RLWC Attendance-O-Meter

[Dave T]

Just now, GeordieSaint said:

I am not believing a word that is coming out of Dutton’s mouth at the moment. 

I haven't for a long time mate. 

And I feel bad saying that as he seems a nice bloke, but as I said earlier, style over substance. 

[Hull Kingston Bronco]

9 minutes ago, GeordieSaint said:

I am actually really confused about what point Dutton is actually trying to make there… it’s pretty incoherent.

He's saying the tournament runs to break-even on fixed overhead (covered by grant funding), and that we then make - or lose - money on the variable event costs per game. It's a good model, and that part of it (securing enough grant funding to cover overhead) is really well executed. It minimises risk that the tournament will be a financial car crash on the downside (which is the WC2000 fear on every organiser's shoulder).

But...

Where it falls down is on the by-match entrepreneurial mindset. If we can sell 12,000 tickets for a promotable product (NZ vs. Lebanon) at £20 average that's better than £40 per ticket in a 6,000 gate. The venue and staffing cost is the same (ish, headcount scaled to volume), so the direct 'contribution to direct overhead' from ticket revenue evens out but...

1) you have upside on food/merch, and more importantly

2) you have the potential Lifetime Customer Value of the incremental 6,000 consumers from future events they may buy down the track.

That's before you try and price in intangibles like "customer experience from atmosphere = higher propensity to buy further tickets" and "viewer TV perception = higher propensity to buy tickets and/or value sponsors products more highly" etc. etc. etc. 

My strategy is higher risk. If you think the max total achievable market is 6,000 anyway and consumers aren't price sensitive to that level, then don't worry about it and focus on yield.  But do we really think that? 

 

[meast]

1 hour ago, Bolton Leyther said:

The only regular international calendar worth considering currently, financially and competitively, would be a Four Nations tournament between England, Australia, New Zealand and Tonga.

Perhaps make it a Five or possibly Six Nations with Samoa and Fiji.

Why not have a 2nd tier 4 nations running alongside it?

Have it in alternatively in North and South hemisphere in non world cup years.

The team who wins the 2nd tier gets promoted to the top tier for the next years event.

Run a women's and wheelchair tournament at the same time too.

How good would that be?

[RL Tragic]

9 minutes ago, Damien said:

It's just downright weird. Frankly this is the best funded World Cup ever with the highest ticket prices yet we have blatantly scrimped on pre match entertainment and things like national anthem singers. That just doesn't add up. If 2013 made a record £4 million profit this should be making £10 million plus based on what we know. That would obviously be a huge windfall for the IRL.

I’m convinced they have Sp£&@ed the money on staff and socials . Frankly the organisation has been a show up to this point . 

[Jughead]

1 minute ago, Dave T said:

This is probably the least attractive of the three Donny games, and on a Monday night, so hopefully we will get bigger crowds at the follow up games. Although the central main stand seats go to £55 for the Samoa v Greece game. 

Arguably, this was the closest of the three, though. Samoa and PNG should be winning quite convincingly and also this one the most friendly price wise. 

The initial idea of having this during the day during half term wasn’t a bad idea, it’s a shame this couldn’t be the same as the initial plan. That said, the next game at Doncaster is in half term so we will see with all games next week if that has any bearing on attendances. 

[Dave T]

3 minutes ago, Hull Kingston Bronco said:

He's saying the tournament runs to break-even on fixed overhead (covered by grant funding), and that we then make - or lose - money on the variable event costs per game. It's a good model, and that part of it (securing enough grant funding to cover overhead) is really well executed. It minimises risk that the tournament will be a financial car crash on the downside (which is the WC2000 fear on every organiser's shoulder).

But...

Where it falls down is on the by-match entrepreneurial mindset. If we can sell 12,000 tickets for a promotable product (NZ vs. Lebanon) at £20 average that's better than £40 per ticket in a 6,000 gate. The venue and staffing cost is the same (ish, headcount scaled to volume), so the direct 'contribution to direct overhead' from ticket revenue evens out but...

1) you have upside on food/merch, and more importantly

2) you have the potential Lifetime Customer Value of the incremental 6,000 consumers from future events they may buy down the track.

That's before you try and price in intangibles like "customer experience from atmosphere = higher propensity to buy further tickets" and "viewer TV perception = higher propensity to buy tickets and/or value sponsors products more highly" etc. etc. etc. 

My strategy is higher risk. If you think the max total achievable market is 6,000 anyway and consumers aren't price sensitive to that level, then don't worry about it and focus on yield.  But do we really think that? 

 

Is he saying that? Because you appear to be filling a lot of gaps for him tbh. 

[Hull Kingston Bronco]

Just now, Dave T said:

Is he saying that? Because you appear to be filling a lot of gaps for him tbh. 

Yes, it's obvious

We know the tournament doesn't overall run to break-even, as it is designed to create a surplus for the IRL to invest

The context is ticket pricing

So obviously his comment is in the context of "we price individual matches to make a profit contribution"... i.e. we can't afford to price so low that they won't cover their own direct costs of running X match

No other interpretation makes sense. 

