Brandon not alone in his price gouging

Submitted by Yo_Blue on

It appears that ridiculous ticket price increases and seat licenses are NOT the brainchild of Dave Brandon (as much as we would like to believe).  There is a story on Eleven Warriors about the history and rise in ticket and PSD costs through the years.

While Ramzy gets some of his facts wrong on how PSDs and ticket prices are "subsidized" by the government, he does make a few good points.  It is interesting to note that the 2014 game between Michigan and Ohio will run $150 each. This is up from $70 two years ago.

Interesting read.  I didn't find a single bad word about Gene Smith.  He apparently can gouge the Buckeye fans at will while collecting his bonuses for National Championships from a wrestler has probably never met.

LINK

SysMark

April 24th, 2014 at 8:46 AM ^

It was in the NFL for years before Brandon got to it so obviously not an original idea.  Question for him is how far can he push it and still sell 100K+ for every game.  He may have overshot.

andrewG

April 24th, 2014 at 8:52 AM ^

Uhh, did people really think this was isolated to only UofM/Brandon to start with? The vitriol for Brandon around here isn't because he's a pioneer in being an evil AD. It's due to him following the trends of commercialization of many other ADs.

Tater

April 24th, 2014 at 2:23 PM ^

You are correct.  Brandin' is "following the trends of commercialization of many other AD's."  

If you want to see the University of Michigan football program turned from "leaders and best" into followers and mediocre, you certainly have the right to your opinion.  

I don't mind seeing Brandin' produce enough revenue to reinvest into the programs, but he has gone too far.  He has removed all pretense of loyalty or providing an optimum experience for his customers in favor of worshipping the gods of supply and demand.  His strategy is to continually erode customer experience and satisfaction while charging as much money as he can get people to pay for it.  

As long as the revenue continues to come in, Brandin' has no reason to change what he is doing.  But if he hasn't done it already, he is in danger of turning the University of Michigan into "Just Another Program."

Worst AD Ever.

 

TheDirtyD

April 24th, 2014 at 8:57 AM ^

Let's be honest if we were winning all the time and going undefeated this would be a minor issue. The fact Brandon is raising prices for an inferor product doesn't make sense. 

GoWings2008

April 24th, 2014 at 8:58 AM ^

and I must hand it to you for venturing over to 11W to find it.  I rarely go over there without a specific reason to do so.  But my favorite comment suggests that notion that we all know to be true that we'uns have a common enemy:  "All this accounting has the SEC troll's heads spinning."

UM2k1

April 24th, 2014 at 9:40 AM ^

PSDs were around before Branding became AD. Sailboat McGee was at the helm when they were instituted, and season ticket prices have only gone up slightly in the last 4 years. I am by no means a huge fan of some of the decisions DB has made, but attempting to place blame on him for "gouging" season ticket holders is blatantly wrong.

taistreetsmyhero

April 24th, 2014 at 9:48 AM ^

and just one man's opinion in that article, but I think it goes to show that the biggest reason Michigan fans are enraged by the price inflation is because we haven't been very good. If we consistently put out a good team, I think more people would look at the raising prices as a necessary cost of winning.

WolvinLA2

April 24th, 2014 at 12:04 PM ^

This is exactly right.  Michigan has been losing, and the fans are upset about it.  Because no one wants to say "Fuck the players" we find everyone else we can blame.  Some people blame Hoke, some blame(d) Borges, some blame Brandon, and some blame everyone.  

Brandon gets the brunt of it for a number of reasons, but mostly because he's the easiest target.  I'm not saying he doesn't deserve criticism for a handful of things, but like you said, if we had won those close games last year instead of lost them, this conversation probably doesn't exist.

Seth

April 24th, 2014 at 9:54 AM ^

A little rough on Ramzy, there. He's the closest thing there is to a "Brian Cook of [Name of Team]" on the interwebs. I've seen him rip on Smith before, especially for his handling of Tressellgate.

LSAClassOf2000

April 24th, 2014 at 9:55 AM ^

I don't know if it has been done, but it would be interesting to see a study of college football or basketball ticket prices versus general inflation over the last, say, 20 years or so. I would have to think it would be even higher than the 20%-30% above inflation that I believe tuition alone has risen in a similar timespan. I know they did a similar study with EPL ticket prices in Britain and prices were rising at nearly 200% above inflation at one point. I wonder if some teams in college football could top that. 

mGrowOld

April 24th, 2014 at 10:33 AM ^

The biggest difference between the PSL I paid for my Browns tickets and the PSL I paid for my Michigan tickets is simple - frequency of payment.  With the Browns I paid once (or rather my late father-in-law) paid once and it's done.  End of revenue stream.  He paid once and then "owned" the right to buy those tickets as long as he so desired.

