They should keep the east upper stands, as the seats when priced right like last year, and heavily promoted, can sell very well. reduce the pricing in the lower bowl, and people will sit there.
Argos Season Ticket Holder: 2010 - 2014 & 2016 - Present
Grey Cups Attended: 2012, 2016
Current Seats Location: Section 227
I have always sat in the upper deck on the west side and expect to again this season. Really enjoy the view from up there, great atmosphere. Curious comments about the tarps though.
Time to dust of the old tarps from the Skydome..
Let's wait and see what actually happens. Maybe he has an actual plan, maybe he's just pondering options (although it did sound fairly definitive), maybe he's already thinking about 2019. I know someone who has season's seats in the upper east stands (in the handful of rows at the front that are separated from the bulk of that stand), so if the entire upper east side were to be closed, they'd be affected.
Year of the Rocket: John Candy, Wayne Gretzky, a Crooked Tycoon, and the Craziest Season in Football History (https://sutherlandhousebooks.com/pro...of-the-rocket/)
Bouncing Back: From National Joke to Grey Cup Champs (https://bit.ly/3fvip5x)
YOTR YouTube https://bit.ly/37jtG4f
BB YouTube https://bit.ly/2TSYPs7
My parents sit in row 1 of the upper east side with their Skydome seat mates.
TORONTO ARGONAUTS FOOTBALL CLUB
GREY CUP CHAMPIONS: 1914, 1921, 1933, 1937, 1938, 1945, 1946, 1947, 1950, 1952, 1983, 1991, 1996, 1997, 2004, 2012, 2017, 2022
WTF? Your team just won a championship. How about sell seats. How embarrassing is it to tarp over a 25,000 seat stadium? Why go there, and even if you are thinking it why say that publicly. You would think there are other things to muse about with regards to the Argonauts. I hope this guy isn't Copeland 2.0.
Don't forget the last game the Argos played in at BMO drew about 25,000. Let's not set the bar so low for your first go around Bill.
I enjoy sitting in the 200 level and agree they are better seats as my seasons in year one in the 100 level.
GO ARGOS!!!
Yep assumed it's the east side upper level. I get it, reduce supply and increase demand. Unfortunately that's the side that's on tv. Perhaps tarp the top 2/3rds.
I sit on the west upper level during the season. But sat on the upper east side for the final.
Since when was BMO a big stadium? I get that the Argos don't sell out but its no where near the size of Commonwealth. Comment also shows lack of faith/progress. I would hope games could get similar numbers to East Final.
Reading the article again. It looks like 'new configuration for 2018' is an interpretation from the Sun. So a new seating configuration appears to be for 2019.
In hindsight, it makes sense why the team left the seating map alone for this season after discussions about it last year. By the time the renewal process started, the wheels were in motion for an ownership and management change were already in motion so it's best to leave it to the new regime.
Still, I know it's early in the Manning era. But talking about tarping doesn't sound like a plan to grow the fan base. They're not going sell tickets via TFC or other MLSE brands so what is the plan so should there really be a plan right now under him.
Good ownership and management need to see the whole operation including reaching out to exsisting customers before they execute.
We seem to be in another 'year one'.
With Toronto FC booming, top boss Bill Manning looks to improve embattled Argos situation
Kurtis W. Larson Toronto Sun January 24, 2018
TORONTO — If sports juggernaut MLSE can’t right the Argos’ ship, nobody can.
President Bill Manning says the embattled CFL team will have equal footing under his guidance.
The Leafs are the Leafs. The Raptors have exploded. Toronto FC, he said, is shattering records.
“Our plan is to make the Argos just as important,” Manning, who also oversees MLS Cup champs Toronto FC, told the Toronto Sun during an evening sit-down at TFC’s BMO Training Ground. “The Argos are going to be a priority in a lot of ways.”
Manning’s vision for the Argos is to replicate what he has helped establish with the Reds.
“Can we get to the point where we’re selling 25,000 tickets a game and the team is competing for (Grey Cups) year in, year out? That’s my vision,” he said. “How long does it take? I don’t know.”
Manning referred to the Argos’ rebirth as a “long play” – a process that’s certain to take far more time than it took to build Toronto FC into one of the most successful franchises in Canada.
“We’ve gotten to a point where our demand has surpassed our supply – which is a good spot to be in,” Manning said of TFC, adding the club’s season ticket base will balloon to 24,500 this year.
“I say this humbly,” Manning continued, “TFC is hitting on all cylinders, across the board.”
So much so that TFC intends to keep the extra north-end seats it added for last year’s playoffs.
Additionally, Manning said he’s looking at options to expand BMO by as many as 5,000 seats.
“The atmosphere at BMO has just become so electric that it became a really hot ticket,” he said.
