2021 Canadian Premier League Attendance

[Macksam]

I wouldn't be overly concerned with Edmonton. Another entity will come in if the Fath's cannot execute, it is lucrative non-MLS market. It just needs to be done right. 

Edited August 16, 2021 by Macksam

[SpecialK]

On 8/11/2021 at 2:55 PM, masster said:

The more I think about it, I see a lot of positives about this Pay What You Want match. You increase your database of names of people who express at least a bit of interest in your product, so your sales team can try to sell them in the future. Also, you will be able to get a sense of how much people actually value your product. How many people are just giving you $5 because they want a cheap night out? How many people are giving you $20 because that is what they feel is a fair price? You may collect some good data that could be useful for the future. 

I went to the game and paid 10 dollars for two tickets. Now my girlfriend and I just bought two tickets for Wednesday game at 40 dollars ( regular price). I think it was great promotion. Also the food at TD place is pretty pricy! I wish TD place had a better options for supporter section.  

Edited August 17, 2021 by SpecialK

[Watchmen]

19 hours ago, Ozzie_the_parrot said:

Interesting to see one of the biggest fans of my attendance related posts on here having a go at FCE crowds on Reddit in a manner that calls into question the future existance of one of the founding clubs:

I'm never sure what to make of FCE crowds because the camera placement makes it difficult to gauge what is happening on the near side where there are enough seats to make the crowd numbers reasonable if still well below initial stated break even target in a Cavalry sort of way, if full. Sounds like they were not unfortunately.

Hadn't been checking but apparently the league website is showing the crowd stat for games again and when I checked the 803 one for FCE mentioned below from late last week was there:

https://canpl.ca/matchcentre/bhsfarrt7arlogjorl96z4d1w/highlights

.

It's interesting to see attendance for games.  I don't think I'd jump to any conclusions based on any of them this year, for any team.

[Ozzie_the_parrot]

2736 announced for Valour vs Pacific:

https://canpl.ca/matchcentre/bi15l7rdz3145hkrmzhfevo5w/stats

[Ozzie_the_parrot]

1729 was the lowest number announced by York 9 for a league game in 2019 so that's the first time a three digit crowd has appeared in the official stats for a CanPL game (there was a 728 for a York 9 home game in the Canadian Championship). Having so many weeknight games this season to have as full a season as possible in scheduling terms is providing plenty of difficult to market games (colder weather and schools back will soon make it even tougher).

 

Overall there does seem to be a move towards significantly greater candour where crowd levels are concerned this season. I usually don't see anything hugely egregious going on where announced vs actual is concerned from the Onesoccer coverage that can't be explained by factors like a reasonable percentage of season ticket no shows.

 

Edited August 17, 2021 by Ozzie_the_parrot

[SpecialK]

Those are not very good numbers at all. What’s happening here? COVID ? Lack of  promotion/advertisement? I know some of friends didn’t even know about the ottawa game before it was too late. I know one soccer has been great for Canadian soccer but maybe it’s actually hurting things because the general sports fan are not buying one soccer. Also Onesoccer doesn’t do a very good job at promoting itself. I don’t see ads on Facebook or YouTube or basic cable. 
 

Also I think the CPL should have 2 DP spots. 

[m-g-williams]

"I usually don't see anything hugely egregious going on where announced vs actual is concerned from the Onesoccer coverage that can't be explained by factors like a reasonable percentage of season ticket no shows."

[ted]

5 hours ago, SpecialK said:

Those are not very good numbers at all. What’s happening here? COVID ? Lack of  promotion/advertisement?

IMO it is mostly COVID and hesitancy to go to large events mixed with the usual weak marketing of the league and teams. 

[shermanator]

So since my post on Reddit got dragged in here I figure I should explain. I think everyone here should be very worried about FC Edmonton right now. IMO, we are watching the club die before our eyes.

I don't think it should be a surprise that attendance is down. In other markets, we are seeing an expected drop in attendance due to the pandemic, and the 4th wave that is either inevitable, already here, or fake news depending on who you speak to. Everyone has a different risk tolerance. Speaking to Calgary, I think most are surprised with how many people are showing up; crowds in the range of 2394 - 2459 on weeknights and Sunday afternoons is a pretty good floor given what has happened in the last 18 months. The supporters scene, which was having somewhat of a snowball effect going into 2020 and saw that momentum hit a wall is now seeing that momentum pick up again. 

However, in Edmonton, I think there is more going on. The attendances we are seeing are the results of a club that was never a big draw, that is now seeing people begin to get apathetic after 10 years of a poor game day experience, a losing team on the pitch, a front office that doesn't care about supporters, a lost year, and now an owner that seems to be scaling back the spending to no more than the bare minimum. COVID is a factor too, of course. 

Remember that when FC Edmonton relaunched in 2018, Tom Fath proclaimed that the rivalry between Cavalry and Edmonton would help them draw well. Yet, I have Edmonton supporters sending me videos of a dead silent RVV during Sunday's game. When it was 0-0. People in Edmonton's supporters scene are moving into the apathetic stage, and these are supposed to be the hardcores.

