to watch and kept fans at the edge of their seats. Unfortunately his time here was short-lived. He battled through injuries in 2005, and then went to the NFL before the 2006 season. That move really ruined his career as he was never the same dynamic QB when he came back (signed with Hamilton and looked lost).

Off the heels of that, the Lions retained their fans as they were the class of the league, winning the Grey Cup in 2006.

Bob Ackles passed away in July 2008. Our average attendance for that season was 34k. One season later our average attendance plummeted to 28k, despite getting to the WDF in 2008 (3rd place team though). The Lions record also fell from 11-7 to 8-10 which didn't help. QBing had become a problem. Buck Pierce couldn't stay healthy. Jarious Jackson wasn't that good as a starter, and the team faltered. Casey Printers was brought back at the end of the season, and helped lead the team to an Eastern Semi-Final win in Hamilton, but the team got slaughtered a week later in Montreal.

In 2010 the Lions moved to TEmpire Field as BC Place underwent renovations. The stadium didn't hold nearly as many as BC Place, but average attendance fell once again to 24k (stadium held 27,500). Another 8-10 season which saw a transition at QB from Casey Printers to Travis Lulay. The team got off to a dismal 1-6 start, and lost in the Western Semi's to Saskatchewan in double OT. What started off as a gloomy start to the season ended in promise as Lulay really had his coming out party in that playoff game. He and Manny Arceneaux both looked like ethe future.

2011 started off at TEmpire Field, and midway through the season went back to BC Place. Average attendance rebounded to 29k, mostly boosted by the back half of the season. The opening game at BC Place drew over 50k as people were curious to see the new stadium. Attendance did continue to increase over the average and the Lions finished strong with a 41k finale. We started off 0-5 to start the season, but after that something clicked and the Lions went on to win 11 of their final 13 regular season games. No doubt the acquisition of Arland Bruce helped bolster the team (much to the chagrin of some veteran Lionbackers on here who opposed the acquisition at the time it was made), and Andrew Harris had his coming out party in the back half of the season. This was a young and exciting team once again that marched all the way to a home Grey Cup victory.

Attendance teetered around the 28-30k mark for the next 3 seasons. The Lions didn't do anything significant, following up a GC win with a disappointing West final loss to Calgary ( a game which we trailed 31-16 heading into the 4th quarter). 2013 saw the team fall from a 13-5 first place finish to a 11-7 third place finish, and a Western Semi-final loss to Saskatchewan after blowing a 25-16 third quarter lead. This was the game where in the fourth quarter our defense couldn't do anything to stop Henry Burris. We would take away his passing options and Burris would then break out for a 15-20 yard run himself. Very frustrating. 2014 saw the Lions continue to fall, finishing with a 9-9 record, 4th place, and getting slaughtered by Montreal 50-17 in the Eastern Semi-final.

2015 saw our attendance drop significantly to 21k. Jeff Tedford was brought in as Head Coach, and the season was a disaster. 7-11 third place finish, and a 35-9 West semi-final loss to Calgary. Attendance held at 21k last year as we finished second in the division with a 12-6 record, had an exciting WSF win against Winnipeg, but another embarrassing loss to Calgary in the WDF. And that brings us to this year: en route to missing the playoffs, last in the West, and a further erosion to our attendance that is now averaging a shade under 20k. The last time our average attendance was this poor was the 2002 season, Bob Ackles first year back with the Lions, and the season before Wally Buono took over as head coach.

Great summation, Pauser.

Casey Printers really helped the Lions resurgence in the market. He was a flashy, hot-shot QB who was very exciting to watch and kept fans at the edge of their seats. Unfortunately his time here was short-lived.

I suppose seeing Casey Printers at QB was certainly a huge, pleasant change from seven years of seeing good but boring hall of famer Damon Allen and injury prone Dave Dickenson.

[cjones2451]

I think if I were the Lions Pres. I would proceed with ST sales campaign just as the Lions are doing, knowing full well that the current uncertain ownership and management/coaching situation is a tough sell and make sure the owner knows that ST sales and revenue will be down in 2018.

I'm with you there. I would keep ticket prices stagnant. Would certainly not increase them, but I don't think you can slash them either as that would undermine a potential ownership sale. I still maintain the belief that while the CFL has this great TV deal with TSN that teams like the Lions need to take advantage of this by cutting ticket prices to be more and more people inside the building. Create that atmosphere, build up your fan base, and then slowly increase ticket prices in the future while ideally retaining as many of those fans as possible. We may not get that lucrative TV deal again, so cutting ticket prices in the future won't be as feasible as it is now.

The focus needs to be on building new fans and packing BC Place. Season ticket prices of: $20 per game end-zone seats, $30/game in the corners, and $50 per game between the 30's. Club seats you can charge $70-90 per game for since the people who sit there are likely the more hardcore fans and likely to buy tickets regardless. On top of this, $5/game tickets for children under the age of 18, accompanied by a full priced ticket.

