How about they lower prices. Every wondered why SANFL gets about triple the attandances the NBL gets? My sister went to the gf, and it cost her $7. that's right, $7. It costs four times that to see a regular 36er game.

If you were to take $10 (or thereabouts)off the price of tickets then you would get plenty more people through the doors. What you lose in door takings you would surely make in food and drinks, merchandising anyway.
Result = happier customers, game with atmosphere, happier sponsors and so forth.
To me it's not rocket surgery, or was that brain science?
Mind you, BASA wouldn't want to be seen supporting the supporters that support them would they???????

It cost me $23 to go to the SANFL Grand Final. Where were the $7 seats?

It is not hard to increase attendances.

We don't need gimmicks we need cheaper prices.

$27 a ticket for what could turn out to be a game that goes for little more than an hour is expensive enough for one adult let alone a breadwinner who has to pay for their entire family.

The 36ers have a great, exciting team this season but the prices are still too high for the average family in my opinion.

I have no doubt that if tickets were around the $10 to $17 range that we would have a packed house.

Unfortunately, there are some real die hard fans who would love to go and simply can't afford to.

you all talk economics 101 it doesn't take much to realise that sanfl or afl can charge less because of the volume of tickets they can fit 40000 plus in their ground and they are all tied in around aust to the same ticketing aren't they? football also has a larger fan base, may dad even knows footy exists he wouldn't know which way the basketball was bounced.

as a season ticket holder who has paid full price for my ticket i'd be more than pissed off if they reduced the tickets this season.

face it the dome is a financial drain and something needs to be done about the financial state of basketball in this state and that i also believe comes back to salary cap overruns etc in years gone past...don't you think these problems exist elsewhere with teams going broke or merging.

why do you think the nbl reduced its salary cap.

we are no orphans and if they reduced the prices like someone said and got more food sold etc...you are assuming the profit on food sold comes back to basa it doesn't ...isn't the food outlets franchised out

the problem that we now face has been coming for years basketball is really on a decline around australia less people becoming involved and that goes back to clubs, fees, uniforms etc it is an expensive and to a certain extent elitist sport

there isn't a quick fix although everyone seems to just blame the admin is going to cover all bases

The $7 ticket would of been a childs...it costs $8 for an adult for only a regular season game so it can't cost less for the GF

In Economics 101, Rocket Scientist, which book was it that said that expensive ticket prices that resulted in an empty stadium would lead to financial viability.

I agree with what you say that there are numerous problems that cannot all be aimed at 36ers admin but I think ticket prices are a fair complaint.

Personally I wouldn't mind if the they gave out cheaper game night tickets to sell out the 'nose bleed' section at least. Would lead to a better atmosphere.

Similarly while it is a valid complaint that us as season ticket holders would be angered if game night seats were cheaper than what we pay per game, the truth of the matter is that if they had made season ticket prices more affordable then they would have sold a damn lot more of them to begin with.

Obviously, I believe the tickets are worth what I am paying because I am a die-hard fan. Having said that, I can see why a casual fan, or families who would be keen to otherwise go and check out a game will decide to spend their money elsewhere when they find out the costs.

I understand that if the 36ers don't take care of their financials then we may end up with no team to support.

However, I do not see that we would have made any more of a loss having cheaper ticket prices if it meant having a huge increase in crowd numbers.

Obviously if one were to believe that we would have sold the same number of tickets to Wednesday's game irrespective of the cost then good on 36ers management as they have made a good financial decision.

However, if you believe that we would have sold 7000 seats if ticket prices were in the $15 range then the debate re ticket prices is fair enough.

I can't see why anyone should be angry if they lower prices for the rest of the year. I'd rather have a full house, great atmosphere etc rather than an empty place where everyone paid the same as me.

And Rocket Scientist:

4400 x $27 = $118,000

7000 x $17 = $119,000

Bigger attendence = more sponsorship, more singlet sales, better atmosphere (which will make people want to come to games again and then when people are interested ticket prices can go up).

At the moment we had 4400 fans last night and I'm not sure how many of the casual fans there actually feel like coming back.

