RLWC Attendance-O-Meter

[Chrispmartha]

2 minutes ago, Dave T said:

Apologies it may have been an RLWC spokesperson. 

But it was following the lower than expected women's game at Leeds. 

But was that just for that game?

[Guest]

11 minutes ago, Dave T said:

It's important to remember that Dutton explicitly stated they don't include unused tickets. So there absolutely were 40k in Arsenal. 

UFC always used to announce the box office of each event - not sure if they still do.

I know they used to paper the event if there were a lot of unsold tickets - freebies galore. All included in attendance the same as those paying.

[Dave T]

Just now, Chrispmartha said:

But was that just for that game?

The Coventry posters on here reckoned more tickets had been sold for that game than were announced. 

 

[Chrispmartha]

Just now, Leonard said:

UFC always used to announce the box office of each event - not sure if they still do.

I know they used to paper the event if there were a lot of unsold tickets - freebies galore. All included in attendance the same as those paying.

Its pretty standard to include no shows, I know they published actually attendance for that Leeds game but doesn’t mean it was a ‘strategy’ to do so for the whole tournament 

[Guest]

Just now, Chrispmartha said:

Its pretty standard to include no shows, I know they published actually attendance for that Leeds game but doesn’t mean it was a ‘strategy’ to do so for the whole tournament 

I was referring to free tickets - not no shows.

For example, mention was made of 20k being given to key workers. That can render official attendance figures meaningless - if you are interested in paying customers.

[Dave T]

3 minutes ago, Leonard said:

UFC always used to announce the box office of each event - not sure if they still do.

I know they used to paper the event if there were a lot of unsold tickets - freebies galore. All included in attendance the same as those paying.

I've no issues with always announcing the top number, if you've sold it (or even gifted it) the ticket can't be reused, so it makes sense to count it. 

[Chrispmartha]

1 minute ago, Leonard said:

I was referring to free tickets - not no shows.

For example, mention was made of 20k being given to key workers. That can render official attendance figures meaningless - if you are interested in paying customers.

They can announce what figure they like but they will have all the proper data and more importantly so will the tax man

[RP London]

I always think its a strange debate.. surely anyone who turns up and turns the turnstile is in the attendance anyone who does not is not.. 

If there is an accounting issue due to more money than people in the ground you then would show that with the receipts of the payment and the corresponding none use of the ticket.. the 2 (announced attendance and book keeping) dont need to align, its only when they come to do an audit you need the back up etc. 

 

[Dave T]

1 minute ago, RP London said:

I always think its a strange debate.. surely anyone who turns up and turns the turnstile is in the attendance anyone who does not is not.. 

If there is an accounting issue due to more money than people in the ground you then would show that with the receipts of the payment and the corresponding none use of the ticket.. the 2 (announced attendance and book keeping) dont need to align, its only when they come to do an audit you need the back up etc. 

 

I think it's reasonable to use either approach. I'd expect an organisation to use a consistent approach, whichever way they go. 

[Guest]

9 minutes ago, Dave T said:

I've no issues with always announcing the top number, if you've sold it (or even gifted it) the ticket can't be reused, so it makes sense to count it. 

Me neither - but I have an issue if they are portraying they sold X, i.e. full paying customers, when it was really Y.

 

Edited November 17, 2022 by Leonard

[Guest]

"As well as that, Dutton is hopeful that with a five-figure crowd expected for Australia's clash with Fiji later on Saturday evening in Leeds, a new opening-day record attendance figure will be set for the Rugby League World Cup. Fewer than 5,000 tickets remain for England's second group game against France in Bolton, while Dutton described the ticket sales for the game against Greece as being in 'a decent space'.

The goal now for organisers is to try and get near to the target of around 570,000 tickets that were sold at this summer's women's European Championships. With the tournament already near the total ticket sales of the last Rugby League World Cup held in England nine years ago, Dutton and his team are aiming to get as close to their 'stretch target' of 750,000 sales as possible.

"We're not quite past 2013, but we're not far off it," he said. "We know we'll surpass it eventually and we will continue to build on from that."

So the day after SJP - they were supposed to have done 438k. Not sure what the women's and wheelchair totals are - but they really must have sold next to no tickets post SJP.

[Chris22]

25 minutes ago, Dave T said:

I'm saying a couple of things.

On the opening day one, they claimed a record breaking day. Great, but it doesn't really mean owt. Some tournaments have had 1 match on opening day, some a double header, some 4 games. The claim is basically "our first two games added together have done well". 

I'm saying that after the Leeds Women's opener they claimed that they do not announce tickets sold, only those who turn up. That seemed to be supported by the claims that Coventry had sold over 13k, but announced 10k.

