Do Cubs fans think their season is over already?

I want to begin this post by saying that I am a Cubs fan, and living in the middle of Cardinals territory makes me live through daily jokes about the ineptitude of the Cubs.

For those who haven’t really studied the Cubs lengthy history, they have won two championships in their existence, the most recent one of those was in 1908, 104 years ago.  The Cubs have been dubbed many things, including the “Loveable losers”, yet attendance has been fairly strong for home games at Wrigley Field in Chicago.  The Cubs started their 2012 campaign with two homestands which have gone less than well.  They currently sit 1-5, and it seems fans are already getting ready to jump ship.  The attendance numbers tell an interesting tale.

04/05/2012 Opening Day Thursday vs Washington attendance = 41,176 (100% of capacity) 2-1 Loss

04/07/2012 Saturday vs Washington attendance = 40,102 (97.4% of capacity) 7-4 Loss

04/08/2012 Sunday vs Washington attendance = 31,973 (77.7% of capacity) 4-3 Win

04/09/2012 Monday vs Milwaukee attendance = 38,136 (92.7% of capacity) 7-5 Loss

04/10/2012 Tuesday vs Milwaukee attendance = 37,265 (90.5% of capacity) 7-4 Loss

04/11/2012 Wednesday vs Milwaukee attendance = 34,044 (82.7% of capacity) 2-1 Loss

Now it’s not too unusual to see such fluctuations, though the only time attendance has gone up was after the Cubs first win.  They have not won since.  One thing I was doing this season was paying attention to price of the cheapest ticket for Cubs games on the secondary ticket market using the website Stubhub.  Opening Day actually had someone selling a ticket in the nosebleed sections for around $20.  Since then, the secondary ticket market has started to be hit, as tickets dropped to $15 by the end of the series with Washington, and then to $10 and below as the Cubs lost one game after the next to the Brewers.

This morning my students alerted me during class that the Cubs cheapest ticket on stubhub was going for $0.49 for tomorrow’s (04/12/2012) game against Milwaukee.  This evening that price had dropped to $0.19.  In fact three different sellers now are offering two tickets at $0.19 each.  It costs me more to wash my clothes than it would to get four of these tickets to a Chicago Cubs game.

It is worth noting that there are tickets still going for $250 in row 2, right behind the on deck circle), however it seems that the secondary ticket market for the Cubs is really going down the drain.  The question is, are the Cubs fans giving up early this year and already dumping tickets off while they can actually get money for them?  I will keep looking at the Cubs ticket market this year, as I’m curious to see how fans will respond to the teams performance.

On a final note, I am watching the Cubs play the World Champion (of MLB at least) St. Louis Cardinals in St. Louis on Sunday in what are considered to be nosebleed seats.  I got the tickets “cheap” for $30.  Cubs fans may be giving up, but Cardinal fans look to be ready for another exciting year.

Capacity Contstraints, Excess Demand, and Profit Maximization

We typically think about the seating capacity of a sports facility as a constraint faced by teams.  They can sell every seat in the facility, but once those seats are sold, they have a limited ability to generate additional ticket revenues through ticket sales.  Of course they can raise the price of the existing tickets, but that can only be done in the off-season, and teams also risk alienating fans who may object to “price gouging” practices by the team.

This puts the teams at somewhat of a disadvantage, given that demand clearly increases when the team plays better.  The Washington Capitals have been very successful in the past few seasons, and demand for both single-game and season tickets has increased significantly.

In response to this increase in demand, the Capitals have come up with a novel solution to the increased demand for tickets.  Washington Post reporter and blogger Dan Steinberg reports that the Capitals will offer standing-room-only season tickets beginning next season.   For the rock-bottom price of $60 per game, which adds up to $2,250 for the season, would-be Caps fans will be able to purchase a ticket for a standing-room-only (SRO) spot in the Loge section of the MCI Center (shown above).  According to Steinberg, Capitals ticket prices are in the bottom half of the NHL’s ticket price distribution.

Tickets holders cannot simply wander around the arena with these tickets.  The tickets come withe a designated standing area printed on them, and holders of the tickets are required to stay in their designated area (marked off with lines painted on the floor) while watching the game.  Owning these SRO tickets also entitles the owner to buy SRO tickets to playoff games for $107 per game.

Since the number of seats in the facility are limited, this strategy suggests that the resistance of fans owning season tickets to actual seats in the MCI Center must be significant, and that there must be quite a bit of excess demand for Capitals tickets.  It will be interesting to see how much demand there is for these SRO seats, and how long this lasts.