Season-ticket sales are trending down significantly for what has traditionally been the University of Hawaii’s two best-selling teams: football and Rainbow Wahine volleyball.
Football, which had already dipped to at least a
30-year low, is running
13 percent below the same point last year, UH said. This comes despite UH offering seven home games this year for the same price of what was a six-game package in 2017 and the return of the run-and-shoot offense.
Rainbow Wahine sales are running 6 percent below this time last year despite coming off an NCAA Tournament appearance.
As of Wednesday — and with seven weeks to go before the first home game at Aloha Stadium — UH said it had sold 11,442 football season tickets. Last year’s final tally was 14,294.
Meanwhile, 3,382 season tickets have been sold so far for women’s volleyball. Last year’s sales totaled 3,826.
Tickets went on sale for football in April and for women’s volleyball in May.
Football is the largest revenue engine for the 21-team athletic department through direct and indirect streams, including tickets, sponsorships, media rights and donations.
UH officials have told the Board of Regents that football continues to make money, helping to fund some nonincome sports, just not as much as it has contributed in previous years.
Season tickets account for the biggest portion of football ticket revenue, sometimes topping 75 percent. Last year’s total football ticket revenue, $2.6 million, was approximately half that of a decade ago, when the Warriors were coming off a 12-0 regular season and an appearance in the Sugar Bowl. Women’s volleyball brought in $840,129 in total ticket revenue in 2017.
Last year, with football and Rainbow Wahine volleyball getting off to slow starts, they finished down a combined $315,712 in ticket revenue from 2016, contributing to the athletic department’s anticipated deficit of more than $2 million for the fiscal year that closed June 30. Football went 3-9, and Rainbow Wahine volleyball, which rallied from an 0-3 start, went 20-8.
Even with the decline, UH football has ranked in the top half of the 12-member Mountain West Conference in season-ticket sales. League champion Boise State, which sold 17,633 in 2017 — its lowest figure in several years — led.
But UH faces higher travel costs and is one of just two schools in the MWC that does not own or operate the stadium in which it plays.
The UH football team opens its season Aug. 25 at Colorado State and plays its first home game Sept. 1 against Navy. The Rainbow Wahine open their season with the Rainbow Wahine Classic on Aug. 24 against Gonzaga.
Along with season tickets, UH is also selling parking passes for its football games.