We then suddenly announced a record breaking 23k at Wigan - and that's for individuals to believe the numbers or not, but wouldn't you say it was weird that we had probably sold around 24k based on no-shows, but didn't mention that the game was almost sold out in the lead up? 

Again, people are free to believe what they feel the crowd was at Arsenal, but many don't accept there were 40k in there. It must be remembered that Dutton said they do not announce unused tickets. So there absolutely must have been 40k in that stadium. 

People are free to choose to believe what they want. 

To respond to each point

1. I'm torn on 43K for the opener at St James'. On the one hand, very good considering not a traditional 'big' opponent. On the other, we aimed for a sell out and fell short.

2. I agree. We claimed not to count purchased but unused ticket for the women's opener at Leeds but at Wigan we must have.

Some seats were blocked for the broadcast platform and I've seen 23K at the DW and it look more full. Equally, it looked more full than I was expecting.

It's plausible that some left after the women's game but I doubt it was many. Also plausible that many bought tickets but couldn't attend due to train strikes.

There is an obvious contradiction in approach between women's game at Headingley and quarter final at Wigan.

The comms have been muddled throughout. At times, they've overpromised and underdelivered and at Wigan, I saw a higher crowd than I thought.

Even based on occupied seats, an announcement that a sell out was close would be accurate. I believe this is a poor communication approach after feeling burned by the Leeds Women's opener. Hard to say without inside knowledge.

3. I have no idea about the Emirates crowd. I've only ever seen it full apart from Saturday. I think it's very difficult for anyone to predict the attendance with any accuracy by sight.

[pahars]

3 minutes ago, Leonard said:

"As well as that, Dutton is hopeful that with a five-figure crowd expected for Australia's clash with Fiji later on Saturday evening in Leeds, a new opening-day record attendance figure will be set for the Rugby League World Cup. Fewer than 5,000 tickets remain for England's second group game against France in Bolton, while Dutton described the ticket sales for the game against Greece as being in 'a decent space'.

The goal now for organisers is to try and get near to the target of around 570,000 tickets that were sold at this summer's women's European Championships. With the tournament already near the total ticket sales of the last Rugby League World Cup held in England nine years ago, Dutton and his team are aiming to get as close to their 'stretch target' of 750,000 sales as possible.

"We're not quite past 2013, but we're not far off it," he said. "We know we'll surpass it eventually and we will continue to build on from that."

So the day after SJP - they were supposed to have done 438k. Not sure what the women's and wheelchair totals are - but they really must have sold next to no tickets post SJP.

Roughly 105,000 tickets available for wheelchair and women’s- were these included in the 750k? believe they sold around 45,000 so far. 

[Dave T]

2 minutes ago, Chris22 said:

To respond to each point

1. I'm torn on 43K for the opener at St James'. On the one hand, very good considering not a traditional 'big' opponent. On the other, we aimed for a sell out and fell short.

2. I agree. We claimed not to count purchased but unused ticket for the women's opener at Leeds but at Wigan we must have.

Some seats were blocked for the broadcast platform and I've seen 23K at the DW and it look more full. Equally, it looked more full than I was expecting.

It's plausible that some left after the women's game but I doubt it was many. Also plausible that many bought tickets but couldn't attend due to train strikes.

There is an obvious contradiction in approach between women's game at Headingley and quarter final at Wigan.

The comms have been muddled throughout. At times, they've overpromised and underdelivered and at Wigan, I saw a higher crowd than I thought.

Even based on occupied seats, an announcement that a sell out was close would be accurate. I believe this is a poor communication approach after feeling burned by the Leeds Women's opener. Hard to say without inside knowledge.

3. I have no idea about the Emirates crowd. I've only ever seen it full apart from Saturday. I think it's very difficult for anyone to predict the attendance with any accuracy by sight.

On point 1, despite missi g being a sellout, I thought the opener was a great success. The event was great, apart from the sound failure obviously, but I was extremely excited after that game for the month ahead. 

[RP London]

18 minutes ago, Dave T said:

I think it's reasonable to use either approach. I'd expect an organisation to use a consistent approach, whichever way they go. 

I dunno I think it should be those that attend are the attendance (old fashioned I know) those that bought tickets and didn't show up are an accounting anomaly.. but you can still say "sold out" but have an attendance below that. 

I'm not hugely fussed either way to be honest (i really dont pay it that much attention normally, go by feel if i am there, dont really worry about it if im not) as long as they try to work out why those who bought/were given tickets and didnt go werent there. If its something they can fix/help with in the future then they can actually plan and do it. 

Edited November 17, 2022 by RP London

[Guest]

9 minutes ago, pahars said:

Roughly 105,000 tickets available for wheelchair and women’s- were these included in the 750k? believe they sold around 45,000 so far. 

