Hurricanes Bucking Attendance Trends

As someone who has been involved in game-day entertainment for more than a decade now, I’ve become quite fascinated in consumer trends in the Western Hockey League.

For some reason, this year has seemed a little quieter around the Scotiabank Saddledome for Calgary Hitmen games. Instead of just shrugging it off, I decided to put on my math nerd pants, and investigated.

As it turns out, I wasn’t wrong. Through the first ten home games, the Hitmen have totalled 55,475 fans in the stands. That’s down slightly from the 55,955 of 2018, but when you look at the last five years, it’s down considerably. The high over the five years was 72,126 in 2016.

Now I’m not trying to get too political here but given all the conversation around the economy and jobs and everything else in our world, I thought I would see if this is something seen across the other Alberta markets.

In Edmonton, the pace has also slowed down considerably. Through the first nine home games of the season, the Oil Kings picked up 47,784 fans. That’s down from the 2016 top number of 77,342, where they actually had a couple of nights with over 10,000 in the stands.

In Red Deer, things have dropped off as well. From the high of 43,343 in the first eight games of 2015 to 30,124 in the first eight of this season.

In Medicine Hat, the story is the same. The Tigers have seen 21,557 fans through the turnstiles through their first seven home games. That’s down from 31,290 in 2015.

And then there’s Lethbridge, who is trending in the opposite direction. Through the first ten home games, the Hurricanes have attracted 37,134 fans. That’s up from 35,966 last season, and it’s been trending up each year over the last five. Back in 2015, the number at the Enmax Centre was 32,193.

Now there is one slight caveat with the numbers and that is with the ratio of weekend games versus weekday games. The Hurricanes have had two midweek games thus far, while at this point last year, they had four. That said, the number has hovered between two and four over the last five years.

The reason for the numerical discrepancy is up for anyone to argue. It could be the number of minor hockey teams that come through at this time of year. It could also be the nightly promotions, or the weather, or the ticket prices or the quality of the team on the ice, or yes, the economic conditions in each city and the amount of disposable income people have.

I know it’s a lot of numbers, but it is interesting to look at the quantitative evidence in front of us when we’re asking questions about the atmosphere in each of the WHL’s rinks through the first quarter of the season and to ask why something is happening.