Perhaps with their new President, they can reverse this trend going into the 2022. Given the track record of past GM's with this club, I wouldn't expect much.

[Aird25]

1 hour ago, ted said:

IMO it is mostly COVID and hesitancy to go to large events mixed with the usual weak marketing of the league and teams. 

I have seasons ticket and I've only gone to the first match because I had immunocompromised guests staying with me after that. I know of a handful of other fans with similar stories as well. The plethora of week night games is baffling to though. We knew those wouldn't draw well in Langford

[Ivan]

On a somewhat brighter note, I gave my Forge seats to a buddy for the second game because I couldn't go.  While at the game, he bought his own season seats!

[youllneverwalkalone]

As others have said, we just got to get through this year and not read too much into it. Take the positives like Ottawa, and build off of it. I would agree that if there's a partner out there for the Faths, FCE could use a few stadium and probably front office upgrades. You only need to head south a few hours to see what can be done with a similar footprint. 

[narduch]

4 hours ago, ted said:

IMO it is mostly COVID and hesitancy to go to large events mixed with the usual weak marketing of the league and teams. 

Another factor was time. Teams had only a few weeks to start selling tickets 

[Ingham]

On 8/16/2021 at 1:42 AM, Ozzie_the_parrot said:

Interesting to see one of the biggest fans of my attendance related posts on here having a go at FCE crowds on Reddit in a manner that calls into question the future existance of one of the founding clubs:

I'm never sure what to make of FCE crowds because the camera placement makes it difficult to gauge what is happening on the near side where there are enough seats to make the crowd numbers reasonable if still well below initial stated break even target in a Cavalry sort of way, if full. Sounds like they were not unfortunately.

Hadn't been checking but apparently the league website is showing the crowd stat for games again and when I checked the 803 one for FCE mentioned below from late last week was there:

https://canpl.ca/matchcentre/bhsfarrt7arlogjorl96z4d1w/highlights

.

I'm sure I've said this before, and maybe I'm under a rock now. However if we want a promotion/relegation system, we cannot afford to move clubs to different markets. They must stay where they are at regardless of attendances.

That said, they must do a better job advertising. When I drove to York United vs Forge on the first match back, there was a billboard advertising for a York 9 game, the same one from 2 years ago. And I didn't make a typo, it said York 9 with all the old players. Kind of a joke.

[Macksam]

2 minutes ago, Ingham said:

I'm sure I've said this before, and maybe I'm under a rock now. However if we want a promotion/relegation system, we cannot afford to move clubs to different markets. They must stay where they are at regardless of attendances.

That said, they must do a better job advertising. When I drove to York United vs Forge on the first match back, there was a billboard advertising for a York 9 game, the same one from 2 years ago. And I didn't make a typo, it said York 9 with all the old players. Kind of a joke.

I saw that to....gave my head a shake as I drove past it on my way to the stadium. 

[Ozzie_the_parrot]

3780 announced for Halifax vs Blainville:

https://canpl.ca/matchcentre/dzo3wipmkebtlbewtjgvsj1g4/highlights

[Ozzie_the_parrot]

13 hours ago, Ingham said:

...However if we want a promotion/relegation system, we cannot afford to move clubs to different markets. They must stay where they are at regardless of attendances...

Think talk of individual clubs dying is premature. There has been plenty of evidence that this is more of a single entity type venture than the initial marketing spin implied. There was supposed to be a ten year commitment associated with the initial CanPL launch. I'd be very surprised if a hefty set of exit fees doesn't apply to any ownership group that tried to be the first one to leave the party well before that.

If they were going to pull the plug collectively, the pandemic gave them a face saving way out but the league is still around playing lots of weeknight games this season that they must know by now are not a recipe for box office success in most of the cities. Although it didn't fit the prevailing groupthink on here, the relatively low salary cap at launch was a good sign that the people running the league were not expecting huge instant success that the longevity of the league would be reliant upon. 

FC Edmonton in particular drawing low crowds is nothing new. It happened in the NASL era as well. Having been around for the 1987-92 CSL, it always seemed naive to me to expect that situation to be radically transformed in the context of a Canadian league that wasn't going to have most of the best Canadian players on board and wasn't going to have TSN pushing it hard on Sportscentre this time around.

Halifax has done tremendously well on paid attendance and several of the rest are where they realistically should have been aiming to be at this point (plenty of posters on here were predicting that the 2500-3500 range was what was realistic pre-launch) so if they genuinely understood that they were entering into a long term investment that could easily take a decade to start to take off things should be fine until after WC 2026.

Edited August 18, 2021 by Ozzie_the_parrot

[Ansem]

On 8/17/2021 at 1:04 PM, shermanator said:

So since my post on Reddit got dragged in here I figure I should explain. I think everyone here should be very worried about FC Edmonton right now. IMO, we are watching the club die before our eyes.

