There are no expansion plans that involve closing the skyline gap.
The first 10,000 expansion will involve making the third deck along the visitor’s sideline much larger and adding suites to the press level.
The second expansion calls for more seats in the student endzone that would essentially bowl that side of the stadium.
However, the first thing we will spend money on is the football auxiliary building in the video board end zone (assuming the indoor facility is as close to being a done deal as is rumored).
I think you can count on us negotiating an early exit, probably leaving before the 2018 season.
I say this assuming that Big XII will issue invitation before the end of this season and we buy out a year of the 27 month obligation. .
It’s the same concept as the restaurant business. Don’t overbuild the dining area so the tables are always full. If you overbuild, there’s always tables available and the restaurant doesn’t appear as popular. Human nature is to always gravitate to whatever is popular.
Houston has too many entertainment alternatives to put the prices too high. This is not Lubbock Texas, where the only thing to do on a Saturday night is watch football.
I think we should expand and pepper the city with big 12 logos. Casual fans will gravitate to UH vs TT/UT/TCU/Baylor games because of local fan interest and just the buzz that comes with good rivals.
Right now with the likes of Tulane, Tulsa, and UCONN on the home docket, we are selling record numbers, just because of how good WE are. Imagine what will happen when fans go to a game to watch 2 interesting teams! (8-1 ranked Memphis brings LESS excitement then 5-4 Tech/UT IMO)
I think we easily sell 30K season tickets if you have 2 of the 4 Texas schools, and 1 of the Oklahoma schools on the schedule every year. Let’s say we the end the year at 25K season tickets. I think the big 12, at minimum, equals 10K more season tickets sold.
I think we should go to 50K, with the normal season ticket price never exceeding 50 bucks per game for the upper deck type seats, then see how attendance is from there. Right now I think the cost of the cheapest ticket has a lot of room to grow (124/7=18 per game=CHEAP). Anything over 50 and you are losing out on casual fans who would go see your games, but decided it was too pricey and spent there dollars somewhere else.
I don’t agree with the idea that you want every game to feel sold out. When you look at UCLA’s attendance, vs the premier opponents they sell 80K+!! But vs Wash St. “only” 50K show up. That is a huge difference in one season, and it’s because big cities have a lot of band wagon fans. Should we exclude the potential 10K fans that cherry pick games instead of buying a season ticket package? NO, that’s just the reality. We are a big city school and should use it to our advantage. I don’t care if some of our games look half empty. If we are 11-1 in the Big 12, and we have to turn people away at the door and say, “Sorry you should have bought season tickets”, then we are losing out on revenue.
