Take Me Out to the Yakyushiai

Abstract

The authors use data that are collected from the 2007 season to study attendance at Nippon Professional Baseball (NPB) games. Like Major League Baseball (MLB) teams, Japanese teams set price in the inelastic portion of the demand curve, but standard explanations for low prices do not apply. The authors also find some evidence that the visiting team's fans play a greater role in NPB than in MLB. Games in domed stadiums or between teams in different leagues also draw more fans. Finally, attendance is greater at games between better teams and games that the home team is more likely to win.

Estimating Consumer Spending on Tickets, Merchandise, and Food and Beverage: A Case Study of a NHL Team

“…Results revealed that weekend games, special promotions, division opponents, and night games (after 5:00 p.m. local time) significantly influenced ticket sales for this particular team. Our results confirmed previous research in the NHL and other sport leagues who found that weekend games increased attendance (Cebula et al, 2009;DeSchriver, 2007;Jones et al, 1993, Leeds & Sakata, 2012Lemke et al;Paul, 2003;Paul & Weinbach, 2011). Based on Equation 5 predictions, weekend games would have the greatest positive influence on ticket sales with an estimated 2,993 more tickets sold compared with weekday games.…”

“…Previously selected factors used to estimate attendance (i.e., ticket sales) in other sport leagues include day of the week, promotions, opponent, time of game, and timing during the season (e.g., month or week). Day of the week analysis has predominantly shown that weekend games attract more fans than weekday games (Cebula et al, 2009;DeSchriver, 2007;Leeds & Sakata, 2012;Lemke et al, 2010), which is often attributed to the opportunity cost associated with attending games during the week compared with the weekend (Paul, 2003). In a comprehensive study of MLB special promotions, McDonald and Rascher (2000) concluded that promotions increased attendance on average 14%.…”

Capacity Allocation of Game Tickets Using Dynamic Pricing

“…As mentioned in the introduction, several previous researches have pointed out to the fact that loyal fans are not always deterred by high ticket prices [30]. Due to this fact, several researchers have reported a positive correlation of game attendance with ticket prices [5,[32][33][34][35][36][37]. Thus, a more robust data centric study considering all factors is required for further analysis.…”

“…Dimitropoulos and Alexopoulos (2014) [31] investigated that game attendance and the profitability of football clubs are positively associated to their short and long run success, but not on the seasonal uncertainty of the league. Ticket demand for sports events and the factors that affect market equilibrium have been studied in References [5,8,[32][33][34][35]. On the other hand, studies by Burger and Walters (2003) [36] and Pinnuck and Potter (2006) [37] researched that market size and the team performance are strongly associated with team revenues.…”

“…On the other hand, studies by Burger and Walters (2003) [36] and Pinnuck and Potter (2006) [37] researched that market size and the team performance are strongly associated with team revenues. Leeds and Sakata (2012) [35] inferred that attendance is greater at games between better teams and games that the home team is more likely to win. Economic studies of North American sports have shown that a variety of factors affect attendance at sporting events, including the presence of superstars [38,39], home game vs away game attendance [40], the fallout from work stoppages [38], the construction of a new stadium [41,42], and changes in competitive balance.…”