Attendance

[rudolph]

televised games are a free promotion and a must in the first few years in order to get the population interested. Next year their should be no televised games. Nobody thought the seadogs would be in first place this year. having the Dog on TV this year will only generate long term seadogs fans in the future. the seats will fill up eventually. maybe they should do some promotions like 7$ walk up seats and get sell out crowds, get ambiance and get people coming back next year at full price.

[Maddog]

Do you people really think the televised games are going to make that much of a difference? Your're grasping at straws. What do you propose, go back 15 years and not televise anything? Its not going to go away. I welcome it as do many others who are not able to attend or are not totally convinced they should spend their money on the Dogs. I think its great exposure. After 2 years of sucking its going to take at least one good year to get the fans interested and to create a buzz. Most on this board are hardcore fans but you have to look at it from a causal fans perspective. They are going to need more than half a season of success to attract them. Televised games can only help with the exposure.

[yousuckref]

ontariohockeyfan said:

Maybe the Q should think of showing just away games only of teams ( lets say for example Saint John show all away games free on net but donot show home games .

Then how are away teams going to see their away games? That is a huge flaw in your idea.

Also Leask, you can't just sign with Bell and scrap Telus webcasts, it is a league wide thing. The Dogs don't have a choice.

[bjindaho]

you can't do home ban on internet broadcasts, but rogers can black out Saint John and surrounding area for games on TV. they used to do that with the flames

[Judas In My Mind]

The whole sign a deal with Bell Aliant thing was more a comment out of frustration at the lack of people going to games. I love the internet broadcasts league-wide and would hate to see that change.

To those defending the TV broadcasts though I say this. TV is a good idea, up to a point. The Sea Dogs games have been on TV since the seaosn started. The "free advertising" benefit is pretty much at an end there. Do you not think by now that those people watching at home on TV for free have realized we have a good team? If they haven't started coming out to games by now, they won't be coming this year at least, excluding playoffs maybe. (which we'd be a bunch of dumbasses to televise playoff games unless they are sold out). However the people normally sitting at home on Friday watching us on TV might actually get out to a game at this point in time if they realized "Oh crap I can't stay home and watch for free tonight like I've been doing all year".

Televise the games early and often for the first month or two of the year, then shut it down or seriously cut back on televised games. Televise long enough for people in the SJ area to realize "Holy shit there's a good team playing some good hockey here". Then shut it down and make them get off their ass and come to a game, or miss out.

[bjindaho]

jrsuperstar said:

The whole sign a deal with Bell Aliant thing was more a comment out of frustration at the lack of people going to games. I love the internet broadcasts league-wide and would hate to see that change.

To those defending the TV broadcasts though I say this. TV is a good idea, up to a point. The Sea Dogs games have been on TV since the seaosn started. The "free advertising" benefit is pretty much at an end there. Do you not think by now that those people watching at home on TV for free have realized we have a good team? If they haven't started coming out to games by now, they won't be coming this year at least, excluding playoffs maybe. (which we'd be a bunch of dumbasses to televise playoff games unless they are sold out). However the people normally sitting at home on Friday watching us on TV might actually get out to a game at this point in time if they realized "Oh crap I can't stay home and watch for free tonight like I've been doing all year".

Televise the games early and often for the first month or two of the year, then shut it down or seriously cut back on televised games. Televise long enough for people in the SJ area to realize "Holy shit there's a good team playing some good hockey here". Then shut it down and make them get off their ass and come to a game, or miss out.

I second this opinion.

[sharrow]

I was in your fair city about a month ago, went to the Swiss Chalet for supper and was shocked to see a Calgary Flame jersey hanging from the rafters, when I inquired about where is the Seadogs jersey they stated that nobody has came by with one. I am sure that many players have eaten at this place as well as fans and I would hope that the Seadogs organization would correct this problem.

[chillywack]

sharrow said:

I was in your fair city about a month ago, went to the Swiss Chalet for supper and was shocked to see a Calgary Flame jersey hanging from the rafters, when I inquired about where is the Seadogs jersey they stated that nobody has came by with one. I am sure that many players have eaten at this place as well as fans and I would hope that the Seadogs organization would correct this problem.

I would think there is no jersey because Swiss Chalet doesn't sponsor the Sea Dogs. If you go into any other business that sponsors the Sea Dogs there is some sort of item in that business regarding the Sea Dogs.

[elementz]

Even Arbys has Sea Dogs stuff in there. They aren't going to have a jersey in every single restaurant.

[seadogsmarketing]

Saint Johners complained about the first two season's of losing and that was everyone excuse for not coming to the seadogs games.Now we have a winning season and a great hockey team and attendance is bad this you.We should be around the five thousand mark each game.Come on saint john wake up and support the seadogs before we lose another hockey team.

[habh8er]

First off I don't see the team going anywhere any time soon.....the attendance could be better for sure, but it's far from a dire situation. I checked on the Q site to see just how bad it is .... and really it's not that bad in relation to the rest of the East.

Sea Dogs (capacity) 6297 (%sold) 58.8 (av. attend.) 3702
Wild Cats ( " " ) 6900 ( " " ) 54.2 ( " " ) 3738
C. B. ( " " ) 4670 ( " " ) 66.9 ( " " ) 3126
Rocket ( " " ) 3690 ( " " ) 62.0 ( " " ) 2305
Fog Devs ( " " ) 6247 ( " " ) 53.7 ( " " ) 3352
Lewy ( " " ) 3675 ( " " ) 65.9 ( " " ) 2421
Titan ( " " ) 3162 ( " " ) 62.3 ( " " ) 2195
Halifax ( " ' )10595 ( " '' ) 67.1 ( " " ) 7105

That puts us about 2.5% below the average of 61.3% of (seating) capacity or about 157.5 empty seats below average...... Halifax has about 4x the population and has had a team for about 6x as long , and are a winning team and only average 8% more than we do, we will be fine ......as McCain said he is "in it for the long haul"

As far as jerseys in resturants ....I can't see the Sea Dogs stopping by every resturant in Saint John to "correct" the situation....go to a different place if you want to look at hockey stuff Boston Pizza, Rockeys, McDonalds.. they even have SeaDogs tray papers.

[bjindaho]

This is a problem in my opinion. Swiss Chalet doesn't have a jersey because they EXPECT the Sea Dogs to give them a free one, and couldn't be bothered to actually attend a game and buy one. This is terrible!

[habh8er]

No... hot dogs on pizza is "terrible"... IMFAO!!

The "problem" lies in the fact that sharrow is back on the board....who let him in Saint John anyway??

[bjindaho]

why is that a problem? because you are old and he doesn't want this place to be like the library we call harbour station?

[habh8er]

bjindaho said:

why is that a problem? because you are old and he doesn't want this place to be like the library we call harbour station?

Another well thought out post by bjisabitslow ;D.