This issue goes back more than 50 years. In the 1960’s teams were having increasing difficulty selling game programs. What once was a 50 cent item had increased to $5 at a time when most schools ticket prices were less than $15. In an effort to increase program sales some schools elected to take player’s names off the jerseys. It was such a blatant money grab the fans reacted and the media made it an issue and soon most schools had returned names to the jerseys.
When you are in the entertainment business you should make every effort to do a good job with those things you can control. You can’t determine wins or losses or the quality of team performance. What you can control is the quality of the gameday experience. It is really counter productive to give potential new fans reasons not to embrace your product. Everything from parking to usher and vendor’s friendliness, quality of the concessions, cleanliness of the stadium and especially the restrooms, game presentation including traffic control, parking, pregame, halftime show, Band, PA, Video Boards, music, field appearance, player uniforms, game programs and things relating enhancing the fan experience like making players identifiable are important. Customer service is paramount and clearly identifiable players is pretty high on the list for most fans. As an outsider who frequents this forum it sure seems to me it is an issue for some folks on this forum and you are among the most faithful fans. If it pisses of your best fans and you have lots of seats to sell to those not so faithful, why make it an issue. Out the names back in the jerseys. Listen to your customers.
Now I spent thirty years in the business as a game management, Public Relations and Marketing executive at the professional level in the NBA, MLB and the NFL. I was part of setting records everywhere I went in season ticket sales and single game and season attendance records. I was paid a lot of money for what I did. I would not know Fred Glass if I bumped into him, but if I was introduced to him I could talk for hours about the importance of quality control in every aspect of a sports organization’s on the and off the field operations. It’s often said “If you take care of doing the small things right the big things will take care of themselves.” I can tell you one thing. What has happened at Purdue since Mike Bobinski arrived is textbook
“How To Do” sports entertainment management and operations. Whether Brohm won right away or not, it was obvious from the first event under new management that things were different. The winning certainly is welcome, but with a new customer oriented philosophy in effect the fact they won and the fans were treated so much better than previously helped insure people came back again and people who had left the fold returned and liked the way they were treated. Thirteen home games in two seasons with an attendance increase of 16,000 per game is 208,000 people buying parking, tickets, concessions and novelties. It should be noted that the numbers from previous attendance included huge amounts of “No Shows” so the actual in stadium increase is much greater than 16,000 per game. Good luck.
