Season Tickets for 2019-2020

[Imdone]

Here is a portion of the canned response I received from the Athletic Department.

This new program is designed to better support 650+ student athletes and to move towards paying for all $17M worth of scholarships we currently owe back to the University every year. As I'm sure you are aware running a large division I athletics programs takes resources if we want to compete at the highest level. The decision to introduce the scholarship seating program was not taken lightly and is in line with best practices and peer groups from around the country. I understand this change will require you to pay more for your current season tickets at Gampel and the XL Center. This will influence each season ticket holder differently, some will see an increase, some will be required to pay less then what they are currently donating, and others will remain about the same. As we began to analyze our current model and look to make changes we did what is best for UConn Athletics, our donors/ season tickets holders, and most certainly our student athletes.

I'm happy to help you to retain being a season ticket holder, I welcome the opportunity to discuss this more if you are interested.

Thank you for your many years of support. Go Huskies!

Michael


Michael Oblinger
Senior Associate Director of Athletics for Development

I love this part:

This will influence each season ticket holder differently, some will see an increase, some will be required to pay less then what they are currently donating, and others will remain about the same.

I'd love to see the breakdown between % who will see an increase, % who will remain the same and % who will see a decrease.

My guess: 95% will see an increase; 3% will remain about the same 2% will see a decrease

 

[Waquoit]

I think UConn finally found my breaking point. I guess I've been weeded out.

 

[Excalibur]

Here is a portion of the canned response I received from the Athletic Department.

This new program is designed to better support 650+ student athletes and to move towards paying for all $17M worth of scholarships we currently owe back to the University every year. As I'm sure you are aware running a large division I athletics programs takes resources if we want to compete at the highest level. The decision to introduce the scholarship seating program was not taken lightly and is in line with best practices and peer groups from around the country. I understand this change will require you to pay more for your current season tickets at Gampel and the XL Center. This will influence each season ticket holder differently, some will see an increase, some will be required to pay less then what they are currently donating, and others will remain about the same. As we began to analyze our current model and look to make changes we did what is best for UConn Athletics, our donors/ season tickets holders, and most certainly our student athletes.

I'm happy to help you to retain being a season ticket holder, I welcome the opportunity to discuss this more if you are interested.

Thank you for your many years of support. Go Huskies!

Michael


Michael Oblinger
Senior Associate Director of Athletics for Development

I love this part:

This will influence each season ticket holder differently, some will see an increase, some will be required to pay less then what they are currently donating, and others will remain about the same.

I'd love to see the breakdown between % who will see an increase, % who will remain the same and % who will see a decrease.

My guess: 95% will see an increase; 3% will remain about the same 2% will see a decrease

My donations come mostly from paying the seat deposit for a group of 10 for football (though I often throw in a little bit of $$ on top of that). If I want to keep my basketball seats for the same price, my choice is easy -- just stop buying football season tickets. Even so, it's still an increase ($1,000 in donations for 10 football tickets vs. $2,000 for 5 Gampel tickets).

Of course, they timed this announcement to come right after the "ordering deadline" for football so I can't do that this year.

 

[Excalibur]

UConn basketball donors having their loyalty questioned:

 

[ColchVEGAS]

The only decrease will be the ones who do not want to pay the ransom for the seats they currently have or want to move to.

In my situation if I kept the same seats I had last year, which oddly enough were the worst I have had in my 10 years of purchasing season tickets since graduating from UConn, I would be paying about $100 more.

To move to the seats that I felt were the best I had of any year having tickets, 200 section sideline at Gampel and lower bowl sideline at XL, it would be $1400 more per year.

I told my rep I would most likely not renew because of this and my loyalty to the program was questioned. At that point I said I will definitely not renew because they are delusional. The reasoning my rep gave me was more than absurd.

 

[Kathy]

The only decrease will be the ones who do not want to pay the ransom for the seats they currently have or want to move to.

In my situation if I kept the same seats I had last year, which oddly enough were the worst I have had in my 10 years of purchasing season tickets since graduating from UConn, I would be paying about $100 more.

To move to the seats that I felt were the best I had of any year having tickets, 200 section sideline at Gampel and lower bowl sideline at XL, it would be $1400 more per year.

I told my rep I would most likely not renew because of this and my loyalty to the program was questioned. At that point I said I will definitely not renew because they are delusional. The reasoning my rep gave me was more than absurd.

Questioned your loyalty? That's harsh, wasn't gonna call because moving out of state anyway but may call and tell them I am not renewing because too expensive which would be the case if I was staying.

 

[ColchVEGAS]

Questioned your loyalty? That's harsh, wasn't gonna call because moving out of state anyway but may call and tell them I am not renewing because too expensive which would be the case if I was staying.

