Packed to the rafters … 200 times in a rowMATTHEW SEKERES
Globe and Mail
VANCOUVER — Chris Zimmerman inherited a good situation.
Unlike his predecessors, the Vancouver Canucks president stepped into a string of full houses at General Motors Place when he joined the NHL franchise in October of 2006. Tonight, the Canucks will face the Dallas Stars before the 200th consecutive sellout, a phenomenon that began in November of 2002.
To the outsider, Vancouver looks every bit the hockey hotbed as Toronto or Montreal, a place where demand to see the local NHL team far outweighs ticket supply at 18,630-seat GM Place.
It's at the point where the Canucks now have waiting-list commitments for 8,000 seats on top of a season-ticket base of 17,000, meaning only a handful of single-game tickets
But Zimmerman doesn't want to hear comparisons to the sold-out-from-now-to-eternity Toronto Maple Leafs.
"That's an incredibly dangerous thing that I would never say," Zimmerman said. "We talk all the time about 'don't take any of this for granted.' Loyalty can be a fragile thing."
Especially in Vancouver, which has historically been a fickle market.
Save two runs to the Stanley Cup final in 1982 and 1994, the Canucks have never been more popular than they are today, but there are enough cautionary tales for Zimmerman and Co. not to rest on laurels. For the moment, the team's slogan — We Are All Canucks — extends to all parts of British Columbia, but there were days when such a statement would have been a single entendre.
Consider that the team was Stanley Cup runner-up in 1994, yet came back the next year to its worst crowds in two decades, a combination of excessive ticket price raises — in some cases as much as 50 per cent — and a 104-day league lockout that delayed the opening of the season until January.
Fans rejected both with their wallets.
One year later, the team moved into a new, downtown building and corrected its error by freezing ticket prices. Yet even with people curious to see the new digs, hundreds of empty seats remained at every game.
Then, in the last two seasons before the turn of the century, attendance dipped again under what Zimmerman called "the perfect storm of disenchantment."
In 1998-99, Brian Burke became president and general manager of the team, replacing the popular Pat Quinn and inheriting unpopular head coach Mike Keenan. The previous season, popular veteran Trevor Linden had been traded to the New York Islanders having already ceded his captaincy to big-money free-agent Mark Messier, whose Broadway popularity did not translate on the Lower Mainland after three of his worst offensive seasons.
Attendance dropped by 1,300 per game in Burke's first season, then plummeted to 14,649 in 1999-00 after Marc Crawford replaced Keenan as coach.
"There was a lack of connection with the community," Zimmerman said. "I'll be honest with you, it's a little hard for me to imagine."
Just as hard to imagine was Burke's routine. This wasn't a sunbelt market that needed primers on the hockey or exposure to a new team, yet Burke would make four public appearances daily, including speeches before and after dinners, selling the community on the team.
Anyone who owned four season tickets and did not renew received a call from Burke, and every year, the Canucks executive would attend a chamber of commerce breakfast with the humble goal of selling four season tickets.
"It was poor performance followed by the beheading of several popular figures. Firing Pat Quinn did not go over well; he was very popular, and so was Trevor," Burke said. "The presence of the [since-departed NBA franchise Vancouver] Grizzlies I thought was a big drain. There are a lot of people who want to bring their kid to a sporting event and basketball works just as well."
Burke said the tide started to turn due to three factors.
First, the Canucks began concentrating on group sales, believing that getting people into GM Place, even with discounted tickets, would keep them coming back.
Second, the team's style of play changed to suit Burke's fiery personality. Crawford instituted an up-tempo style that produced goals and fights and one of the NHL's best lines in Markus Naslund, Brendan Morrison and Todd Bertuzzi.
Third, after a five-year absence, the Canucks returned to the postseason in 2001.
By the beginning of the 2002-03 season, the Canucks were a tough ticket again. But more recently, even with a 99-per-cent season-ticket renewal rate last year, Zimmerman has attempted to strengthen the bond between the community and the team. Here, the comparisons to the Maple Leafs or Montreal Canadiens are welcome.
"The one thing those franchises might have on us is longer histories," Zimmerman said. "[But] we want to create something that, over time, has that kind of brand power and fan affinity."
Zimmerman said hockey in Canada can be compared to soccer in Brazil or Europe because it is so much a part of the local culture. The team is constantly looking for examples, be it from Manchester United or the NFL's Green Bay Packers, to further seed the Canucks into the DNA of British Columbians.
"In some ways, I believe every NHL Canadian city looks at its NHL team to define part of the community," said Zimmerman, a New Yorker and life-long hockey fan who came to the team from equipment manufacturer Nike Bauer. "So, giving back in a significant way, that's an important element."
The Canucks' community partnerships are so vast they cover four pages of the team's media guide and include the Canucks for Kids Fund, which has contributed more than $23-million to charities in the last two decades, including $2-million last season to Canuck Place, a hospice for children living with life-threatening conditions.
Zimmerman made the team's website his top priority and said it is now the No. 1 team site in the NHL. It is updated daily and includes contests, searches and videos, but it also allows the team to cull feedback from fans.
"There is no shortage of passion," Zimmerman said. "Our job is to fuel that passion."
No comments:
Post a Comment