Quote:
Originally Posted by KevFu
The old lease and an antiquated building means that revenue streams other teams get simply don't exist for the Islanders.
-- The Islanders have the fewest suites and fewest club seats in the league (they do get most the suite revenue under the old and modified lease).
-- They also have few concessions points of sale, and very few high end concessions. (they didn't get any of that money anyway in the old lease, get some in the modified lease).
-- They also have few advertising spots in the arena. It's small so there's not as much space on LED boards/scoreboard, etc (they didn't get any of that money under the old lease, get some in the modified lease).
When you add up "known" revenue (Local TV deal, National TV split, Revenue sharing, and gate receipts) for all the teams in the league, and subtract that from total revenue, you get a list of each team's revenues from things like suites, advertising and concessions (as well as merchandise). The Islanders would be so far last on that list it would not be funny. Like $20 million behind Phoenix, $45 behind most of hockey, and $60 million behind big clubs.
THAT'S why the Islanders lose money.
So it's really not fans/attendance at all. If the Islanders had sold every single ticket last season, at the average ticket price (and let's be honest, a lot of the unsold tickets are the cheap seats), that would have given the team $6.2 million more in revenue. STILL dead last in revenue. STILL losing money. If they sold out year after year and could raise ticket prices, then they could make a little money.
But the Islanders losses were the highest when Wang said "screw it" and bought Yashin, Peca, Hamrlick and Aucoin and made the playoffs.
They need to either A) Win with a ridiculously low payroll. Or B) Move into a new building.
After the Brooklyn announcement, one report said the Islanders can get up to $35 million MORE in revenue just from SUITES ALONE by going from NVMC to Barclays. And that's why we're freaking stoked. We're just running out the clock on being a poor team. Time to start acting like a New York franchise again.
|
If they won, and sold out regularly, they get those sponsors. You advertise where you are seen. Why do advertisers not spend on a team that ranks last for two decades short of one blip? Because there is no attendance and no money in advertising.
If you have 16,234 people in a building and are in the suburbs and you have another team with 12,000 people in a giant metro area with no draw.....where do you spend? Are the urbanites spending more money on goods and services than the suburban person per capita?
Now add the number of events. If the NVMC were selling out 41 nights and playoffs every year in the 'burbs, you also have concerts and shows and circus acts. say a well run barn had 120 nights packed. Would advertisers see more value to getting exposure? To say they don't would mean one believes the burbs don't spend on goods and services. But city folks do.
That's silly.
No one advertises because the Isles are synonymous with SUCKING.
The luxury box concept is the only real difference, then.
But the team is not well run and the man who runs the team runs the events as well so no bookings, no winning, no revenue.
And in 2001, we were positive in revenue. The arena stood in the way then as did SMG and we were still in the black. If we had refurbed or replaced the building then and gotten rid of SMG, we'd have made more money IF.....we sold out enough. If we didn't, eventually advertisers pull out and we get Tattoo Lou's and moving companies because no one gives a **** about a team that doesn't give a ****. Period.
Especially when they can had their ad dollars to Dolan or Ratner or a slew of other local shows.