 

 

[Dave T]

1 minute ago, Jughead said:

Arguably, this was the closest of the three, though. Samoa and PNG should be winning quite convincingly and also this one the most friendly price wise. 

The initial idea of having this during the day during half term wasn’t a bad idea, it’s a shame this couldn’t be the same as the initial plan. That said, the next game at Doncaster is in half term so we will see with all games next week if that has any bearing on attendances. 

It's not quite true about the pricing. Tonight was really weird, because they sort of went with an approach of offering good value (£20 per adult) but actually the PNG v Wales game has probably over a quarter of the ground at £15, and even the Samoa v Greece games has a quarter of the ground at £20.

So tonight's game wasn't actually any kind of great value

For a family of 4, the PNG v Wales game is cheapest at £40.

Its just a confused, muddled strategy. 

[JM2010]

1 minute ago, meast said:

Why not have a 2nd tier 4 nations running alongside it?

Have it in alternatively in North and South hemisphere in non world cup years.

The team who wins the 2nd tier gets promoted to the top tier for the next years event.

Run a women's and wheelchair tournament at the same time too.

How good would that be?

I keep changing my mind about what tournaments I would like to see. The main thing I would like to see is several tournaments at the end of the season covering all levels plus 2 mid season tests for a lot of the nation's.

If we went for a 4N with a 2nd tier 4N underneath then there could be an intercontinental cup at the same time with representatives from Americas, MEA, Europe and Pacific if there are any not included in 4N.

4N - Aus, NZ, Tonga, England

4N tier 2 - Fiji, Samoa, PNG, France 

Intercontinental - Jamaica, Nigeria, Lebanon, Wales, Scotland, Ireland, Greece/Italy, Cook Islands 

 

 

[Dave T]

2 minutes ago, Hull Kingston Bronco said:

Yes, it's obvious

We know the tournament doesn't overall run to break-even, as it is designed to create a surplus for the IRL to invest

The context is ticket pricing

So obviously his comment is in the context of "we price individual matches to make a profit contribution"... i.e. we can't afford to price so low that they won't cover their own direct costs of running X match

No other interpretation makes sense. 

 

 

It's certainly not obvious, 

Tournament runs to break even, no profit and we pay for everything, hence the need to raise funds from tickets and other sources

Is a really weird way of describing the model.

Completely isolating an income stream from talk of any P&L is odd. 

[Coastal_Geordie]

The All Blacks played Tonga at the 2015 Union World Cup, group stage.  They sold out St James with the cheap seats starting at £50 and most of the lower bowl £100 plus.  It was sold and promoted as a premium event, a hot ticket.

The Kiwis v Lebanon I definitely expected higher attendance.  Perhaps it just didn’t feel/was not promoted as a big event.  England v Samoa definitely was and had that big game day feel.  I’ve been to NFL games at Wembley and it has that sort of vibe with lots of non hardcore fans there for a good time and being very excited by the “product”.

[Stuff Smith]

3 minutes ago, Coastal_Geordie said:

The All Blacks played Tonga at the 2015 Union World Cup, group stage.  They sold out St James with the cheap seats starting at £50 and most of the lower bowl £100 plus.  It was sold and promoted as a premium event, a hot ticket.

The national media portrays any international game in Rugby Union as a premium event which helps. Rugby League doesn't have that luxury.

[Gomersall]

23 minutes ago, Dave T said:

This is probably the least attractive of the three Donny games, and on a Monday night, so hopefully we will get bigger crowds at the follow up games. Although the central main stand seats go to £55 for the Samoa v Greece game. 

PNG v Wales at Donny is also a Monday night.

[Gerrumonside ref]

13 minutes ago, Coastal_Geordie said:

The All Blacks played Tonga at the 2015 Union World Cup, group stage.  They sold out St James with the cheap seats starting at £50 and most of the lower bowl £100 plus.  It was sold and promoted as a premium event, a hot ticket.

The Kiwis v Lebanon I definitely expected higher attendance.  Perhaps it just didn’t feel/was not promoted as a big event.  England v Samoa definitely was and had that big game day feel.  I’ve been to NFL games at Wembley and it has that sort of vibe with lots of non hardcore fans there for a good time and being very excited by the “product”.

That’s good to hear about the England-Samoa game.

Edited October 17, 2022 by Gerrumonside ref

[wilsontown]

29 minutes ago, Dave T said:

This is probably the least attractive of the three Donny games, and on a Monday night, so hopefully we will get bigger crowds at the follow up games. Although the central main stand seats go to £55 for the Samoa v Greece game. 

So £55 is the same price as a Club Wembley seat for the challenge cup final last time I managed to get there. I know we don't want to undervalue ourselves but seems a bit too much.

[Damien]

9 minutes ago, Coastal_Geordie said:

The All Blacks played Tonga at the 2015 Union World Cup, group stage.  They sold out St James with the cheap seats starting at £50 and most of the lower bowl £100 plus.  It was sold and promoted as a premium event, a hot ticket.

