Tuesday, January 15, 2008

Tigers Tickets Selling Like Hotcakes

Season tickets are selling so well that the Tigers are considering halting sales in order to ensure that some decent single-game tickets remain:

Ticket sales for the upcoming Tigers’ season would already be through the roof—if Comerica Park had one. As it is, they’re going sky high.

They’re going so well, in fact, that for the first time ever, the Tigers are considering shutting off season-ticket sales. But even if they don’t, so many season-ticket packages will be sold that tickets for individual games, when they go on sale in March, could be gone in record time.

“It’s almost hard for me to talk about how much we’re selling,” Tigers president and general manager Dave Dombrowski said. “The excitement is phenomenal.”

There are a couple of lessons to take from this: First, the notion that attendance is a function of winning and investment in the product on the field has once again been proven to be true. Second, given how rough Michigan's economy is at the moment, the Tigers' good fortune is further evidence that, compared to most other things, baseball is extremely recession-resistant (other smart people have already noted this).

The only bad news here: I have finally gotten over my huff about Tiger Stadium going away and had in recent months prepared myself to end my Comerica boycott, drive three hours to Detroit, and take in a game there this summer. If I had done this in 2003 I could have walked up and gotten in practically for free. Because of my stubbornness, it's now going to cost me.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

On Saturday 26 game ticket packages went on sale for the Tigers. On Sunday I bought two seats and clicked on the option for "best available" seats. It turned up with two seats in row 30 of section 141. While these are still pretty good (3rd base side between the dugout and foul poll) it's amazing that they were the best available. Good times in Detroit.