A rainbow famously and fortuitously arced over Rogers Arena before the Vancouver Canucks eliminated the defending Stanley Cup champion Chicago Blackhawks from the first round.
While the boys in blue, white and green aim for the club’s third berth in the finals in its 40-year history, not all the gold in owner Francesco Aquilini’s pot will remain in Vancouver.
Victor de Bonis, Canucks Sports and Entertainment (CSE) chief operating officer, through spokeswoman Stephanie Maniago, refused a Business in Vancouver interview request. But a Philadelphia Inquirer story from last June indicated the National Hockey League takes a bigger cut of revenue from teams that successfully prolong their seasons.
“After travel expenses, revenue sharing and other expenses, it’s good money, but it’s not the bonanza that people think,” said Peter Luukko, president of the Philadelphia Flyers’ parent Comcast Spectacor.
According to the Inquirer, each Flyers’ game at the 19,537-seat Wachovia Center during the 2010 finals grossed more than $3 million. The Flyers stood to net $5 million from overall playoff ticket sales and $2 million from food and beverage. The arena doubled its nightly food, beverage and merchandise sales to $700,000 in the playoffs, but kept only 20% to 25%.
The Flyers players shared $1.125 million, while the Blackhawks divvied up $1.875 million from the overall $6.5 million playoff prize pool. The league took an unspecified amount from its playoff payoff and pumped it into the revenue-sharing fund. It’s believed most went to owners of the suffering Sunbelt franchises.
Rogers Arena boasts a capacity of 18,810, including 88 luxury suites that hold 1,784 fans. The club has claimed sellouts since November 14, 2002, though a City of Vancouver-contracted Olympic transportation study found the rink slightly under capacity when 18,325 attended a March 15, 2007, game against St. Louis. Lower-bowl tickets that cost $250 each in the first round are $325 in the Western conference final and will cost $505 if the Canucks are in the finals. Before the third-round series, CSE was offering a 34-seat hospitality suite for $14,000 per game. That doesn’t include Molson Canadian ($39 per six-pack), Boston Pizza ($30 for a Hawaiian pie) or Haagen-Dazs ice-cream bars ($6 each) from monopoly caterer Aramark.
Today’s playoff success should pay dividends next fall with renewals for ticket and sponsorship packages at likely higher prices and the franchise’s US$262 million valuation, according to Forbes, would increase.
Salary cap restrictions caused the Blackhawks to shed several stars last summer while simultaneously raising the championship banner and ticket prices an average 18.4%.
The 340-location, Richmond-based Boston Pizza chain has three kiosks in Rogers Arena, where it’s treating contest winners to luxury suite tickets each game, plus transportation to and from the rink “in a limo,” as the radio ad says. The company is featuring wings to protect its turf as American competitor Buffalo Wild Wings Grill and Bar sets its sights on the Canadian market.
Boston Pizza marketing director Brad Bissonnette said traffic and revenue at B.C. locations on Canucks’ game nights is up 40% to 60%.
“We want to see the Canucks lift the Cup at the end of the playoffs,” Bissonnette said. “Of course the further a series goes on the more beneficial to the industry.”
DSA Media president David Stanger said the only ones happier than Canucks fans this May are CBC executives because a Canadian team guarantees high ratings. Hockey Night in Canada has a chance this round to meet or beat the top-rated 3.82 million audience for Vancouver’s thrilling first-round overtime upset of Chicago.
“As each round goes by in hockey and there’s a Canadian team hanging in there, they breathe a collective sigh that says, ‘We’re going to generate the kind of audiences we were hoping for and we won’t have to be giving [advertisers] compensation,” Stanger said.
Non-rights holders like Global TV are also capitalizing. According to Stanger, the Burnaby station’s Stanley Show with sports director Squire Barnes is a genius move.
The biggest off-ice winners, however, are the Green Men. Ryan “Sully” Sullivan and Adam “Force” Forsythe have reached unofficial mascot status for pestering penalty box visitors while clad in one-piece spandex suits.
They provided sports TV and radio talk shows across North America a welcome diversion from Vancouver’s lacklustre series against the Nashville Predators. Stanger said they could offer another avenue for sponsors to gain attention.
“As long as the Canucks are in the playoffs you’re going to see more and more hype around the Green Men and their antics,” Stanger said, “and that will spill out onto the street and street -level activity.”