With Michigan you have to pay the PSL each and every year.  That's silly - buying the right to buy tickets annually is simply baking in an addtional cost to the season ticket holder and prices the seats far higher than one can get for most games on the secondary market

funkywolve

April 24th, 2014 at 4:41 PM ^

Sure face value may say X dollars depending on the game, but when you factor in the cost of the PSL, it's X+PSL for every game.  Since ticket price varies per game and cost of the PSL varies too, it's hard to say what the average price is anymore but I'm guessing anyone who buys season tickets is probably shelling out a minimum of $100/ticket/game.

Perkis-Size Me

April 24th, 2014 at 12:26 PM ^

You didn't find a bad word about Gene Smith because his football team wins. The likes of Bama and OSU can charge outlandish prices to games if they want because their teams are winning.



No one wants to pay a ridiculously high price to watch a mediocre product, like what DB is trying to get away with.

samsoccer7

April 24th, 2014 at 1:25 PM ^

Not to mention a garbage schedule. Osu has been doing home and home with Texas and usc. That's fucking badass. And that was before strength of schedule was an issue. The build up to Alabama was nice but I'd rather do a home and home and get to visit some of these other places for a labor day weekend game. I can only dream.

Mgodiscgolfer

April 24th, 2014 at 12:48 PM ^

at the shoe and scalped two tickets for $75.00 from a Ohio fan, while I was decked out head to toe in UM gear. That was supposed to be outrageous prices then in '96 or '94, I can't remember which year it was but the other one of those years we scalped our tickets from UM fans at the shoe and payed face value at $19.00 or $20.00. We won both games so they would have been worth it had we payed $75.00 at both games.

The drive home from Columbus is so damn fun after wins. Luckily we were never pulled over by Michigan or Ohio state police. We went to "The Game" home and away for ten years back then during the Cooper years. That was some of the most fun I ever had in my life. 

Blue in Yarmouth

April 24th, 2014 at 1:18 PM ^

This is more an instance of the straw that broke the camels back. I get so sick of people trying to justify things by saying things like "this school is doing the same thing". In a previous thread people were trying to justify 9-3 and 8-4 seasons by saying that should be expected in todays CFB enviornment and look at the other teams that average those records etc. etc. etc. Enough already.

If all we want to be is just like everybody else, then fine, I guess we just have different expectations. Personally though, I feel the way my Father must have felt when he used to say "I don't give a shit what Morgan did, you're not Morgan, you're better than that and settling for that level of achievement just isn't acceptable." 

We aren't OSU, we aren't MSu, we aren't anyone else so please can we stop trying to excuse our recent ineptitude by saying at other places similar things happen. We aren't other places, we're Michigan and as much as BH has diminished that by shoutiing it from the roof tops while our achievments have been dwindling, it still means something at its core. 

Again, sorry OP as this wasn't really directed at you as you're talking ticket prices, but the mentality of "look, we're not alone, other people are doing it too" to justify things is what set me off. 

/Rant

M go Bru

April 25th, 2014 at 6:02 AM ^

The seat license gouge was first installed at OSU and Penn State. We followed suit to upgrade facilities. I could justify the cost of tickets to support UM versus paying the price of local professional sports teams and lining the pockets of their owners.

UM's Track and Field building is a dump. Eastern has a much better facility than us. My sons run HS Track so I have seen both facilities during their events. I don't see spending any money on some stupid $40M rowing facility.

Brandon has also increased the size of the staff for the Athletic department by some 60%.

I'm sick that the football fans are being fleeced at the expense of all the non revenue sports. I don't care about the stupid all-around athletic trophy. Stanford has their entire athletic department endowed and will win it perpetually. I don't care about a soccer or lacrosse team.

I still can't believe that Brandon allowed UM to get screwed by the Big Ten by letting MSU getting two home games in a row and screwing the balance of our home schedule with MSU and OSU home games in the same year. Did anyone else get screwed like we did?

I am normally out of town visiting my parents over easter so I have not attended a spring game in a few years. I went this year and I was appalled by the piped in music even for that. Why do they do this? Who likes it? If you want to amplify or pipe in the band music to increase the experience ok. I want more Hawaian War Chant and Temptation!