This is my annual rant on the Bills ticket distribution process:
- Team sells a respectable amount of seasons (52,000+)
- Team sells individual game tickets to STHers...nothing wrong with that. It's a legit STH perk.
- Team announces most games "sold out" after STH sale or group sale date. 8000 tickets reportedly "held back" for potential STHers.
8000 tickets held back for potential season tickets! There's the problem: the Bills get some cheap PR by announcing that individual game tickets are gone, when in reality it is not true. They are creating an artificial "demand market." I still believe the Bills will sell a couple of thousand STs, but 8000? No way. So...after the Detroit preseason game, the team will have about 6000 tickets for the Seattle game to unload, IN THE NEXT WEEK. A sellout should occur, but that's a lot of tickets to flood that market with, only a week or so to go before the Seattle game.
I think in late July, early August, the Bills may start to bleed some tickets into the market, but folks make plans early in the summer which games they attend and if we're told in early June, all but SF and NE are "sold out," well that takes the wind out of alot of sales (pun intended). Now you fine folks fortunate to be able to make your way to WNY for the TBD party have to make a decision, mostly concerning air travel. Do you take a chance now and book a flight? Hotels are usually able to be cancelled pretty easily, but good luck changing your flight plans these days.
The is an annual corner the Bills paint themselves in every year...I think the marketing is misleading and surprised the paid media (Buffalo Snooze, D and C) hasn't caught on to this. Instead, they run the virtually the same press release that OBD hands them.
End of Rant.