The UFC announced that UFC 129: St. Pierre vs. Shields at Rogers Centre in Toronto sold out in mere minutes.
Via UFC press release:
UFC® 129: ST-PIERRE vs. SHIELDS, which is presented by TapouT®, is the first major mixed martial arts event to ever be held in Ontario. The event doubles the largest gate and attendance records in UFC history. The previous gate record for a UFC event was $5.4 million, which was set on Saturday, Dec. 30, 2006 at MGM Grand Garden Arena in Las Vegas for UFC 66: LIDDELL vs. ORTIZ 2. UFC 124: ST-PIERRE vs. KOSCHECK 2, held at the Bell Centre in Montreal on Dec. 11, 2010, previously held the attendance record with over 23,000 fans.
With two UFC records already shattered, UFC 129 is also the largest single-day event gate in the history of Rogers Centre, which has played home to some of the world’s top entertainment and sporting events.
Via the Vancouver Sun (h/t Bloody Elbow):
While final gate numbers haven’t been tallied for the April 30 card, the sold-out event generated between $10 million-$11 million dollars at the live gate. Originally configured to seat 42,000, those seats were gone within the first hour of Thursday’s pre-sale for UFC Fight Club fans. Opening up more sections for Friday and Saturday sales to newsletter subscribers and the general public, an extra 13,000 seats were made available, allowing more fans to get their hands on the hottest ticket in town.
Payout Perspective:
The record ticket sales shows the growing fan base of MMA. The UFC is set to surpass all records in gate and attendance. It will likely receive a high PPV buy number as well. Its hard to imagine that there were some that did not want the UFC in Ontario. With the anticipated revenue it should gain from the hospitality industry, the Toronto economy should receive a nice, positive jolt thanks to MMA.
It will be interesting to see how the UFC handles the venue. When you hear that the UFC added 13,000 seats from its original venue configuration, one may be skeptical about the quality of the seats. Also, one can only think about last week’s Super Bowl to realize the pitfalls of overselling a stadium. Hopefully, the UFC learned from the Super Bowl and ensures that no one has to watch the fights on a television from inside the stadium.
On another note, it would be interesting to see a stat as to how many people signed up to be a part of the UFC Fight Club for this event so that they could participate in the pre-sale. For $75 (U.S.), one could purchase tickets the first day they were available (Thursday). If not, and you waited until Saturday, you could have been shut out but for the addition of seats.
I have brought up the UFC fan club on here amny times. Its an under estimated revenue stream. It used to cost $99 not sure now maybe $75. But i realized how many people were using it when i attended UFC 68. There was a Q&A with fan club memebers and there were tons. Roughly 500-1000 members. What was so impressive was this is Ohio. Anyone who join the fan club was doing it just for this event. Unlike those close to Vegas who got to purchase tickets for many events over the year. If you have a 1000 for Ohio how many are buying them close to Vegas? You are talking an extra 100K for Ohio.
I believe there is a 6 ticket cap on all Fan club orders. Even with that limit and assuming all members took the max. Thats 7,000 fan club memberships for an extra 525,000 revenue. The real revenue is likely 1 million from just memberships for 1 events. The UFC has to be making many million on the fan club thing every year. With local event taxes on ticket sales and other costs the fan club memberships is become as profitable to the UFC as the gate itself.
smasher, you got a good point.
I bought 6 tickets for event in Toronto. Without the fan club membership there was no chance that i would be able to get tickets. After seeing the UFC in Montreal for their first event in Canada post Zuffa, I thought that it was enough. When I heard they would be holding the Toronto event at the Rogers center, I decided I wanted to be there just so that I could be part of history. I’m familiar with the Rogers center and I can tell you that it would luck if there were say 1000 seats worth paying if you are interesting in actually seeing the fight. The place is just too big for a cage type of event.
Without a doubt I would say that scalpers or after market ticket sellers bought a big chunk of the tickets. Fan club membership is really just another revenue stream for the UFC. A smart one at that. I would suspect that over 50% of tickets sold are in the hands of after market sellers. I think that’s bad for fans, but I don’t know a way that would prevent it.
Anyway, looking forward to the experience, but I don’t think for a minute that 55 thousand people will go through the turnstiles. I’d bet on a number in the low 40’s come fight night.
I would love to be there. I was at UFC 68 and it set the attendance record of 19K and every single one of them was screaming for Couture all 25 minutes of his fight with Sylvia and that was the greatest moment i have ever experienced in MMA. The place was electric. Boston was crazy when Randy come out to fight James Toney but nothing like 68.