Manning explained that an 84% show rate – up from 72% in 2015 – prevented TFC from announcing what would have been considered sellouts in terms of tickets-sold from July through the end of last season.
“You’ll always see empty seats,” Manning said. “That doesn’t mean the seat wasn’t paid for.”
This year, he said, could be even better following TFC’s playoff run. Between season tickets and group sales, MLSE expects every TFC match to sell out within 60 days of every fixture.
“I don’t think we’re going to have many single-game sells at all,” Manning suggested.
The club’s 98.5% season-ticket renewal rate, he said, “is approaching Maple Leafs territory.”
“It’s real money,” he continued. “You look at the gates we’re generating. You can do the math.”
With an average ticket price of $45, TFC brings in nearly $1.2 million in single-game ticket sales.
Toronto FC revenue is up 30% since 2015. TV viewership is up almost 200%, Manning said.
“If you have a good product, everything goes up,” he added. “Same thing with the Argos. Every decision we make is about what we need to do to win, and leveraging that to build our business.”
After averaging 16,380 fans per game in 2016, the Argos lost 38% of their existing season-seat holders before last season. The storied franchise’s renewal rate this off-season improved to 82%, Manning said.
“The one thing I keep challenging myself with is that this is a market with six million people,” Manning said. “Can I find 25,000 people a game, eight times a year, who will come?”
Furthermore, can MLSE convince at least some of the 400,000 TV viewers to get off the couch?
“How do we convince those people to come out to the game?” Manning asked. “What I do know, though, is that the folks at 50 Bay St. are really good. I have a lot of faith in that group.”
The Argos have never had what TFC has: “Arguably one of the most successful sports organizations in the world … saying, ‘We think (the Argos) have legs.’ We’re going to give it the attention it needs and the resources it needs,” Manning explained.
While MLSE doesn’t intend to cross-sell the CFL and MLS, the league’s newest executive expounded on the benefits of bringing the Argos beneath the company’s umbrella.
“We have 100 people who at any given time can shift attention to the Argos or TFC,” Manning said, a benefit of being owned by a company with a database of 13 million prospective fans.
While Manning’s fairly involved in player personnel at TFC, he admits he’s going to leave most football decisions up to GM Jim Popp and coach Marc Trestman.
“I joked with Jim and said, ‘I’m not going to be telling you which wide receiver to sign. I’m going to lean on your expertise and how we can support you,’” Manning said.
Unlike with Toronto FC, Manning doesn’t need to help build a winner in the CFL.
Yet his challenge with the Argos is likely to prove far more difficult.
“How do you continue being a contender and build some buzz in the marketplace so people want to come out and spend some money and buy tickets?” Manning said. “That’s the challenge.”
A DIFFERENT CFL CONFIGURATION AT BMO FIELD?
BMO Field could have a distinctly different look for CFL games in 2018.
New top boss Bill Manning told the Toronto Sun this week he’s considering tarping off the upper deck at BMO to consolidate Toronto Argonauts crowds into the lower bowl.
“We’re going to do what soccer teams do (in football stadiums), when they tarp off the upper decks,” Manning said. “We’re going to do the same thing. It’s going to be a lower bowl. Let’s fill the lower bowl first and then worry about filling the upper deck.”
This after the Argos attracted fewer than 14,000 fans per game last season.
The lower bowl at BMO Field fits roughly 15,000 people.
“Can we add 2,500 or 5,000 paid people this year?” Manning asked. “If we can do that we start building each year.”
Figured this would happen eventually. If MLSE can't get this team figured out in Toronto, no one will.
Where I've seen parts of this article posted I've only seen synopses of what the accomplishments of TFC are and very little of what the positive things for the Argos that I highlighted. And I think a few of those things that I highlighted are very significant.
And again we have to ask ourselves why did those greedy SOBs at Rogers do an about face and get involved. Have they found God and see the light of what's fair and right, or more likely do they smell money in this someway, somehow. And money, in my books, may mean more than the profitability of the Argos, there are likely other factors involved.
article reads like a Bill Manning resume. Yes TFC is wonderful and its the best entertainment in the whole wide world and everything else will never measure up. The boat people love it and the whole wide world is watching Toronto because of it. Did I mention it's better then anything else in the world. Love watching small white men play this game. Love the way they fall down and play dead. Love the scoring and everything else. I believe everything corporate Canada says about it. Oh yea, thanks for ripping up those seats at BMO, there was something wrong with them anyways. Now that's the kind of fans we need at the Argo games.
Thank God the CFL game is exciting and the players are very good
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qjp1Zrvn8VQ
All the Manning write ups in the Sun have come from TFC beat guy Kurt Lawson. I'm really hoping Manning is only telling him things that he perceives will keep the TFC fans happy. Suggesting the Argos can't sell more than 20k per game, would definitely keep them happy.
It's us vs the rest of the country
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