"With the tournament already near the total ticket sales of the last Rugby League World Cup held in England nine years ago"

So I think we are on for 410k in the mens and that would make c. 455k overall.

So post SJP we were near 438k.

Even if you say 400k is "approaching" (and that is being generous) - it makes little sense to sell 55k tickets during the tournament. I can't reconcile anything there.

Edited November 17, 2022 by Leonard

[Dave T]

3 minutes ago, RP London said:

I dunno I think it should be those that attend are the attendance (old fashioned I know) those that bought tickets and didn't show up are an accounting anomaly.. but you can still say "sold out" but have an attendance below that. 

I'm not hugely fussed either way to be honest as long as they try to work out why those who bought/were given tickets and didnt go werent there so that if its something they can fix/help with in the future then they do it. 

Yeah, I can understand why you'd prefer that way. It makes sense. I can live with either. 

But I don't believe in picking and choosing based on what suits the narrative. 

[Dave T]

1 minute ago, Leonard said:

"With the tournament already near the total ticket sales of the last Rugby League World Cup held in England nine years ago"

So I think we are on for 410k in the mens and that would make c. 455k overall.

So post STP we were near 438k.

Even if you say 400k is approaching - it makes little sense to sell 55k tickets during the tournament. I can't reconcile anything there.

I think they were Liberal with the truth early on (if only there was a word we could use ), expecting ticket sales to take care of themselves.

For me, the lack of sales during the tournament shows shows how much pricing was a challenge. To not sell out Bolton following that victory in game 1 was really odd. 

[RP London]

4 minutes ago, Dave T said:

Yeah, I can understand why you'd prefer that way. It makes sense. I can live with either. 

But I don't believe in picking and choosing based on what suits the narrative. 

Agree, and absolutely keeping to the same (whichever that is) for an entire tournament!

[gingerjon]

2 minutes ago, Dave T said:

I think they were Liberal with the truth early on (if only there was a word we could use ), expecting ticket sales to take care of themselves.

I think we do need to take seriously the idea that there was some double counting going on - and not deliberately - as a result of the system transfer they mentioned as well.

We'll never know the scale but it must have distorted what they thought they'd sold.

[RP London]

6 minutes ago, Dave T said:

I think they were Liberal with the truth early on (if only there was a word we could use ), expecting ticket sales to take care of themselves.

For me, the lack of sales during the tournament shows shows how much pricing was a challenge. To not sell out Bolton following that victory in game 1 was really odd. 

If i were in charge of the debrief of this (or whatever you want to call it) thats one I would look at very early for reasons as it should have done a lot lot better and if not why didnt they try some quick fixes, and if they did why did they not work (was it too short notice etc.. ) for me it could tell you a lot about the tournament as a whole. 

But I'd pretty much start at the below... get those figures and get them fast, they are really important for the real picture.. before then looking at the above. 

1 minute ago, gingerjon said:

I think we do need to take seriously the idea that there was some double counting going on - and not deliberately - as a result of the system transfer they mentioned as well.

We'll never know the scale but it must have distorted what they thought they'd sold.

Edited November 17, 2022 by RP London

[Dave T]

39 minutes ago, gingerjon said:

I think we do need to take seriously the idea that there was some double counting going on - and not deliberately - as a result of the system transfer they mentioned as well.

We'll never know the scale but it must have distorted what they thought they'd sold.

All indications are that it was modest, but could still have been relatively significant based on the modest size of the tournament. I. E. Not huge, maybe 20k, but that's big enough to change the narrative. 

But we should be doing better than blaming a junior admin. 

[Dave T]

39 minutes ago, RP London said:

If i were in charge of the debrief of this (or whatever you want to call it) thats one I would look at very early for reasons as it should have done a lot lot better and if not why didnt they try some quick fixes, and if they did why did they not work (was it too short notice etc.. ) for me it could tell you a lot about the tournament as a whole. 

But I'd pretty much start at the below... get those figures and get them fast, they are really important for the real picture.. before then looking at the above. 

They will know those numbers. It does appear to be a specific segment, so not all early sales. 

[RL Tragic]

1 hour ago, Dave T said:

I've no issues with always announcing the top number, if you've sold it (or even gifted it) the ticket can't be reused, so it makes sense to count it. 

I don’t agree in counting them if the have been gifted . It gives organisers a great way of making up attendances wherever necessary 

[pahars]

19 minutes ago, Dave T said:

All indications are that it was modest, but could still have been relatively significant based on the modest size of the tournament. I. E. Not huge, maybe 20k, but that's big enough to change the narrative. 

But we should be doing better than blaming a junior admin. 

It would be intriguing to know when they knew.

Hull Kingston Bronco mentioned earlier that they took tickets off sale to recategorise. Was that a reaction to the news or did they think they were in a much better position then they were and not reduce prices enough?