Not only questioned my loyalty, but also made outlandish statements along the lines of comparing us to Big East teams and how our schedule is better and that justifies the ticket pricing. Or my favorite that our incoming recruiting class is a program changer. I am not putting our recruiting class down by any means, but they are also not a class that will guarantee a metoric rise back to what UConn basketball was. This process takes time. We have people on our roster rated higher coming out high school than what is coming in and how has that worked out? Never put the cart before the horse.

 

[Dogdeacon]

Honestly WTF does loyalty mean? They are showing YOU that UConn is only as loyal as your next $ - shouldn't loyalty be a two-way street?
If you want donations fine, loyalty to your alma matter or a school you care about matters in substantial ways such as increasing the quality of education, enhancing the schools reputation and helping others.

If you want to charge for tickets fine - the tying of that to fan loyalty is manipulation and that loyalty is in the eye of the beholder (as arbitrated every year by boneyard true fan truthers .

So loyalty is applicable to donations to the university, but to use it as an argument to guilt your customers/patrons to make ticket donations is too on the nose hypocrisy and disingenuous.

 

[Chief00]

The problem they are having is people have tons of priority points from when they were easy to get but have donated the minimum for years. So I guess they figure this is how they get them to pay or leave.

But they didn’t see how this would hurt the people who have been donating and getting tickets for years.

I got to challenge you on this priority points were once easy to get nonsense. For donations to the foundation they have been $100=1 point for many years. Other than a couple of points for UConn Club membership, bonus points that go away in a year and more recently Season Tickets for various sports - it’s been purely about the money for decades.

These cheap S*Bs in the lower bowl have cumulatively given well over $100,000 each. It’s amazing that these sports marketing types we employ now give you these ignorant answers without doing the math. These pseudo narratives carry the day amongst people who don’t do their homework.

 

[Waquoit]

Not to be mean but they are very cheap fans.

Maybe not mean, ignorant. UConn women's fans pay the highest ticket prices in the country.

 

[ConnHuskBask]

Anyone who spends a cent on the current football or basketball program should be considered loyal. Hell, anyone who even gives enough **** to watch the teams or post on this board should be considered pretty loyal given the league and our teams performances.

Maybe its time to reconsidered the $600k were wasting every year on AD Dave and not hit up the guy who's had tickets for 30 years for an extra grand or two to see us take us take on Maryland Eastern Shore and Tulsa.

 

[Chief00]

Here is a portion of the canned response I received from the Athletic Department.

This new program is designed to better support 650+ student athletes and to move towards paying for all $17M worth of scholarships we currently owe back to the University every year. As I'm sure you are aware running a large division I athletics programs takes resources if we want to compete at the highest level. The decision to introduce the scholarship seating program was not taken lightly and is in line with best practices and peer groups from around the country. I understand this change will require you to pay more for your current season tickets at Gampel and the XL Center. This will influence each season ticket holder differently, some will see an increase, some will be required to pay less then what they are currently donating, and others will remain about the same. As we began to analyze our current model and look to make changes we did what is best for UConn Athletics, our donors/ season tickets holders, and most certainly our student athletes.

I'm happy to help you to retain being a season ticket holder, I welcome the opportunity to discuss this more if you are interested.

Thank you for your many years of support. Go Huskies!

Michael


Michael Oblinger
Senior Associate Director of Athletics for Development

I love this part:

This will influence each season ticket holder differently, some will see an increase, some will be required to pay less then what they are currently donating, and others will remain about the same.

I'd love to see the breakdown between % who will see an increase, % who will remain the same and % who will see a decrease.

My guess: 95% will see an increase; 3% will remain about the same 2% will see a decrease

All I can say is sad and insulting logic in that email. How many high paid AD administrators sign off on an email containing such misleading nonsense to anyone familiar with the situation. That’s one place where you should head to cut the cost gap.

 

[John]

All I can say is sad and insulting logic in that email. How many high paid AD administrators sign off on an email containing such misleading nonsense to anyone familiar with the situation. That’s were you should head to cut the cost gap.

The thing they don't seem to be getting is that the season ticket holders are doing THEM the favor, not the other way around. Do they realize how soft the secondary ticket market it for UConn sports??? Heck, for football, we paid the seat donation AND overpaid for the product since I could have gotten similar seats for pennies on the dollar outside the stadium before the game. This is why I canceled the football season tickets this year, it's just not worth it anymore. Now, I did feel badly about doing so, however I no longer feel badly AT ALL due to this basketball bull they are pulling. In fact, we are now considering also canceling our 4 seats and going secondary market for basketball too. It's not like the program is even decent right now, and other than the random interesting OOC opponent, the schedule SUCKS.

 

[CTMike]

Watching UConn Athletics die has been very, very sad to see unfold.

