College Football Attendance in a Recession

Major Teams Played to Record Crowds in 2008, Small Schools Suffered

Aug 28, 2009

The Big Ten and SEC drew the greatest attendance last year. Michigan, Penn State, Ohio State, Tennessee and LSU all drew more than 700,000 fans to their home games.

Although average attendance at all 3,493 college football games declined 2.2 percent in 2008, the larger schools in Division 1 of the National Collegiate Athletic Association drew a record 43,456,151 fans to their 1,475 games. According to the NCAA, their average attendance dropped 2% to 29,462 per game, but the Division 1 teams set a total attendance record by playing a few more games last year.

With all their seats and parking places sold out for the season, some of the major college football schools have no reason to fear the 2009 recession. They might face a slight decline in hot dog and refreshment sales, but even that is probably no great concern. Once people get into a football stadium they can be counted on to eat and drink in abundant quantities.

Attendance in NCAA Divisions 2 & 3

On the other hand, small schools with less than great teams may feel the recession and unemployment pinch. Some of them started losing fans in 2008. Their average attendance figures for last year:

Even those figures may be exaggerated because some schools include tickets in student fees and count those numbers in their attendance whether the students attend or not.

The 2009 season could be worse for the small schools because although the recession showed signs of letting up in August, the nation’s unemployment was expected to climb to 10% by year end.

Both large universities and small colleges were also feeling the impact of tightened budgets, applying greater financial pressure on small football programs that have not been self sustaining. How long can a football program averaging a few thousand fans per game survive in a small school struggling through a recession?

Big Ten & SEC Attract Most Fans

It’s a different story, however, in the Big Ten and Southeastern Conference (SEC) and a few other major football schools. Four college teams averaged over 100,000 fans per home game last year. The top three were Big Ten Conference teams: Michigan (108,571), Penn State 108,254) and Ohio State (104,976).

Tennessee (101,448) was fourth and Texas (98.046) was fifth. The other five top ten teams all came from the SEC. They were:

Notre Dame Led Independents

Notre Dame led all independents, averaging 80,795 in its six home games at South Bend.

Tom Van Riper reported in the August issue of Forbes Magazine that the nation’s major college football programs were doing very well with 2009 football ticket sales. Notre Dame, for instance, raised its prices and still sold out early. Van Riper said prices for online resale tickets were running at $1,000 and reached up to $3,500 for the traditional battle between Notre Dame and Southern Cal at South Bend.

Some schools like LSU have long waiting lists for season tickets and require donations to the program just to be eligible to purchase tickets.

StubHub.com, an online secondary ticket seller, told Forbes that sales volume for teams like Notre Dame, Ohio State, Texas and Alabama are up significantly already this year.

In college football, it appears the rich and strong are getting richer and stronger while some of the smaller programs may be headed for tough seasons, win or lose.

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