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Notes from Dave Howard’s call to WFAN

Megathanks to Ceetar from Optimistic Mets Fan for covering me today on Dave Howard’s call with Francesa.

I have not heard the call myself but Ceetar has awesome street cred with me.

As with all things Mets Police I leave it to you decide if you find the site reliable. Please visit Ceetar’s site as a Thank You

There is so much going on that it’s hard to keep up. I have at least two amazing things I haven’t shared yet, and I haven’t commented on today’s press release yet.

Plenty to come but in the meantime here is what Ceetar jotted down.

…

Large, 14% decrease in average ticket price.

Season Ticket holders, Plan holders, group sales, 10% off.

Believe customers will enjoy the perks.

change relationship, treat them in an extradordinary manner. Believe it’s among the best in professional sports in treating customers as if they are corporate sponsors.

increases: did market research, looked at data. secondary market data, talked to fans, etc..
large segment selling above face in secondary market. was surprising. Promenade level $12-$25 seats were selling for more, sometimes substantially more. Season ticket/plan will still be less for these seats, factoring in 10%

Embracing the reality of the secondary market, and helping season ticket holdesr interface with stubhub. (“sell” back to the Mets, reprint for stubhub buyer)

“Entire Season Ticket fanbase collapsing” not true. But disappointing. 94% full in 2009, to 2.6million in 2010.

36-38% reductions. club levels, field levels. 16% reduction average on field , 20% reduction average on excelsior.

the “dump to stubhub accusition”. Howard: “We don’t do that. wouldn’t do that.”

They know that “Price and quality” are the biggest things they need to address to woo back the expired season ticket holders. Sandy Alderson will address the quality part, and they’re confident it will approve.

pricing tiers: “season ticket holders like it” they share sometimes, among fans. And that helps with people in choosing games from the same set of season tickets. Peak versus offpeak. Summer and Weekends versus cold months and weekdays. Helps make some tickets available at a very affordable rate. 30 value dates versus 10. Helps season ticket holders on secondary market (the crap games they want to resell are more affordable, I guess)

Plans: Most plans/packs will have a Yankee or Opener. They are very important. It’s a lot of accounts and fans. See more individual fans versus corporations in season ticket seats. Talking about what to do to add benefits and perks to plans. 10% is included.

Expecting some to trade up on plans to more expensive or more seats because of discounts and reductions.

learned from season ticket holders: “in a nutshell “love the ballpark, love ameneities, comfort, food…but #1, just win.”

undiscussed: “Marked up all the sections/rows. but not obstructions”
“plans, will there be weekend/peak plans?”
“didn’t discuss the payment plans (which is new if I recall)”

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Mets (actually) announce 2011 ticket prices

Analysis coming in a few…

METS REDUCE TICKET PRICES FOR 2011

Full Range of Adjustments Includes Average Price Decrease of 14% from 2010

Season Ticket Holders to Receive 10% Discount Off of Lower 2011 Prices,

Increased Exclusive Benefits and Services, Unique Experiences

FLUSHING, N.Y., November 3, 2010 – The New York Mets today announced a restructured ticket pricing program for 2011 that includes a reduction of ticket prices by an average of more than 14% from last season.  In addition, season ticket, ticket plan and group ticket customers receive an additional 10% discount.

Within the 14%-plus average price decrease, the Mets have made a full range of market-based adjustments to Citi Field’s 41,800 seats:

  • Ticket prices for 62% of the ballpark have been reduced
  • More than half of all seats have double-digit price reductions
  • 18% of the seats have been cut by 20% or more
  • 8% of seats have price decreases of 30% or more
  • Several seat categories have modest increases that average approximately 5%

Season Ticket Holders will begin receiving their invoices – which reflect their additional 10% discounts – by next week.
Season Ticket Holders also will have access to once-in-a-lifetime opportunities through the new “Amazin’ Mets Perks” (AMP) program of unique benefits and experiences.  Season Ticket Holders who pay in full by December 15 will automatically be eligible for the “30-Day Amazin’ Mets Perks” Daily Awards.  Hundreds of winners will be chosen overall, with awards starting on November 21 and continuing daily to December 20.

The Mets have revised their variable pricing plan to four tiers named as followed: Marquee (four games), Premium (22), Classic (25) and Value (30).

The Mets have increased the number of tickets that cost $15 or less by 45% to 384,000 from 264,206 last season.  Almost 2 million tickets, or 61% of total capacity, cost $50 or less, up from 54% in 2010.  Single game tickets start at $12.