Now they are outright questioning the loyalty of the MOST LOYAL part of their fan base for not paying their ridiculous ransom... and I’m not sad anymore.

I’m pissed. Burn it all down.

Get your collective heads out of your collective asses, you’ve squandered everything good about UConn in the last 30 years.

 

[gampelcrazies]

I got to challenge you on this priority points were once easy to get nonsense. For donations to the foundation they have been $100=1 point for many years. Other than a couple of points for UConn Club membership, bonus points that go away in a year and more recently Season Tickets for various sports - it’s been purely about the money for decades.

These cheap S*Bs in the lower bowl have cumulatively given well over $100,000 each. It’s amazing that these sports marketing types we employ now give you these ignorant answers without doing the math. These pseudo narratives carry the day amongst people who don’t do their homework.

From what I've been told by people who have worked at the UConn club/ticket office. Before UConn got good in the late 80's early 90s it was easier to accumulate points. So since these people got so many points, it makes it almost impossible for people to catch them unless they make a huge lump sum donation.

In fact I'm friends with someone who I know hasn't given as much as us but gets better seats than us.

 

[Excalibur]

From what I've been told by people who have worked at the UConn club/ticket office. Before UConn got good in the late 80's early 90s it was easier to accumulate points. So since these people got so many points, it makes it almost impossible for people to catch them unless they make a huge lump sum donation.

In fact I'm friends with someone who I know hasn't given as much as us but gets better seats than us.

If anything the opposite is true. After the dream season, scores of longtime season ticket holders were displaced by people who came in and simply outbid them, and that accelerated through the 90's and early 2000's.

 

[John]

If anything the opposite is true. After the dream season, scores of longtime season ticket holders were displaced by people who came in and simply outbid them, and that accelerated through the 90's and early 2000's.

we were victims of that, our lower bowl seats got booted into second level (Hartford)

 

[gampelcrazies]

If anything the opposite is true. After the dream season, scores of longtime season ticket holders were displaced by people who came in and simply outbid them, and that accelerated through the 90's and early 2000's.

I know. It happened to us. But the people who had the points weren't. People who were giving decent money and buying season tickets were displaced.

 

[Kathy]

If anything the opposite is true. After the dream season, scores of longtime season ticket holders were displaced by people who came in and simply outbid them, and that accelerated through the 90's and early 2000's.

My family was one of them- despite increasing out donation we got booted upstairs in Gampel, finally made my way back down last year
Went from 1 section over from center court in Hartford to the corner, again made my way back last year

 

[blue93]

Not only questioned my loyalty, but also made outlandish statements along the lines of comparing us to Big East teams and how our schedule is better and that justifies the ticket pricing. Or my favorite that our incoming recruiting class is a program changer. I am not putting our recruiting class down by any means, but they are also not a class that will guarantee a metoric rise back to what UConn basketball was. This process takes time. We have people on our roster rated higher coming out high school than what is coming in and how has that worked out? Never put the cart before the horse.

I'm not going to cal you a liar, but I'm skeptical that a ticket office rep was talking recruiting classes and conference scheduling with you.

 

[John]

I'm not going to cal you a liar, but I'm skeptical that a ticket office rep was talking recruiting classes and conference scheduling with you.

why? The reps this year are much more off-script and aggressive, we've been getting killed over not renewing our football tickets.

 

[ColchVEGAS]

I'm not going to cal you a liar, but I'm skeptical that a ticket office rep was talking recruiting classes and conference scheduling with you.

Oh they did. The exact wording was "we have two 4 Star and a possible top 20 coming next year. You will not be able to get tickets on the secondary market for less than what you would pay for lower bowl tickets."

Also said would you rather be playing the Creightons and Seton Halls like Providence?

It was a very interesting conversation. I would love to give out my reps name but that would be wrong. All I can say is he/she is delusional.

 

[whaler11]

If the reports of what the ticket reps are saying is true people should be relieved of their duties post haste.

This is turning into Springtime for Hitler.

 

[John]

Oh they did. The exact wording was "we have two 4 Star and a possible top 20 coming next year. You will not be able to get tickets on the secondary market for less than what you would pay for lower bowl tickets."

Also said would you rather be playing the Creightons and Seton Halls like Providence?

It was a very interesting conversation. I would love to give out my reps name but that would be wrong. All I can say is he/she is delusional.

sounds like desperation. Also sounds like someone with zero fingers on the pulse of how easy it is to get tickets (not just last season, but for years and years)

 

[gampelcrazies]

If the reports of what the ticket reps are saying is true people should be relieved of their duties post haste.

This is turning into Springtime for Hitler.

Biggest mistake made by the AD and the ticket office was hiring these "ticket reps". They are very little help and not very knowledgeable.