At 2:53 PM 12/30/95, greenie wrote:
>Regarding the poor attendance at the WJC, consider these factors:
...
>o The tournament's publicity program stank. Big time.
 
I agree with many of your points, but not this one.  Does anyone have any
suggestions on how the tourney could have been publicized better?  I think
it is more of a case of trying to sell something to people who just don't
want it.  The clear targets were area hockey fans - pro, college, high
school, etc. - and I thought they hit those people very well.  Most of the
college rinks in the area (if not all) have had posters and WJC info
abounding, along with announcements during the games about how to get
tickets.  The papers and tv (especially NESN during hockey broadcasts) have
carried ads for a while.
 
I'm having trouble thinking of something the organizers did NOT to do try
to let people know about the tourney and where the games were.  Just
because people don't go, doesn't necessarily mean that the publicity was
lacking.  If people are really not interested, then no amount of
advertising will make them go.
 
>-- How are the ticket prices? If kids can't go see two European teams bash
>heads for $5, you can bet their parents would stay home and watch TV.
 
And they can't.  Ticket prices range from $10 to $15, with most games being
$12.  They do offer a $3 discount for kids under 12, but the prices are
still way too high.  I don't know if lower prices would have helped a lot,
but I would bet that with the cost of the tickets, most people weren't
going to pay that much to see more than a couple of games, and they
probably were more interested in seeing Team USA if they were going to see
a game at all.  If people aren't going to pay $8 to see a college game,
they aren't going to pay $12 for a WJC game.
 
>-- How is the local media covering the tournament? Are there feature
>stories on the cover of the sports sections in the Globe and Herald? How
>about feature stories on TV news about New England kids in the tournament?
 
What I have seen of the Boston papers' coverage has been pretty good - some
features and game stories, and they had a number of stories leading up to
it.  I haven't seen much of tv news lately so I cannot speak about that.
 
>-- Do you think that there would have been a better crowd for the USA-Canda
>game had it been played in the Fleet Center?
 
I thought the crowd at the Centrum was pretty good - over 10,000 in a place
that I believe seats about 12,000.  It drew better than many of the NCAA
Regional games that have been held there.
 
>I worked in Boston for four
>years and was a student for four, and like many others in Greater Boston
>never had a car. Games at Worcester were always a pain (Peter Pan Bus was
>the only way to go)
 
On the one hand, I think that the fact that games are spread out all over
the state makes it difficult for people to get to many of the games.  On
the other hand, if most of the games were in Boston, you run into the
problem that even college teams have: too many other things to do in a
large metro area.
 
I think another problem was the lack of recognizable stars in the tourney.
The organizers tried to sell it on the basis of who has played in the past.
Unfortunately, they could not sell it based on big names who are playing
in it now.  I believe that if a Lindros or Kariya was playing for Canada,
you'd see some pretty big crowds at those games.  They were big names at
the time that they were playing in the WJC.
 
The format of the tourney also doesn't lend itself well to attracting fans
in this area.  With so many games in such a short period of time, added to
the ticket prices, it is understandable why people don't wish to go to that
many games (and thus concentrate on the games with players or teams they
know like USA).
 
If it was possible to spread the tourney out or have fewer games during the
week, I think it would have been better - say, have Group B games in Boston
and Group A games in Minneapolis/St Paul, and fly the teams to one of the
sites for the medal round or relegation round games.  But I'm not
suggesting that the tourney should be altered that drastically for the sake
of the US fans.  (And I expect both sites would fight over the right to
host the games involving Team USA.)  Still, I'm perfectly willing to grant
that it may not be the right type of event to hold here.
 
Does that mean that Boston is not a hockey area?  No...it just means it's
not the right type of area to host this event.  Places in Canada may have
given the tourney much better support (and have in the past), but this is
not Canada and as popular as hockey is here, it is still not the same as it
is in Canada.  I am sure that the Canadian press must be having a field day
with this, but they need to understand the underlying factors and realize
that you can't take Canada and its support for a tourney like this and just
transplant it someplace else.
 
I'm curious to hear what the support was like in other places in the US
where the WJC was held.  How did it do in Anchorage in 1989?
 
---                                                                   ---
Mike Machnik                   [log in to unmask]            *HMM* 11/13/93
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