WC: WC popularity and attendance

[BalticWarrior]

The popularity of WC is dwindling every year its becoming less and less important,how do you fix it?
Lower the ticket prices?
Make the tournament every 2 years for example?
What can the IIHF really do?

Click to read more...

 

[Finnpin]

-Tournament only in one country
-Ticket & beer/food prices down
-Tournament only every 2 years as some teams have difficulties getting their best players every year.

 

[SwissLeaf]

-Tournament only in one country
-Ticket & beer/food prices down
-Tournament only every 2 years as some teams have difficulties getting their best players every year.

This.

(well, I don't know the beer prices, but lower beer prices sounds good anyway)

 

[Reznor]

From what I've seen, the ticket are really expensive this year. That could already be a good thing for attendance to lower them at an acceptable price...

 

[BalticWarrior]

Also do you guys think IIHF should step up with marketing WC? It sometimes seems like they are not even trying.

 

[Finnpin]

From what I've seen, the ticket are really expensive this year. That could already be a good thing for attendance to lower them at an acceptable price...

They were even more expensive last year.

 

[Finnpin]

One thing is tv-coverage, it was great when games were in Eurosport.

In Finland, team Finland games are only shown in free tv channel... all other games are in pay channels + Finnish games with better commentator: See Mertaranta thread.

 

[joe89]

Every two years probably isn't going to happen. It's a cash cow for IIHF and its members.

 

[DrStrangelife]

-Tournament only in one country
-Ticket & beer/food prices down
-Tournament only every 2 years as some teams have difficulties getting their best players every year.

How is having the tournament every 2 years solve the problem of teams not getting their best players? If the players play in NHL, there's no difference how often you have the tournament, if they are busy, they are busy.

The more logical way of solving this is moving WC to a different month, like September and more players will be available, thou it won't be a guarantee that they will therefore participate.

 

[Colorado Avalanche]

-Tournament only in one country
-Ticket & beer/food prices down
-Tournament only every 2 years as some teams have difficulties getting their best players every year.

This. To be honest I don't really give **** about this "WC". Finland has horrible team, like 90% FEL players. Who gives a **** about WC competition where there's like no good players. What's the point. Pointless ****. I hope Switzerland wins! Something to cheer for..

 

[Finnpin]

How is having the tournament every 2 years solve the problem of teams not getting their best players? If the players play in NHL, there's no difference how often you have the tournament, if they are busy, they are busy.

The more logical way of solving this is moving WC to a different month, like September and more players will be available, thou it won't be a guarantee that they will therefore participate.

NHL player named "A" plays for a NHL team named "B" and the team doesn't make the playoffs like never or most likely exits in the first round. The player most likely doesn't want to come to play WCs every year...

September? when the players are still summer rusty and local leagues are about to start or already have. Hmmm no.

 

[Wolfy*]

Change the time of year to NHL off season, then all the best players will be available. August would be a perfect month.

Lower ticket prices, although that has already been done this year. Now they also have "two for one" tickets. Lets see if it helps.

 

[Trizz]

Also do you guys think IIHF should step up with marketing WC? It sometimes seems like they are not even trying.

its a really tough one to do this
the hockeymarket just isn't that big, i believe i heard thats the reason the world championship is placed every year instead of 2-year by the IIHF

it's not the fifa who makes billions of dollar with a championship

 

[stv11]

I think this two countries crap really hit the last two tournaments hard, it feels like there is no real home country.

Going to new places could also boost popularity. There was a big enthousiasm for the tournament in 2006, 08 and 11 that hasn't been replicated with Stockholm and Helsinki. Maybe Sweden should have tried Malmö or some other place?

Moving the tournament later would make it worse, most fans wouldn't travel to a hockey tournament in the summer, and having out of shape players wouldn't improve the games very much.

 

[joe89]

its a really tough one to do this
the hockeymarket just isn't that big, i believe i heard thats the reason the world championship is placed every year instead of 2-year by the IIHF

it's not the fifa who makes billions of dollar with a championship

Well for starters the IIHF goes way beyond the top division. For many countries the lower tier events is the highlight of the hockey calendar every year.

From an IIHF standpoint you can look at tournaments every two years instead of every year like this:
-More buzz.
-Possibly more motivated players.
-Less countries get to host, or not as often.
-Less broadening of the sport on a yearly basis.
-Less profit.
-Less money into development programs.