The Kiwis v Lebanon I definitely expected higher attendance.  Perhaps it just didn’t feel/was not promoted as a big event.  England v Samoa definitely was and had that big game day feel.  I’ve been to NFL games at Wembley and it has that sort of vibe with lots of non hardcore fans there for a good time and being very excited by the “product”.

Again though, and I've made this point before, one is being played in a marquee big stadium while the other is being played in a bog standard 15k SL ground.

England v Samoa was promoted as a premium event at St James Park and sold well too. Not many are going to consider a game at the Halliwell Jones as a premium event no matter what the organisers do and certainly not because they just charge a lot.

[Wendigo7]

Couldn’t they have done dynamic price ticketing?

So based on the match, ticket prices are higher for England games, but the lesser known matches to the general public are cheaper and more accessible

Would that work?

[Dave T]

10 minutes ago, Gomersall said:

PNG v Wales at Donny is also a Monday night.

Yeah, I think Donny have been dealt a raw hand tbh. 

[Dave T]

2 minutes ago, Wendigo7 said:

Couldn’t they have done dynamic price ticketing?

So based on the match, ticket prices are higher for England games, but the lesser known matches to the general public are cheaper and more accessible

Would that work?

They are to an extent, but are all over the place. 

They don't appear to have got the balance right tbh. 

[The Hallucinating Goose]

I don't really know what to think about tonight's attendance really. Probably a bit lower than I'd have liked but at the same time right from the start of tickets going on sale these Doncaster games have been very poor sales wise so I'm not too surprised.

France v Greece was never gonna be the most appealing game in the world and its on a Monday night which certainly doesn't help for people travelling from further afield. You're essentially relying on people in Doncaster alone to go which isn't the most hardcore of RL cities. The other two games there are a bit more appealing so I'd like to think there will be at least a few more at them.

It's certainly not a disaster, every World Cup has a couple of really low attendances. In 2013, Wales got less than 4,000 for a home game for example.

The attendance I've been most disappointed with so far is the Ireland-Jamaica one and that's mainly cos we tend to get decent crowds at Headingley but at the same time, there was a game there the previous day so it was probably too much for a lot of people to attend games on consecutive days for both the scheduling and the monetary reasons. And again, Ireland v Jamaica was clearly not as big a draw as the Australia game the day before. 

There's positives and negatives in most of these attendances and if nothing else, that attendance tonight still showed even a small crowd can create a great atmosphere. Best one of the tournament so far!

[wilsontown]

It's just reality that a group game at Donny on a Monday night is not going to be a massive draw. Shame as it was a decent watch (on telly in my local).

[Wendigo7]

I do think the Energy Price issues have deffo put people off though. Obviously not all, but with money being very tight for a lot of people, there’s a decent shout that if the financial situation in the country was better the attendances would be higher. 
Kiwi vs Lebanon game still looks weird though. I don’t think even the organisers could have foreseen that, it was just a poor crowd with not a massive justification as to why. 

[saintspete83]

What would I do 

 

Now I hate panic selling and discounts, but the games reputation is on the line and the cost-of-living crisis is a genuine issue that could not have been foreseen by the tournament organisers back in 2020. 

1.  I would look to knock 30-50% off the higher category tickets A B C for pool games only 
2. Above means that we would be breaking the promise to the fans (probably not that many looking at attendances) who chose the early bird prices. To keep them in pocket I would offer them a free equivalent priced ticket of what they have bought to an equivalent game.
3. I would then release a statement explaining about the ticket prices being put together in 2020 and how a cost-of-living crisis was not factored in, mixed in with a bit of "we got this a bit wrong"

 

To me this would keep everyone happy and maybe relight sales. Something needs to be done as the issue will stick with this comp and the negativity will grow and we end up with a similar situation to 2000. 

 

 

Edited October 17, 2022 by saintspete83

[Bedfordshire Bronco]

1 hour ago, RL Tragic said:

I’m convinced they have Sp£&@ed the money on staff and socials . Frankly the organisation has been a show up to this point . 

Spaffed isn't a swear word 

Is it?

 

[Dave T]

3 minutes ago, saintspete83 said:

What would I do 

 

Now I hate panic selling and discounts, but the games reputation is on the line and the cost-of-living crisis is a genuine issue that could not have been foreseen by the tournament organisers back in 2020. 

1.  I would look to knock 30-50% off the higher category tickets A B C for pool games only 
2. Above means that we would be breaking the promise to the fans (probably not that many looking at attendances) who chose the early bird prices. To keep them in pocket I would offer them a free equivalent priced ticket of what they have bought to an equivalent game that their ticket is for (pool, knockout, final)
3. I would then release a statement explaining about the ticket prices being put together in 2020 and how a cost-of-living crisis was not factored in, mixed in with a bit of "we got this a bit wrong"

 

To me this would keep everyone happy and maybe relight sales. Something needs to be done as the issue will stick with this comp and the negativity will grow and we end up with a similar situation to 2000. 

 

 

If they are telling the truth and we have sold as many tickets for this as the 2013 edition, we can afford to hold our nerve. Even though we have 5 extra mens events, that's fine, and hopefully we'll sell more as the weeks go on. 

If however, we actually haven't sold that many tickets. Well...