I don't think it should be a surprise that attendance is down. In other markets, we are seeing an expected drop in attendance due to the pandemic, and the 4th wave that is either inevitable, already here, or fake news depending on who you speak to. Everyone has a different risk tolerance. Speaking to Calgary, I think most are surprised with how many people are showing up; crowds in the range of 2394 - 2459 on weeknights and Sunday afternoons is a pretty good floor given what has happened in the last 18 months. The supporters scene, which was having somewhat of a snowball effect going into 2020 and saw that momentum hit a wall is now seeing that momentum pick up again. 

However, in Edmonton, I think there is more going on. The attendances we are seeing are the results of a club that was never a big draw, that is now seeing people begin to get apathetic after 10 years of a poor game day experience, a losing team on the pitch, a front office that doesn't care about supporters, a lost year, and now an owner that seems to be scaling back the spending to no more than the bare minimum. COVID is a factor too, of course. 

Remember that when FC Edmonton relaunched in 2018, Tom Fath proclaimed that the rivalry between Cavalry and Edmonton would help them draw well. Yet, I have Edmonton supporters sending me videos of a dead silent RVV during Sunday's game. When it was 0-0. People in Edmonton's supporters scene are moving into the apathetic stage, and these are supposed to be the hardcores.

Perhaps with their new President, they can reverse this trend going into the 2022. Given the track record of past GM's with this club, I wouldn't expect much.

I think FC Edmonton's ambitions and those of the league might not be aligned or if they were at the beginning, they no longer are.

We went from allowing Clarke Stadium and York Lions to give a "conditional" expansion to Saskatoon IF they build the SSS while the league has been somewhat clear of their unhappiness with Starlight Stadium and the hydro pole - hence plans for a revamp facility in Victoria.

I don't think the market of Edmonton has something wrong with it, I blame the club/owners who seems "content" with operating at the bare minimum

 

Edited August 18, 2021 by Ansem

[ted]

22 hours ago, Aird25 said:

The plethora of week night games is baffling to though. We knew those wouldn't draw well in Langford

The absurd scheduling that saw Pacific play nearly 30% of their 2021 home games in 8 days certainly does not help. I tend to lump that into the "marketing" category in my head but it is worth noting. But on the topic of weeknights vs weekends, I have noticed that drawing crowds to afternoon games on the weekends is also difficult and I have been complaining about it since the 90's going back to Victoria United. The largest and most profitable target demographic for spectator sports remains men age 18-35. During the day, in the summertime, this demographic wants to be on the water or trail or road. The best time to schedule matches is, IMO, 5:00 or 6:00. Late enough to allow for daytime activities, early enough to be the start of an evening out, and the perfect time to sell them lots of profitable food and drink.

Sorry to go off a bit but the lack of understanding at the league and club level of these points continues to drive me nuts.

[masster]

^^ Totally agree with the above. I would always complain to the Whitecaps about Saturday afternoon kickoffs. I felt like the match would take up my whole day. I always loved Friday evening games. It felt like the perfect kick off to the weekend.

[BearcatSA]

1 hour ago, ted said:

 The largest and most profitable target demographic for spectator sports remains men age 18-35. During the day, in the summertime, this demographic wants to be on the water or trail or road. The best time to schedule matches is, IMO, 5:00 or 6:00. Late enough to allow for daytime activities, early enough to be the start of an evening out, and the perfect time to sell them lots of profitable food and drink.

I obviously don't know the Victoria demographic like you and others do but I honestly don't see enough people truncating their afternoon outdoor activities to be there for a 5 PM regular season start on the weekends.  I guess it's just the nature of having so many options in such a beautiful area of Canada.  Maybe better to stay a 7:30 start on a Friday/Saturday?  

 

[Bison44]

Proper scheduling is another pandemic casualty.  They needed to squeeze in a decent season in a short time frame, at the last minute.  Player movement was hampered, marketing, advertising was set back, almost back to square one.  i think we are all just happy the league is going again, butts are getting back into seats, people are buying and wearing their jerseys proudly and we'll have more solid ground to build on when it comes time to do all the organizing for the next season.  

[SpursFlu]

I've actually been pleasantly surprised with the CPL attendance. Its not just one thing its a multitude of things that makes maintaining or increasing attendance of a sporting event difficult right now. Remember the key is to make the experience as enjoyable and accessible to as many people as possible. We are nowhere near an ideal situation at the moment

Edited August 18, 2021 by SpursFlu

[Aird25]

I suppose I can understand condensed scheduling, and saving money by lumping home games together to reduce travel. It sucks and I'm sure it hurts attendance, but I can understand why it's done. But why on earth have we never had a Saturday evening kickoff? Not one. Does the stadium sit empty, or do youth sports have a lock on those times?

[Stanley]

20 hours ago, masster said:

^^ Totally agree with the above. I would always complain to the Whitecaps about Saturday afternoon kickoffs. I felt like the match would take up my whole day. I always loved Friday evening games. It felt like the perfect kick off to the weekend.

Friday evening games were great, as were the Saturday evening games.  I hated when they moved the games to 4pm on Saturdays.  Also the USL days on certain weekends having Friday night games followed by another home game on the Sunday really sucked.