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Post ID	Date & Time	Game Date	Function
#49365	05/20/2017 7:12:06 am		Ignore
Seca Joined: 05/05/2014 Posts: 5202 Waterloo Dinosaurs Legends	Salinas, who finished 2nd in your new division last season, won 90 games and averaged over 28k. Casper was 4th, won 66 games, and averaged a little under 22k. 25k may be ok. Depends on your expectations. I think it's better to be a little overbuilt than underbuilt. PS - nice thread. Gives everyone a poke to think about their seating. Going to check my attendance from last season.
#49367	05/20/2017 7:32:40 am		Ignore
dsz071 Joined: 09/12/2015 Posts: 334 Inactive	Before last season I downsized by stadium to 22,000. I averaged over 21,500 for the season. So when I promoted this year I went and looked at ballparks from 30-40 other teams in similar situations as myself. In the end I decided to bump it up to 28,000. We'll see what happens.
#49368	05/20/2017 7:38:07 am		Ignore
Seca Joined: 05/05/2014 Posts: 5202 Waterloo Dinosaurs Legends	Lower division teams may actually look at their cup group. I don't think it takes too many dates to cover some extra seats. Can be worth a little higher capacity to accommodate cup blips.
#49380	05/20/2017 9:43:39 am		Ignore
Yankee1219 Joined: 12/03/2016 Posts: 113 West Allis Devil Dogs IV.2	Thanks for the info. I had my stadium set at 24,000 last year in LLVI and averaged 21,000 during league play but at capacity for Cup. Maybe I'll bump to 27,000 and see what happens. I'd be curious to see feedback from multiple teams in the various levels as to their attendance averages.
#73014	04/21/2020 3:51:54 pm	Apr 22nd, 2045	Ignore
Ken_Kennilworth Joined: 11/26/2019 Posts: 400 Charleston Hawks II.1	@Seca's post above: "Lower division teams may actually look at their cup group. I don't think it takes too many dates to cover some extra seats. Can be worth a little higher capacity to accommodate cup blips. Actually, I've better pondering this very point recently. Per my calculations, it takes 13.3 league home date sellouts to recover the cost of adding a seat. Here's how I figured this: adding 1000 seats will add to annual team expense by $200,000 (1000 seats times $20 per seat per update times 10 updates per year). Each additional seat sold brings in another $15 in revenue. So, how many times must the added 1000 seats be sold to recover the added expense? answer 200,000 / (15 times 1000) or 13.3 times. So, is that number useful in setting seating capacity. I think so. My initial reaction is that one should target 13.3 sellouts per season. Thus every seat available will have its season's cost covered, and the number of times a seat is sold in excess of 13.3 times will result in added revenue available for other expenses and profit. As mentioned in another post above, looking at attendance in previous seasons for one's team, and that of other teams in one's league, will give one some idea what stadium size may result in 13.3 sellouts. Why I got interested in the above is because of my own experience—it wasn't anything rocket science related. Season before last, as a newbie I took over my team midway through the season. Seating capacity was 27,000 and I was in Level V but not selling out any dates. I finished last in the division, was relegated and lowered my seating capacity to 25,000 for the following season in LL VI. I sold out only 8 home league games and 2 cup games. Most of the sellouts were because of a late season surge that enabled me to win my division. So coming into the season I knew I should expand my stadium for Level V. But how much? I had only two suggestions: the 27,000 the previous owner had used or 30,000 as recommended by the manual. I opted for the least costly: 27,000. So far, all 12 home dates have been sellouts, as have the 6 Cup dates. Thus, I've already covered the expense of the added seats. From this time forward each time one of those 2000 seats is sold (when attendance is between 25,000 and 27,000) I will be making added money. But was I too conservative and did I leave money on the table, should I have expanded to 30,000? Don't know. Play and learn. Updated Tuesday, April 21 2020 @ 6:01:05 pm PDT
#73020	04/21/2020 6:54:41 pm	Apr 25th, 2045	Ignore
Geech Joined: 01/12/2014 Posts: 546 San Luis Obispo Turtles IV.8	"My initial reaction is that one should target 13.3 sellouts per season" I think this is a bit too conservative. You buy seats in 500 seat increments, so your marginal (last) increment can be profitable even if the last seat isn't sold 13 times. It's a bit trickier to calculate the profit that way, though. With a real quick check, I've seen a particular increment be profitable with only 7 "sell outs", but that wasn't the last batch of seats in my ballpark that season.
#73024	04/21/2020 11:00:02 pm	Apr 25th, 2045	Ignore
Ken_Kennilworth Joined: 11/26/2019 Posts: 400 Charleston Hawks II.1	your right...instead of 13.3 sellouts, 26.7 times selling 1/2 of the increased seating works also...and 53.4 times selling 1/4 the increased seating does too another way of analyzing: 500 seats will increase annual expense by 100,000 (500 * 20 * 10)...at 15 per seat ticket, 6667 additional tickets need to be sold over the course of a season for the added revenue to cover the cost. But, how to set the target sellout/seating capacity? The only idea I have is to take attendance history for a season, ideally for a team that did not sellout any dates, and incrementally lower seating while recalculating ticket revenue & seat cost until the maximum profit level is found. That is doable as the data is available and can be copied into a spreadsheet where the calculations can be made. (Another social isolation project for me!) Still, I prefer using 13.3 sellouts to set seating capacity, as fewer sellouts commits to higher capacity and higher annual expense, and more financial risk--I prefer minimal risk; others may be bolder--lets have fun playing it out! Updated Tuesday, April 21 2020 @ 11:13:04 pm PDT
#73029	04/22/2020 7:14:55 am	Apr 25th, 2045	Ignore
Bridger Joined: 08/04/2016 Posts: 264 Muncie Flyers III.4	Have never taken the time to look this closely at this since my team has excess cash on hand from before I took over. Will be back to re-visit this when it comes time to set up ballpark next season. Thanks guys for the insight. Updated Wednesday, April 22 2020 @ 7:16:49 am PDT
#73036	04/22/2020 10:51:42 am	Apr 25th, 2045	Ignore
Geech Joined: 01/12/2014 Posts: 546 San Luis Obispo Turtles IV.8	It's worth noting that your attendance in general simply is not super risky. Contrary to the description in the manual, the cost of each seat is actually only $10 per update. You can confirm this by checking the costs on your financial page. This means that one block of seats costs you only 50,000 over the course of a season. So, if you miss very, very badly and have 5,000 seats you never sell, this will end up costing you 500,000, which is the minimum major league salary for a single player. That's it. If you're aiming for 13+ sellouts a season, you're virtually certain to be leaving net income on the table. However, it's probably pretty small amounts of income, so it still won't hurt you that bad. I think the sum of all of this is: don't sweat it too much, don't feel like you have to be perfect. Experiment to see what works.
#73100	04/24/2020 6:54:19 am	May 3rd, 2045	Ignore
Ken_Kennilworth Joined: 11/26/2019 Posts: 400 Charleston Hawks II.1	Greech, you are absolutely right!! I did as you said and got $10 per seat per update. Thank you exceedingly!

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