I think it is still a bit too early to determine what will be the attendance situation for the year: Wednesday night; during school holidays; lack of game promotion.

If attendance remains a problem how about the following. For each game say 500 tickets are made available free to BASA clubs. Could be one club one game, and another the next and so on or two sharing them a game or whatever. The club is then responsible for doing what they want with them. They can give them away to sponsors, or junior players or sell them at discount prices to their own members/players/supporters and help generate some funds for the club. Any views?

DC, You really cant see how people who have been willing to put up $300 per ticket before we even knew who would be playing in the team (which wasnt looking too good there for a while, but we loyally pay up anyway) could be slightly offended by cheap door tickets??

Of course everyone agrees the atmosphere is so much better with a full house, but the season ticket holders HAVE to be protected in some way.

If that means the back rows get flogged off cheap, maybe thats fair enough, but anything else and I for one will be super pissed.

Well I worded my statement incorrectly in a mad rush to post it. Yes I can see how people can be angry, but given the options of a terrible atmosphere all year long, versus the option of cheaper tickets and a full house I'd rather have the latter, and couldn't be angry towards the club if they did that.

Maybe if the club did discount tickets, they could possibly offer a reduced rate for next season's memberships for people with memberships this year.

I agree completely with SAW.

If they have gone the way of expensive tickets, and management have reason to believe that bar an exceptional purchase of tickets from the door on the night of the game then they should 'give away' tickets to BASA juniors.

These juniors help support BASA and in any event, these juniors will one day be parents and if you get them addicted to going to 36ers games now then I'm sure many future season tickets will be sold as a result.

Besides the immediate flow on effect would be that some of the parents of these juniors who received free tickets would purchase tickets to accompany their children.

Even if you paid the $23 for the SANFL Grand Final, that's still cheaper than one game at the Dome. And AAMI was packed. What an atmosphere (yeah it sucked if you're a WWT fan like me...). They got 24, 000 people along to that game. Why? Advertisement, reasonably cheap prices, time and date of the game, etc. If it only costs $7 to get to an SANFL game regular season, why would you consider getting a ticket to the 36ers match? Or a season ticket? Why not just spend the money getting Foxtel, watch games from all over Australia instead.

My suggestion: They ARE NOT going to lower prices for the 36ers match anytime soon. But they should consider some tactics to get people through the door. For example, everyone has heard of the Melbourne Tigers. Next home game against them, offer 2 for 1 ticket prices at the door. Or at least knock $10 off the price. You know, adults at children's prices. That way we might get a full house... And get some new people along to the game.

If they can't afford that, maybe give everyone a freebie at the door. Something small, a little memento. A little key ring, for example, with the home games printed on them. The new people might refer to it in the future and come back to the Dome.

People, give up on the idea of lower prices. It won't happen

I don't think you can compare SANFL to NBL. SANFL is a local league, the farthest a team has to travel is from one side of Adelaide to the other! The NBL is now International!! (okay, bit of a farce, it's only NZ). Point being that clubs have to pay to fly players everywhere and stay in hotels. So ticket prices to a SANFL game compared to an NBL game are likely to be different. NBL is on the same level as the AFL...that gives you a fairer ticket comparison.

However, saying that, I agree the prices are too high in general. Hopefully the addition of a league wide major sponsor in Philips may help that for next season - although that will remain to be seen.

There is no way the club could drop prices to single games now...season ticket holders would be extremely offended. However what about offering a 5-game or 10-game package at a discounted price?? 5 games for $120 or something?? Set it out such that a couple of the games are marquee and it might generate some interest. Perhaps send it out to past season ticket holders who have not renewed because of the cost and they might take it up instead?

Costs money to run the club and if tickets are cut and numbers stay low, the club loses out even more. The example of the $17 ticket above assumed 7000 would come to the game! Even in the heydays, not every game would sell out. If tickets were cut to that and 6000 turned up, sure it's an improvement but the club loses even more money. Also, 4400 will be one of the lowest crowds of the season I think. Wednesday nights are bad for families, plus holidays too. Lets get a few games under the belt before we worry too much about the attendance.

I like the idea of free tickets to junior games MVP's - good incentive - get's the families involved.