“The Mets are committed to providing quality and value to our fans,” said Dave Howard, Executive Vice President, Business Operations.  “We reduced ticket prices for 2011 based on fan feedback and marketplace information.  We introduced Season Ticket Holder discounts and the ‘Amazin’ Mets Perks’ program as a way to thank and reward them for their loyalty and commitment.”

The complete list of Mets ticket prices, Season Ticket Holder benefits, and the 2011 Mets schedule is posted online at Mets.com and attached.

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So how much will my 2011 Mets tickets cost?

I gotta tell ya, I am so so so confused by the leaked 2011 Mets ticket prices.

Why do I need to be a calculus major to understand how much baseball tickets cost?  Whatever happened to four decks four prices?  Jeez Louise…

On the one hand Dan says

I am actually impressed with the new pricing.  Overall I think they did a good job
in 2010 they had 41 different seat categories, 2011 they will have 34
Of the 34 categories, average prices dropped in 27 seat categories

and says Peter’s chart was wrong and proposed his own chart (click it to make it giant)

I’m not smart enough to understand all the numbers, but in the column on the right Dan has it worked out that there are lots of price cuts.

In the comments Doug posted:

Some of us worked the math and posted the results over at baseball fever, in the citi field thread. Data is presented for most areas of seating.

In a nutshell (and this was all yanked back before being made ‘official’)…

1. 10% discount for Full Season buys. No word on 15 or 40 game plan discounts.
2. BIG decreases in most lower bowl seating (100 and 300 level). Elimination of Row 1&2 *surcharges* in the Pepsi Porch, LF Landing, the Caesars Level, AND Promenade Club. Some Caesar Level seating has been renamed. If you paid for Row 1 or 2 last year, you are getting a BIG discount.
3. 500 level seating has gone up in price. However, the 10 percent discount means that Full Seasons in 500 level seating will go down. Not sure how this will play out for 15 game plan holders.
4. The only losers are those with LF / RF Reserved Gold (Row 1 & 2) seating. They actually see an increase.

The biggest drop? Caesar Bronze (now Silver) dropped 43% for Full Season Tickets. Field Box Silver not far behind.

What we still don’t know:

1. Will discounts be offered to 15 and 40 gamers.
2. Will they restructure 15 game plans? This is big since Opening Day is on a Friday, and that SHOULD be in either the Fri+ or Weekend Plan. With no OD, what’s the reason to buy the Weekday Plan?
3. Will they open up low Prom Res Inf seating to 15 game plans?

Cheers!
-Doug

Dave says: “There are 92 possible single game prices, none of which are affordable for the typical working stiff with kids.”  Wait, is it 92 because Dan said it was 70, Corey had some other figures and WE CAN’T EVEN ALL AGREE ON HOW MANY DIFFERENT TICKET PRICES THERE ARE?

Is it me?  Isn’t that CRAZY?

Dave Howard  – simple question.  I want to go to a Mets game (with you).  How much will it cost?  My head’s gonna explode.

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The Backman skeletons?

Last night, I finally got a chance to check out the Adam Rubin chat from yesterday and with so much going on last night with tickets and Ricciardi I figured this could wait.

When asked about Backman, Adam wrote:

If I can say it cryptically, I just think the Mets know things that are not circulated and don’t feel comfortable.

Now what does THAT mean?   I’m not going to speculate but it sounds ominous.   I wonder what it means?   That’s a bomb I don’t think Adam would throw lightly.

Apparently there are sometimes things that the NYC media knows.

Back in the 90’s, a friend of mine told me  a story that Giuliani was having an affair…this when Rudy was married to Donna Hanover and the peak of Giuliani mania (pre 9/11 and pre-jaywalking-blitz)….and that all the NYC media knew it but didn’t publish it because they needed to deal with City Hall.

I don’t know if Rudy was having an affair or not when I was told that story, but if I am recalling the details of his transition from Donna to Judi it seems plausible.

Maybe the mainstream just chooses to stay away from something that is really nobody’s business….like who cares what Rudy was doing…but whatever the Wally info is it’s enough to scare off Fred?

Who knows.  Sure is interesting.

MetsBlog has more on the Backman story this morning.

Yet through all this, Backman still will get an interview.   I imagine they have to, so they can decide to rule him out, and that way fans like me can’t complain that they didn’t give Wally a chance.

In happier news, Adam also said:

I believe Lee Mazzilli is under consideration. And he certainly has a strong relationship with Fred Wilpon.

Lee if you get this job you gotta hook me up with tickets for the opener.

Nobody keeps your name out there more than I do.

…

As part of the Honor Among Bloggers program, I want to mention that I originally heard about this via Mets Blog. if we all link and are honest about where we read things the world will be a better place.  Likewise thanks to MB and Rubin for their links to the tickets story.