Here's a giant reason for tournaments every year:

In 2012, the IIHF Ice Hockey World Championship has reached a new record cumulative audience of more than 900 million worldwide in 114 countries with over 4,500 hours of coverage broadcast.

In the end it's about pros and cons. They're not looking to satisfy only the big guns, they have to think about the other divisions and the countries that build their programs around the National team. The main goals are to be profitable and develop the sport.

However, I'll sign up on going back to only _one_ host. Two countries is a mess.

 

[1Gold Standard]

Move it to the September and 25 million to the winner. A cool million to each player on the winning team (not that they need it.) but it is what motivates these A**holes.

The players of the silver medal team get 100 dollar gift certificates to Morton's Steakhouse.

 

[roto]

The popularity of WC is dwindling every year its becoming less and less important,how do you fix it?
Lower the ticket prices?
Make the tournament every 2 years for example?

I'm not sure if I understand. How is popularity of WC declining? FIN-SVK game on saturday drew 1.6 million TV spectators (out of 5 million people) even though Team Finland has only one NHLer. Smaller ice hockey countries have gotten better so there are less 12-0 blowouts like fifteen years ago, so the games are more entertaining. I also guess that WC is at least as popular in Norway and Denmark as it was ten years ago. In Sweden WC popularity might be declining but how would it help to have it every two years? If I don't anticipate some event I don't anticipate it more if it happens rarely.

I don't understand how having WC every two years would make it more popular. The attendance/ratings would likely be bigger than with current system, but still smaller if compared to combined numbers from two tournaments held on consecutive years. Either you like to watch WC hockey or not. If you don't care WC, like most Canadians, it doesn't matter if the tournament was held every 100 years.

Ice hockey is not soccer. In soccer we have international games basically every year with our best players: Euro qualifiers, European Championships, World Cup Qualifiers, World Cup, friendly matches. In ice hockey we have top teams playing few games once in four years, and even that is too much asked from NHL, which is about to be go bankruptcy if there's a two-week break every four years.

 

[ViD]

Do we have the facts that indicate the WC is losing popularity? As far as I know, the problem with the attendance last year was due to high ticket prices. I think we should look at the TV ratings to see if the interest has dropped

 

[Xokkeu]

Next year's tournament should solve the ticket and beer price problem.

 

[markz*]

The popularity of WC is dwindling every year its becoming less and less important,how do you fix it?
Lower the ticket prices?
Make the tournament every 2 years for example?
What can the IIHF really do?

Isn't the NHL revenues mainly from Canadian Teams? That's a recipe for disaster more so than the IIHF.

 

[roto]

The latest ratings from Finland:

Average TV spectators per game:
FIN-GER 1.27 million
FIN-SVK 1.24 million
FIN-FRA 1.32 million

Top figures for last two games were about 1.6 million. Those average figures are 5% better than last year, so I wouldn't say that popularity is declining at least here.

 

[QnebO]

The popularity is not decreasing. But not many sane people pay 150€ for one World Championship match ticket..

 

[slovakiasnextone]

Well, I can only really speak for Slovakia and the Czech republic, but I have not noticed the popularity decreasing here at all.

In Slovakia it's still the main sporting event during this time of the year (and also non sporting event where people who don't care about hockey the rest of the year much if at all watch it) that is only overshadowed by summer or winter Olympics or football world/euro championships in the rare case that Slovakia plays there (which happened only once). Hockey is everywhere in the media right now, it's a topic of conversation between people and actually there's even a bit more enthusiasm about it than in recent years due to last years result. There also has been an improvement attendance wise for the games the NT played before the tourney at home, while last year they played their last tourney infront of 3000 spectators it was full house this year.

Tbh the only country in Europe where I think the popularity of the WC is descreasing seems to be Sweden, but that's just the impression I get.

 

[Analyzer*]

I'd probably never attend one due to the cost, but it's hard for me to watch them when they're on at 10am.

However, in Europe they can't have games on at 1am so I can watch them here.

Aside from me telling my friends about Canada's loss to Switzerland and a few comments about it, I've seen nothing about it. Especially being a habs fan (Montreal in the playoffs) and being in Ontario (Both Ottawa and Toronto in the playoffs), the WC takes a back seat.

 

[hz]

There is waaaay to many games.