What is behind UL football's attendance woes? Numerous obstacles keep fans from Cajun Field

[John Cocktolstoy]

what changed?

Couple of things IMO. Used to be when you join the RCAF for as little as 100 annually you’d get the parking pass for free now it’s 60 bucks with membership. And lots of people dropped their TG spot when the price increased to 500 bucks and at the time 2 out of 6 home games were weeknights. IMO a 20x20 spot for 83 bucks a game is not a bad deal at all.

[Esqueleto]

You do know it wasn’t very long ago that there were 0 spots available inside the gates at CF and there was a waiting list and not one spot was free. Price change maybe. Price elimination is not necessary.

Well, they ain't there anymore. Times have changed and people have shown they aren't going to pay money for the privilege of cooking in a parking lot. If you want the atmosphere back, you have to open it up now.

[CajunRage]

Well, they ain't there anymore. Times have changed and people have shown they aren't going to pay money for the privilege of cooking in a parking lot. If you want the atmosphere back, you have to open it up now.

and no one is saying it should be free forever... when supply runs out, make adjustments, but to think that people are just going to decide one day to start paying and jumping through all the hoops is insane.

[Louisiana84]

MAKE CAJUN FIELD GREAT AGAIN!

This place was a helluva lot more fun when the great unwashed rolled up with a keg in the back of their pick-up trucks and started throwing down.

[Esqueleto]

and no one is saying it should be free forever... when supply runs out, make adjustments, but to think that people are just going to decide one day to start paying and jumping through all the hoops is insane.

Absolutely

[facelessjonmoon]

what changed?

A whole lot of things

[zeppelincajun]

People won’t even walk across the street from the lite center. They ain’t walking all the way from blackham because they put some food trucks out there. Start inside the gates and make it a party. Once that fills up you expand. It’s not hard

Apparently it’s rocket surgery.

[Rainman66]

I love the passion around this, but this isn't an easy problem to fix. If it was easy, the vast majority of the G5 schools in the country wouldn't be struggling with it.

I think the Hud references aren't applicable, because that situation is similar to what is going on at Texas State right now. Wondering in the desert for years/decades and finally having a taste of winning with an exciting product was/is the reason for the huge spike in attendance in both places. Think of it as a fad.

Now that the fad is over, what do we have. We actually have some good stuff to work with. We have taken that fad and made it into a very respectable string of success on the field. The product is a good to very good product. The marketing and presentation of that product isn't good. The environment (CF) for that product is in the bottom 10% in the country.

The thesis that Dr Maggard is working from is that the environment is the #1 issue impacting the overall product, and spending money on marketing and presentation is not going to generate a worthwhile ROI until it is fixed.

No one can say if he is right or wrong, but at least he has a strategy. We will know in 3-5 years if it was a correct one or not.

[zeppelincajun]

I love the passion around this, but this isn't an easy problem to fix. If it was easy, the vast majority of the G5 schools in the country wouldn't be struggling with it.

I think the Hud references aren't applicable, because that situation is similar to what is going on at Texas State right now. Wondering in the desert for years/decades and finally having a taste of winning with an exciting product was/is the reason for the huge spike in attendance in both places. Think of it as a fad.

Now that the fad is over, what do we have. We actually have some good stuff to work with. We have taken that fad and made it into a very respectable string of success on the field. The product is a good to very good product. The marketing and presentation of that product isn't good. The environment (CF) for that product is in the bottom 10% in the country.

The thesis that Dr Maggard is working from is that the environment is the #1 issue impacting the overall product, and spending money on marketing and presentation is not going to generate a worthwhile ROI until it is fixed.

No one can say if he is right or wrong, but at least he has a strategy. We will know in 3-5 years if it was a correct one or not.

When you have an entire lot inside the gates sitting empty while people park across the street, you are over complicating the issue. There is no reason to sit on our hands for 3-5 years and hope this resolves itself. Acting like glaring blunders can’t be fixed while working on the renovation (upcoming) and during fundraising stages (present and recent past) is disingenuous. You don’t need a new stadium to put up a banner honoring your first outright conference championship 30 years. Tailgating is not going to magically resolve itself because the stadium gets renovated.

[ULvictory]

When you have an entire lot inside the gates sitting empty while people park across the street, you are over complicating the issue. There is no reason to sit on our hands for 3-5 years and hope this resolves itself. Acting like glaring blunders can’t be fixed while working on the renovation (upcoming) and during fundraising stages (present and recent past) is disingenuous. You don’t need a new stadium to put up a banner honoring your first outright conference championship 30 years. Tailgating is not going to magically resolve itself because the stadium gets renovated.

The parking situation could be fixed today.

I park in Lot E (the big barren land at the corner of Congress and Bertrand) and arrived 30 minutes before kickoff for Texas State. I was 1 of 8 cars in that entire lot. For the Northwestern State game, because of the free parking offered inside of the Cajun Field gates, I was sent to Lot C with my Lot E pass. That means there's a ton of spots available to park inside the gates. Also, we took a recent poll on the Ragin Review Twitter page and asked if people would rather A) park general admission inside of Cajun Field for $20 on gameday or B) park across the street for free. 65% voted to pay to park inside of Cajun Field. Not only can the university gain extra revenue, but the parking lot looks full and active as opposed to a barren dessert that's seen now. Perception is everything in this case.

[CajunRage]

When you have an entire lot inside the gates sitting empty while people park across the street, you are over complicating the issue. There is no reason to sit on our hands for 3-5 years and hope this resolves itself. Acting like glaring blunders can’t be fixed while working on the renovation (upcoming) and during fundraising stages (present and recent past) is disingenuous. You don’t need a new stadium to put up a banner honoring your first outright conference championship 30 years. Tailgating is not going to magically resolve itself because the stadium gets renovated.

People need to stop thinking that parking and tailgating are revenue streams. They are enablers. The end goal is tickets, sponsors, donors.

[Turbine]

People need to stop thinking that parking and tailgating are revenue streams. They are enablers. The end goal is tickets, sponsors, donors.

Parking is a loss leader.

You want activity at all times, this appearance of activity eventually leads to more tickets, more sponsors (they crave activity) and more motivated donors.

Active parking is a great place to start.