Revenue / 01.27.21

NFL Secondary Ticket Prices Have Not Suffered Due to the Pandemic, but Home Field Advantage Has

Access Staff

Sports Business Daily (01/25/21)

Secondary ticket prices rose while home field advantage fell during the 2020 National Football League season, with 12 teams hosting more than 1,000 fans to six or more games while half did so for the full regular season. Those 12 teams sold about 20% of their 2019 secondary volume, with 10 teams seeing growth in their secondary prices year-on-year (YoY) for sales on or after Aug. 13, when re-manifested tickets went on sale in 2020. The Tampa Bay Buccaneers' signing of Tom Brady paid off, but even excluding them the other 11 teams saw 18% average YoY ticket price growth. Fans in the stands offered a homefield advantage, because for all games with more than 1,000 fans, home teams won by an average of 0.8 points per game, versus losing by 0.4 points per game for all games played in empty stadiums. But although over the past 13 regular seasons the average home field advantage has been 2.3 points per game, 2019 witnessed a sharp drop to -0.01, which appeared to decline in recent seasons. During the postseason, the magnitude of home field rose almost twofold, from 2.3 points per game in the regular season to 4.4 points per game in the postseason over the last 13 seasons. Moreover, the 12 teams that hosted more than 1,000 fans to six or more games saw fans actually purchase their tickets slightly earlier. Of the tickets bought in the last week leading to the game, in 2019 34% of secondary buyers bought them on the day of the game, falling to 26% in 2020.

Read the full story from Sports Business Daily. 

Tags: Sports , News , NFL