Yankees Plan To Raise Premium Ticket Prices In 2010. Really.
Baseball attendance is down across the board so far this season. MLB expected this. Reporters have made an example out of Yankee Stadium and Citi Field, as both new stadiums saw some embarrassingly empty seats behind home plate for their openers. In part, the economy is to blame for this. But Yankee Stadium’s premium ticket prices are also ridiculously high. So high, that TARPies are worried they’ll be seen in them, and the general public will know the money they received from the government is being used for insanely expensive seats.
But, since premium seat prices were raised 76 percent from the old Yankee Stadium, it’s not so bad for the Yankees’ bottom line. And it doesn’t look like they’ll be dropping prices, at least not now.
And next year? They’ll be raising them. Yeesh. The New York Times reports premium ticket prices will increase four percent next season.
Are they insane? Josh Alper at NBC New York tend to think that way:
On another level, though, that plan turns your stomach. The team’s owner has admitted some of the tickets are overpriced, which is a pretty clear sign that they’re overpriced, but Levine sees no reason to turn back. Either Levine knows something we don’t about where the economy is headed in the next few months, or he’s insane.
Here’s a vote for insane. The Yankees’ attendance at their second home game in 2008 was 48,544, which meant nearly 85 percent of the seats were filled. This year, the Yankees got 45,101 people through the turnstiles on day two, or 78.5 percent capacity. In 2008, the Yankees gained attendance from the first to the second home game, aided by a rainout, but this year they lost more than 3,000 fans.
Maybe by next year 3-D television will be commonplace in our homes and provide a better viewing experience than being at the game. If I’m a Yankees fan, I’d be pulling for that.
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