IBJNews

  • Home

Indians attendance increases for fourth straight year

Anthony Schoettle
September 24, 2012
Keywords
Arts & Entertainment, etc., Indianapolis Indians, Pro Sports, Sports Business, Tourism & Hospitality
Back to TopCommentsE-mailPrint

A strong regular season and a playoff run pushed Indianapolis Indians’ home attendance to its best mark in four years and fourth best at Victory Field since 2000.

The “regular-season attendance increase of nearly 15,000 fans was the highest in the 14-team International League,” said General Manager Cal Burleson. “This achievement was a real team effort.”

A strong marketing plan and family-oriented promotions helped fuel the gains, Burleson said, adding that a competitive team fielded by the Indians’ Major League Baseball affiliate, the Pittsburgh Pirates, helped boost interest in the team.

The team went 89-55 overall and 48-24 at home before losing to the Charlotte Knights 3-1 in the first round of the playoffs.

An extremely warm, dry summer and only two rainouts also helped attendance, Indians officials added.

The Indians drew 595,043 for 70 regular-season home games, averaging 8,501 fans per game. Two post-season home games pushed total attendance up to 605,575 for the season, which was fifth among 176 Minor League Baseball teams.

During the first round of the International League playoffs, the Indians drew more fans—10,532—than the other three league teams in the playoffs combined—8,554.

Sports marketers say affordable ticket prices for Indians games—relative to other sporting events—during a poor economy have helped fuel attendance increases in recent years.

“This organization has several things going for it,” said Larry DeGaris, director of academic sports marketing programs at the University of Indianapolis. “They have a great facility in Victory Field, they’re at the right price point given the economy, and they’re very innovative in terms of entertainment and special promotions. What they’re selling is part baseball, part outdoor picnic with a little bit of carnival thrown in.”

Attendance has been on a steady rise the past four seasons, hitting 549,552 in 2009, 569,969 in 2010, and 580,082 last season. Last year's per-game average for 71 home games was 8,170.

Ticket revenue accounted for $4.3 million of the team’s $10.1 million in operating revenue in 2011. The team had profit of $1.06 million last year, its 36th straight profitable year.

The team's all-time best attendance came in 1999, when it drew 658,250 fans.

ADVERTISEMENT

  • Good Family Entertainment
    TERRYSeptember 24, 2012 12:29 PM
    The Indianapolis Indians and Victory Field are absolutely the best sports entertainment option in the Indianapolis Market. Victory Field is just a great place for the entire family. Thanks Indians - We enjoyed a great 2012 Season, and everyone working at the ballpark is a true professional.
    Reply to CommentFlag Comment

Post a comment to this story

COMMENTS POLICY
We reserve the right to remove any post that we feel is obscene, profane, vulgar, racist, sexually explicit, abusive, or hateful.
 
You are legally responsible for what you post and your anonymity is not guaranteed.
 
Posts that insult, defame, threaten, harass or abuse other readers or people mentioned in IBJ editorial content are also subject to removal. Please respect the privacy of individuals and refrain from posting personal information.
 
No solicitations, spamming or advertisements are allowed. Readers may post links to other informational websites that are relevant to the topic at hand, but please do not link to objectionable material.
 
We may remove messages that are unrelated to the topic, encourage illegal activity, use all capital letters or are unreadable.
 

Messages that are flagged by readers as objectionable will be reviewed and may or may not be removed. Please do not flag a post simply because you disagree with it.

ADVANCED SEARCH
Sponsored by
ADVERTISEMENT

facebook - twitter on Facebook & Twitter

Follow on TwitterFollow IBJ on Facebook:
Follow on TwitterFollow IBJ's Tweets on these topics:
 
Subscribe to IBJ

  1. A non-compete clause is expected to keep Buchman from appearing on-air at WTHR for a year from the WISH contract’s expiration.

  2. In my opinion the estridge companies are crooks. They filed bankruptcy on their 'track housing' side of the business two weeks before they closed on one of my clients' homes. When my client first interviewed Estridge as a builder 6 months before, they specifically ASKED about the solvency of their business, knowing that some builders were struggling. Estridge truly misrepresented their financial situation at that time. I suppose I am more unhappy with the whole system than I am with the builder because what the heck==you can file bankruptcy on 'track homes' but still keep building and make money off of 'custom built' homes??? How ridiculous! They are all homes. How can a company be allowed to bilk thousands of dollars from their subcontractors but still be allowed to build houses?? they should have been made to pay back all their unpaid contractors before being allowed to profit from building any more houses! This alone makes them and the system crooks in my eyes. I would never build an estridge home and I would not recommend for my clients either. If they were truly 'bankrupt' how could they afford to keep building homes anyway??? The whole system needs fixed.

  3. I live a couple blocks east of the Angie's campus and my house is assessed for ~$160,000. If I could get that amount, let alone $384,000 (a 140% bonus), I'd sell in a minute. Either Angie's stockholders just got fleeced, or Angie's is getting about a 58% discount on their property taxes, if these properties are actually worth what they paid Mr. Oesterle for them. Which do you think is the case?

  4. Perhaps the IMA board is really to blame! They agreed to hire Charles. They can't seemingly find donors among themselves, or bring in new blood that will support the museums operating budget with an expanded museum and money to provide curators with something to do (ie buy art). The headlines of disarray at the museum and mass firings are hurting the reputation of the museum for some time to come. If people on the board had misgivings, perhaps they shpuld have more forcefully opposed efforts that they have seemingly been unable to fund, like expansion and the costs it has created!

  5. See, I told u Indyman and Dipsicle....this 8 days is overkill. It's barely worth a weekend....great job Tony George! Your dream has been fulfilled....he fans want the I r l back. Thats how good it was.....and that sucked.

ADVERTISEMENT