Written By: Steve Macy, NMSU Associate Athletic Director
January 26, 2009

I am currently working on a new ticketing plan for the 2009 football season. Currently is probably not the right word, as it has been a work in progress over the past year and a half. I am in the final planning and approval stages of what could be a monumental plan to increase attendance and revenues.

Unfortunately, I cannot release the details of this plan until it gets through all the levels of approval, including Dr. Boston, the university CFO and President Cruzado. However, I am very excited about this plan and what it will mean for the future of NM State football. Let me give you some data that we are working with to create this plan.

• In 2008, we sold around $600,000 in football tickets.
• Season tickets were increased by over 1000 seats to a historical high of 7,430. That is a total of 44,580 seats.
• We sold 36,313 single-game tickets, but 8,856 were sold to the last game at $2. Of the remaining 27,357 tickets sold at regular rates, 15,837 were sold for the UNM game. That leaves just 11,520 single-game tickets sold the rest of the year.
• We need to make the NCAA 15,000 ticket requirement in 2009.
• We need to increase total football revenue from the $600,000 budget achieved in 2008
• Every successful sports property sells more tickets before the season starts than in-season

Many properties simply increase prices to raise revenues and is the route that I have been pressed to enact by the university. However, the plan that I have submitted takes a more complicated approach intent on changing buying behavior and rewarding the type of buying habits that are most beneficial and rewarding to the best fans.

I hope to have an announcement of the new plan in the next few days and will keep you all up to speed. If you are interested in receiving a personal copy of the press release, please send me a blank email with the words “football plan” in the subject line. Email address is: smacy@nmsu.edu.