Some markets are too big, some are too small, but some are just right.
It is not only population that affects a market being just right, it is finding the right way to engage your demographic and keep them filling the seats that keeps a team afloat. For most teams in the league, breaking even on every night is seemingly impossible and there are a lot of factors to blame.
The markets that are small have factors to blame like lack of population, lack of interest, and maybe even lack of success on the ice but some of these smaller markets thrive.
The Brandon Wheat Kings have been around the Western Hockey League for a long time, but over the years have found a way to have high attendance even with a regional population of around 58,000 people.
To the other end of the spectrum, the Vancouver Giants have seen their attendance numbers drop recently in one of the league’s biggest markets.
So what makes an ideal market for a WHL Franchise?
I don’t personally know if there is one market in particular that works perfectly for a Major Junior hockey club. Calgary and Edmonton are both cities with plenty of sports teams and they still manage to draw the most fans out to their games. As mentioned, Brandon pulls in quite a few fans despite their population.
The team’s on-ice success affects the way fans support their teams, there’s no denying it, but a bad team can still have a decent attendance percentage, and a good team can still have a poor one.
The Prince George Cougars in their past ownership were notorious for going from the best atmosphere in the league to the worst by far. In their 2013-14 season, they averaged 1680 fans per game, and I can tell you first hand it was almost like attending walking into a library at every home game. With new ownership came a new life for the franchise and attendance soared to new heights that hadn’t been seen since the team first arrived in BC’s Northern Capital in 1994. The new ownership group has faced some challenges since then, but even at their low point, the Cougars still average 2521 a game, which is nearly half the capacity of the CN Centre.
The obvious model market for a WHL team has to be in Kelowna, BC. A city with a little over 200,000 people (metro) and with no other major sports franchise to compete with, it should make occupying the seats a little easier. The Rockets are not having a terrific season by any means, but they still manage to have over 50% capacity night in, and night out at the Prospera Place. As per hockeydb.com, the Rockets currently average just over 4400 a game, which is well above the break even point for their finances.
Numbers across the league are down in this 2018-19 season, whether it’s due to the economy or the ever rising ticket prices across the board. Every team is feeling more of a pinch when it comes to budgets, and selling advertising and business partnerships almost playing an equal part of a team’s survival than attendance.
Most markets can be ‘perfect’ they just have to be used the right way.
Below is a graph depicting WHL Attendance for the 2018-19 Season (Source: hockeydb.com)
