As Venues Focus on Air Quality, Many Sports Fans Are Ready to Return to Indoor Events
There appears to be pent-up demand among regular event attendees. In the Oct. 14-16 poll, more than 40 percent of regular sporting event attendees said they expect to attend both outdoor and indoor events more frequently than they did before coronavirus spread to the United States.
A growing number of NFL and college football teams are hosting fans at their outdoor stadiums, most of which are capping attendance at less than 25 percent of total capacity. MLB is selling 11,500 seats per game for the World Series, which represents nearly 30 percent capacity at Globe Life Field in Arlington, Texas. Fans are generally allowed to to sit in small groups called “pods,” which are spread out across the full seating area.
Hosting fans has allowed teams and schools to salvage a fraction of the income typically derived from selling tickets, concessions, merchandise, parking and other on-site revenue streams.
The NHL and NBA both sacrificed gate-related revenue by holding their respective postseasons without fans in attendance and face the prospect of playing large swaths of their next seasons without spectators as well. Silver said earlier this year that about 40 percent of the NBA’s revenue is attributable to having fans in the stands, a number that is believed to be higher for the NHL because it generates less revenue from its current media rights deals.
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