Also get back to single game ticket deals with 7-11 like we had during the early part of the Ackles era. 2 tickets in the end-zone for $50, and throw in 2 hotdogs and 2 slurpees from 7-11. Take advantage of Boston Pizza being right outside the stadium and work out a meal + ticket deal with them.

A joint partnership with the White Caps could be beneficial to both teams. Joint Season Ticket passes for both teams, with a slight discount on what it would cost to purchase season tickets to both teams separately. I'll admit I know next to nothing about the White Caps season ticket base, but wouldn't be surprised if this is something that could be beneficial to them as well.

There are plenty of options. This took me literally 5-10 minutes to come up with. It isn't hard. Yet for some reason the Lions have gotten away from being creative.

I agree with you on tickets, but if you look they did lower the end zone seats from 320 to 280 for 10 games (so $28 per all in), corner are down from $400 to $360 with the perks so from that stand point they are lowering to get new fans. I agree that they should not raise prices and then include perks ($40 value add basically)

As far as the other stuff, who is to say they haven't tried? Whitecaps may have passed, they did have a 7-11 deal but it wasn't great (so maybe 7-11 didn't give as much as hoped), maybe BP was busy enough so they said no thanks.......that being said, keep trying. They are not doing enough with what is in their control. The $5 kids ticket has been a success by all means, but they seem reluctant to expand it all year or God forbid to Seasons ticket holders. I would even pay $99 for my kids seasons in my Red Seats and have been asking for this for YEARS!!! I now have a lap child that needs his own seat next year and now instead instead of expanding to 4 seats, I am reducing to 2 and rotating the kids to every other game because I can't afford to pay $2000+ for the 4 seats, so they get $1000 from me instead of $1200ish if they would have a kids deal and 4 butts in seats instead of 2. Plus I am more likely to buy food, souvenirs and have more engaged kids who would be future fans......BTW the kids chicken finger, fries and drink is $6, which is a decent deal - TELL PEOPLE ABOUT IT!!!!

More butts in seats creates a better atmosphere, fans come back, tell friends, etc.....

I looked at Whitecaps seasons and they are about the same $28-29 per game all in too, so it is not like the Caps are lower in price

[TheLionKing]

I think if I were the Lions Pres. I would proceed with ST sales campaign just as the Lions are doing, knowing full well that the current uncertain ownership and management/coaching situation is a tough sell and make sure the owner knows that ST sales and revenue will be down in 2018.

I'm with you there. I would keep ticket prices stagnant. Would certainly not increase them, but I don't think you can slash them either as that would undermine a potential ownership sale. I still maintain the belief that while the CFL has this great TV deal with TSN that teams like the Lions need to take advantage of this by cutting ticket prices to be more and more people inside the building. Create that atmosphere, build up your fan base, and then slowly increase ticket prices in the future while ideally retaining as many of those fans as possible. We may not get that lucrative TV deal again, so cutting ticket prices in the future won't be as feasible as it is now.

The focus needs to be on building new fans and packing BC Place. Season ticket prices of: $20 per game end-zone seats, $30/game in the corners, and $50 per game between the 30's. Club seats you can charge $70-90 per game for since the people who sit there are likely the more hardcore fans and likely to buy tickets regardless. On top of this, $5/game tickets for children under the age of 18, accompanied by a full priced ticket.

Also get back to single game ticket deals with 7-11 like we had during the early part of the Ackles era. 2 tickets in the end-zone for $50, and throw in 2 hotdogs and 2 slurpees from 7-11. Take advantage of Boston Pizza being right outside the stadium and work out a meal + ticket deal with them.

A joint partnership with the White Caps could be beneficial to both teams. Joint Season Ticket passes for both teams, with a slight discount on what it would cost to purchase season tickets to both teams separately. I'll admit I know next to nothing about the White Caps season ticket base, but wouldn't be surprised if this is something that could be beneficial to them as well.

There are plenty of options. This took me literally 5-10 minutes to come up with. It isn't hard. Yet for some reason the Lions have gotten away from being creative.

I concur totally

[Matt Baker]

Also, what exactly happened in 2005?

as MikeAK said, that's when they started to jack up prices across the board. with ackles at the helm. IMO they got too greedy too quickly. 50k+ paid $45 each, flat rate for every seat every section, for the heavily hyped 2004 caseymania nhl lockout playoff game, and thereafter the milking of the fanbase commenced, a mere 2 years after crowds had barely begun to resuscitate from under 20k. braley said lions tickets were an underpriced commodity. they were more interested in milking diehards than filling the dome.

If I recall what also happened in 2004 was they had all but locked up first place before entering the Thanksgiving weekend. They had a 6 point edge + the season series on Edmonton with 4 games left for both. It did take 2 more weeks to clinch but entering Thanksgiving BC had to totally collapse and lose their remaining 4 while Edmonton swept their final 4 for BC to not end up 1st in the West. Officially they had a full month to market the WDF. Unofficially it was game on for hosting the WDF 6 weeks before it happened. It didn't hurt the cause when it turned out to be the Riders would be the opponents BC Place. The tailgating in the parking lots between the Dome and the Cambie Street bridge was insane.

