UFC 125, 6,978 tickets sold, 5,896 comp tickets

[Liquidrob]

Pretty amazing number, almost as many comp tickets as sold, 1,077 were not sold

http://mmajunkie.com/news/22086/ufc-125-officially-draws-12874-attendees-for-2-17-million-live-gate.mma

but I'm sure it did a million PPV buys

[EmpireWF]

lol rob

if it did over 500,000 buys, it should be considered a success with the only real headliner being Edgar/Maynard on New Year's Day no less.

[SHOGUN]

UFC tickets cost a fucking arm and a leg. I've always wondered how to get a comp ticket.

[EmpireWF]

The cheap tickets are snatched up quick which leaves the bigger priced ones. For a show like that, there's no way they can sell a lot of $500 tickets and up which I surmise is what was left unsold.

[calgaryballer]

7000 people paid $2.1 million.

Diaz v Noons 2 had an attendence of 7559 with a gate of $528k.

Rob, you really need to learn some basic economics. I'm sure the UFC is happy with 7000 people paying an average ticket price of $300. If they wanted to, I'm sure they could reduce prices, bump paid attendance up to the 10-12k range and make the same amount of money.

It's a game of public perception. Being the most expensive ticket in town, usually means its the best show in town

[Liquidrob]

7000 people paid $2.1 million.

Diaz v Noons 2 had an attendence of 7559 with a gate of $528k.

Rob, you really need to learn some basic economics. I'm sure the UFC is happy with 7000 people paying an average ticket price of $300. If they wanted to, I'm sure they could reduce prices, bump paid attendance up to the 10-12k range and make the same amount of money.

It's a game of public perception. Being the most expensive ticket in town, usually means its the best show in town

what does Noons vs Diaz have to do with this? I think you need to stop trolling

[trojan49er]

he was comparing ticket prices. when you consider the finances and profitability of an event (something i assume youre doing here) you have to take into account not just the number of tickets sold, but the average price of those tickets as well. he wasnt trolling, simply stating that even though the UFC event undersold the arena, it still made close to 4 times as much off ticket sales as a comparably selling Strikeforce event due to the difference in ticket prices.

[Liquidrob]

he was comparing ticket prices. when you consider the finances and profitability of an event (something i assume youre doing here) you have to take into account not just the number of tickets sold, but the average price of those tickets as well. he wasnt trolling, simply stating that even though the UFC event undersold the arena, it still made close to 4 times as much off ticket sales as a comparably selling Strikeforce event due to the difference in ticket prices.

another guy who wants to bring up Strikeforce in a thread about the UFC's number of comp'd tickets

You dont think its an interesting stat that they pretty much comp'd as many tickets as they sold? I found it interesting, I have never seen a number that close to the actual ticket sales

[Liquidrob]

Wait, I get it, you guys are telling me the UFC makes more more than Strikeforce, wow, never knew that, next thing you will be telling that they make more money off PPV than Strikeforce does on a showtime show

Thanks for the info

[trojan49er]

im not saying i dont find it interesting, its definitely a little odd, imo. however, you do have to take into consideration that it was a new years show and therefore, there were probably significantly more bigwigs and what have you at the event than at an average UFC show. its just one possibility, and still wouldnt go to explain why there were quite so many comped tickets

[Warner2BruceTD]

Rob, the point clagaryballer was making, was that the UFC is not going to lower ticket prices right now, because they can charge what they are currently charging, and consistantly pull in millions of dollars at the gate, even without coming close to selling out. They could cut the ticket prices in half, and draw more in overall attendance, but at the expense of a lower gate. So you will keep seeing odd paid/comp ratios, because its not a giant concern right now.

It's the same argument that these goofs try to make sometimes "UFC needs to lower their PPV prices to $20, they would do so much more business!!!111!", not realising that if you cut the price in half you need to double the buys to break even on the price cut. That isnt going to happen. UFC is a premium product right now, both live and on PPV, and the strategy is correct. Why should a 5-star restaurant start serving $8 spaghetti & meatball plates, just to double up on number of plates served, but lose money in net sales? Makes no sense not to just keep serving a premium product to premium consumers, and too bad if the "spaghetti and meatball" crowd is left out.

And c'mon man, this entire thread was a subtle troll job, "but I bet they did a million buys", implying the ppv buys are rigged based on live attendance, which are two things that historically have little correlation to each other for various reasons. So of course people are going to "troll" back, but that was your goal anyway.

[Primetime]

Successful troll is successful

[Liquidrob]

Hey look, another thread were everyone wants to count zuffas money

[Warner2BruceTD]

Hey look, another thread were everyone wants to count zuffas money

In a thread about paid attendance vs comps, I would say "counting money" is pretty relevent to the discussion, no?

[Warner2BruceTD]

UFC is playing a dangerous game with all of the comps, because the more you do that, the harder it is to sell tickets when you return to these markets, even if you have something better on top than Frankie Edgar, because people now have the expectation that they don't have to pay. However, like anything else, if you present a product people want to see, it takes core of itself. Edgar isn't someone who people are willing to pay hundreds of dollars to see, so that's what you get if you want to run a million shows and have people like him headlining. Its a slippery slope.