Has the Pandemic Ruined Traveling to Sports Games?
The Coronavirus pandemic has been a tough thing for everybody to go through, both in regular life and business in the world of sports. In 2020, we had restrictions on who and how many people could attend a live sporting event in person, and luckily those days seem to be behind us as we have very few restrictions around the United States. However, a question needs to be answered: has the pandemic ruined traveling to sports games?
NFL Week 2 odds are coming up faster than you think, and there is definitely some money to be made so you can travel the country and see some games in person.
Table of contents
Attendance Faltering Off?
There are definitely a lot of factors surrounding attendance as money, time, and willingness to travel all play a role if you are going to go see your favorite team play in person or on television.
Looking at MLB attendance figures from 2022 through June 2022, the numbers show a slight decrease in attendance.
One example is the New York Yankees, a team with a chance to break the MLB wins record in a season. In 2019, they averaged 41,827 fans per home game, while so far, through 40 home games, they are averaging 37,480 (4,347 fan difference per home game).
Okay, but that’s just baseball, you may be saying, but that is also incorrect. Let’s use basketball’s attendance figures to determine this as well as using a lesser market than New York.
The Indiana Pacers are a decent team with a loyal fanbase, but their attendance numbers have decreased since before the pandemic. In the 2018-2019 season, they averaged 16,812 fans per home game, while during the 2021-2022 regular season, they averaged 14,359 fans per game (2,453 fans per game difference).
What Could Be Causing This?
There are probably many things that can cause a lesser attendance to games, as traveling to sports games and being there in person could just be a little too expensive. After a worldwide pandemic and a potential recession, there is less discretionary income available, and the price of tickets, parking, food, and souvenirs have skyrocketed over the years.
Another big issue could easily be the ability to have a better view at home for a lot cheaper. There are a lot of things that could be causing this, but there are ways to make more fans travel to see their favorite players and teams face off live.
What Can Sports Teams & Leagues Do?
People love giveaways and promotions to draw them to the stadium. For example, I am a sucker for bobbleheads at baseball games, so I try to go whenever they give one away. However, there is an issue as they can’t do that for every single game.
One major fix they can do is simply lower the cost of attending a game. There are many ways the sports teams make money (one major factor being television deals, which are why the games are broadcasted in incredible fashion), but lowering the cost for a family to go to a game would help. Making buy one get one ticket deals could help.
Another thing is to make affordable season tickets. A lot of die-hard fans do not realize there are extremely cheap season ticket plans that they can do that would get them extra benefits and probably cheaper than it would be costing them already.
The Tampa Bay Lightning are one team that gives season ticket holders a special discount on team merchandise. For example, let there be special perks for attending more games. In a digital world, we can track this kind of thing and give free tickets for every so many games you attend as a reward.
There are ways to increase travel and attendance at games in a post-COVID world. All it takes is some fun and creative ideas to get people to come out.
Remember, never travel without travel insurance! And never overpay for travel insurance!
I use HeyMondo. You get INSTANT quotes. Super cheap, they actually pay out, AND they cover almost everywhere, where most insurance companies don't (even places like Central African Republic etc!). You can sign-up here. PS You even get 5% off if you use MY LINK! You can even sign up if you're already overseas and traveling, pretty cool.
Also, if you want to start a blog...I CAN HELP YOU!
Also, if you want to start a blog, and start to change your life, I'd love to help you! Email me on johnny@onestep4ward.com. In the meantime, check out my super easy blog post on how to start a travel blog in under 30 minutes, here! And if you just want to get cracking, use BlueHost at a discount, through me.
Also, (if you're like me, and awful with tech-stuff) email me and my team can get a blog up and running for you, designed and everything, for $699 - email johnny@onestep4ward.com to get started.
Do you work remotely? Are you a digital nomad/blogger etc? You need to be insured too.
I use SafetyWing for my digital nomad insurance. It covers me while I live overseas. It's just $10 a week, and it's amazing! No upfront fees, you just pay week by week, and you can sign up just for a week if you want, then switch it off and on whenever. You can read my review here, and you can sign-up here!
As you know, blogging changed my life. I left Ireland broke, with no plan, with just a one-way ticket to Thailand and no money. Since then, I started a blog, then a digital media company, I’ve made more than $1,500,000 USD, bought 4 properties and visited (almost) every country in the world. And I did it all from my laptop as I travel the world and live my dream.