Isn't SANFL the same level of football as ABL in Basketball? The top level in both sports are AFL and NBL. No wonder tickets to the SANFL are cheaper. They are cheaper still if you go to ABL games. Going to a Port Power or Crows game is just as expensive as going to an NBL game. In fact, the last time I checked it was around the $23 mark for the cheapest seats. When you compare prices of NBL games, you need to compare them with other sports at the same level. You will find that Basketball generally is no more expensive. I've just purchased 2 tickets for the 3rd November game in Sydney. They were $40 each plus $3.75 booking fee. We don't have the most expensive tickets in the NBL.

Good point EC. It is easy to forget that other fans have it much worse off than us.

$40 for a Sydney Kings ticket is incredible. Maybe they truly believe they are the LA Lakers.

I guess without huge sponsors, huge television rights or a Mark Cuban type owner, the reality is that clubs will be forced to get as much as they can from their die hard fans to stay alive.

At least the league appears to be going in the right direction with the Phillips deal. Lets hope it is big enough to at least cover Burton's salary.

It is still disappointing that a lot of the NBL teams are charging prices that basketball fans cannot afford.

While a naming right sponsor is an important step I don't believe the league will be even close to going in the right direction until teams start regularly putting up the sold out sign. I think that should have been made the number 1 priority.

It isn't like that is being too ambitious given that most teams are playing in modest venues that fit around 4,000 people.

As good as the on court product was on Wednesday night, we can all only hope that the 36ers play in front of bigger crowds for the rest of the season.

speaking of Lakers - what was bert newton doing with luke longley and the laker girls on good morning australia?

longley was promoting some NBA thing in melbourne this weekend ?

what's the deal?

A couple of things: DC -- I wouldn't suggest all tickets at $17 as you've used for the purpose of demonstrative calculations. What about $25 for below the concourse and $17 above it. You have to retain some level of versioning with the prices.

EC: you could/can get Kings season tickets for free by attending a no-obligation seminar. Even without that, you can get an adult season ticket at $12.45/game. You can get a Silver level regular season ticket for $16 for an adult. $40 is the Platinum price level.

Port Power season tickets could be had last season for $12.20/game per adult.

The cheapest adult ticket to a Sixers game offered this season is $19.60 which is the season ticket rate for seats above the concourse.

Go to the Sixers site and tell me where on the front door it tells you when the next game is, the opponent and what tickets are available (price, where to get them, etc). What's that? It's not readily and obviously available?

I chose Platinum seats to get a comparable seat to what I enjoy at the Dome. I didn't pay anywhere near that much for my seat here at home on a per game basis. If you go to an event once in your lifetime, you will pay those prices. If I had to pay that for every game at home, then it would be a different matter. I am comparing apples with apples. As for Port Power tickets, I did go last season to one game and 3 or 4 the year before. I always purchased budget seats that were over $20. Can't remember the exact amount but do remember comparing it to basketball prices and thought it wasn't any cheaper.

A lot of the fuss about prices to the basketball has been based on buying individual seats and booking through VenueTix. If you purchase a season ticket, it does work out less.

As for the Official Sixers site, you'll get no opposition from me. I think the site is terrible. The lack of information is a big problem there. I agree that more people would be interested in buying tickets if more information was available to them.

The only advertising I have seen for the sixers games was on the side of a Pura Milk Carton. If anyone new to the club gained any interest whatsoever from these ads, they may have gone into the Sixers site to get more information only to find that there is not much there at all. These are the people that the club should be targetting by offering a lot of information that would take their interest and at least come to one game to try it out.

Heres something that would have just about filled the house...

Why couldnt it have been done here...

http://www.nbl.com.au/default.aspx?s=newsdisplay&aid=1325

Apparently Pigs season ticket holders get the night included as a bonus too....

I recently spent 3 weeks in Cairns. There were adverts for the Taipans on TV almost every day and adverts in the press. Taipans team members regularly featured in publicised charity events. There were also large write-ups in the local press on any Taipans activity, including a two page spread on the Blitz (where it briefly mentioned that the 36ers had won!). Maybe you need the right sponsors!

maybe you need the right marketing manager!