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Saturday, December 11, 1999
Come, or they go!
Ticket sales crucial
The empty seats are a death knell.
Not even a critical battle with division rival Vancouver Canucks can fill this barn anymore.
Fans don't care.
You can analyze all day long why they are staying away -- perhaps it's the ticket price, the quality of hockey, the three years of no playoffs or the concession prices.
It doesn't matter now.
It has come to this.
Save Our Flames.
After this season, the Flames will officially articulate the crisis that is barreling down the track towards Calgary like a locomotive out of control.
Apathy is the engine that is killing the Flames.
An average attendance of 13,204 means there are 4,000 empty seats a night.
Season tickets are at an all-time low of about 9,000.
And this is a hockey city.
But now the challenge has been clearly laid out for the future of NHL hockey in this city.
Empty seats mean empty hopes for that future.
As Flames co-owner and NHL chairman of the board Harley Hotchkiss articulated yesterday in the Sun, Calgarians must make a choice whether they want NHL hockey in our city.
They must do that by attending games.
Flames vice-president of finance Mike Holditch confirmed the worst fears yesterday -- the Flames won't qualify for the critical NHL currency equalization money because of lagging attendance.
In order to qualify, Calgary must earn 80% of the league average revenues. That's how the Flames qualified the first four years of the program.
"It's very unlikely we will qualify that way," says Holditch because of the lost revenue from poor ticket sales.
That means the team must qualify on the secondary criteria, as Edmonton did for last season.
That means 13,000 season tickets this summer.
There are other secondary criteria involving additional revenues but the Flames should have those covered.
So it will come to this.
Either fans fill those empty seats now and increase the team revenues or this summer Calgary will be faced with a season ticket drive to save the team.
And Calgary will respond, like it always has.
But the message is clear to the NHL and league owners -- your time to solve your own problems is short.
Fans will understand when team president Ron Bremner says it's impossible to compete with such a revenue disadvantage, even against their Alberta rivals.
If Edmonton has 4,000 more tickets sold per game, they benefit from about $5 million in more revenue. Add the $3-$4 million in league assistance that could be lost, the $1.6 million in concession sales lost ... pretty soon your down $10 million a year in revenue to Edmonton.
Add it all up, and it equals the Portland Flames.
No fan in Calgary wants to see that, yet the inescapable truth is that there are fewer and fewer fans in this city.
Surely that must send a message to the NHL, for this problem extends well beyond Calgary, and well into the promise land of the almighty U.S.
Vancouver is facing the same problem as Calgary.
"Long before we deal with the government aid issue, there is $2 million plus U.S. sitting there that we are at risk of losing," said Canucks GM Brian Burke.
"To walk way from that amount of money because we can't hit certain targets is madness.
"We need the public to back this team and help us get back on track so we are not losing money.
"If you are not performing at the gate and your own market is not supporting you, then why should the U.S. teams?
"That's the challenge for us. We do think we have a hockey market and we need people to demonstrate that."
Certainly, the NHL has done little to demonstrate that it is capable of providing a product that is competitive and entertaining in all of its markets. There are good reasons people are staying away.
If you believe what Hotchkiss and others tell us, then they will solve those problems.
But until then, it is up to you, the hockey fan, to preserve this team in Calgary.
Save Our Flames is coming.
Like it or not.
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