You're correct. An epic comeback in Montreal in game 16 I believe, they trailed 21-0 in first half, clinched first place in the West.

[David]

I don't know the logistics, but it would have been a cool idea to piggy-back the St. Pierre-Bisping UFC fight onto the finish of the Lions-Argos game at BC Place and shown the PPV fight on the big screen. If nothing else, just to try something different that you can't really do at other Canadian stadia in November.

Yes, you'd have to pay staff to work a little OT, then there are the fees of showing it, and you'd likely miss some or all of the prelim fights, but it would be an excellent venue to watch the fight and another way to attract fans to a meaningless game.


DH

[B.C.FAN]

I don't know the logistics, but it would have been a cool idea to piggy-back the St. Pierre-Bisping UFC fight onto the finish of the Lions-Argos game at BC Place and shown the PPV fight on the big screen. If nothing else, just to try something different that you can't really do at other Canadian stadia in November.

Yes, you'd have to pay staff to work a little OT, then there are the fees of showing it, and you'd likely miss some or all of the prelim fights, but it would be an excellent venue to watch the fight and another way to attract fans to a meaningless game.


DH

I don’t know how feasible that would be, but everyone I invited to the game said they were going to the casino to watch the fight instead.

[CardiacKid]

Back in 1995 they had kids priced season tickets. Kids season tickets were $1/game with the purchase of an adult season ticket. I agree with you. No excuse not to offer that deal for season ticketholders. Especially with how great the TSN TV deal is, right now is the time to drop ticket prices and try to fill that stadium. Build your fanbase because the next TV deal may not be so lucrative, and at that point if you're still only drawing 18-20k fans per game you're really going to be hurting.

I could almost guarantee the Lions would not have lost that game tonight if they had 5,000 more fans in the stands. It's not a humongous increase. It's do-able. But BC Place used to be such an intimidating place for opponents. Now it's a "get well" card on the calendar.

Drop prices - do whatever you need to do. But get butts in the seats. It makes a difference.


DH

We dropped the $ for 2 seasons tickets a couple of days ago and it came out roughly $80-90 cheaper than 2017. That was a very pleasant surprise.
If they had gone up marginally, we wouldn’t have blinked. Simply a case of being actuated to continuously increased prices of “stuff”.
Not sure what perk we will choose but glad the Lions at least sort of acknowledged the issues of parking and transit for fans. Now If they could offer free transit like in Ottawa, that would be a sign of seriously trying to get fans back.

[MacNews]

I think the problem is the Lions don't receive any parking or concession revenue. So they can't reduce ticket prices, it's their only source of revenue.

Drawing less then 20K in a 55K stadium is insane though. There has to be something to do with family package+ student package to get more people in the stadium.

[Huge Talent]

This might sound crazy, but the lions should make next year's home opener free. More specifically, they should open the upper bowl and pack the place. Market the hell out of it. I bet people would go. Create some excitement, get some more people going to games. The notion that it would devalue tickets is nonsense.. I can't give mid field seats away, so they're already worthless at this point. They need some extreme marketing tactics, this is just that.

[The_Pauser]

This might sound crazy, but the lions should make next year's home opener free. More specifically, they should open the upper bowl and pack the place. Market the hell out of it. I bet people would go. Create some excitement, get some more people going to games. The notion that it would devalue tickets is nonsense.. I can't give mid field seats away, so they're already worthless at this point. They need some extreme marketing tactics, this is just that.

There are only 9 regular season games at home. This would be a huge cut to their revenue, and would also piss off all the season ticket holders. Not going to happen.

[TheLionKing]

Not if they don't charge season ticket holders for the first game.

[DanoT]

A new owner needs to start with $5 plus a food bank donation with all proceeds going to the food bank for a pre season game.

[Hambone]

This might sound crazy, but the lions should make next year's home opener free. More specifically, they should open the upper bowl and pack the place. Market the hell out of it. I bet people would go. Create some excitement, get some more people going to games. The notion that it would devalue tickets is nonsense.. I can't give mid field seats away, so they're already worthless at this point. They need some extreme marketing tactics, this is just that.

I had a similar thought a few years ago but to do so with the exhibition game. My thought was to try to fill the house by providing the tickets to schools and amateur sports organizations to in turn sell them as fund raisers. Give each group 20 for their own use and another 50 they can sell as fundraisers for say $10 each.

The risk for any radical ideas prior to the sale of the club is that old ownership is setting a precedent for whomever the ownership might be. New ownership may have a totally different idea of how to approach these things but could have the rug pulled out from under them if radical changes by past ownership don't fit with their thought process and business model. For instance if as per an earlier suggestion Coaches Sideline seats were slashed by over a third to $50 new ownership would be vilified if they disagreed and wanted to increase them.

[Hambone]

I think the problem is the Lions don't receive any parking or concession revenue. So they can't reduce ticket prices, it's their only source of revenue.

Not to mention not all of ST and single game ticket prices is revenue for the Lions but rather government revenue (GST) and Ticketmaster revenue. I'm not sure if there is still a stadium fee per ticket as well.