When is a stadium not a stadium?
The Cleveland Indians are getting ready to open a skating track and 10-lane snow tubing hill at Progressive Field during the offseason.
鈥enior director of merchandising and licensing Kurt Schloss declined to specify financial goals. He says the aim is attracting fans downtown during the offseason.
That鈥檚 from the . That raises the question of why the Indians would offer a service to attract 鈥渇ans downtown鈥�. Color me skeptical, but I doubt it鈥檚 much of a factor. Does Target sell products and to attract people to the mall? No. Target does what it does to generate profits. The fact that customers may have to come to the mall to get to Target is coincidence.
The stadium gets used 81 times a year for baseball games. That means there鈥檚 284 days a year that it stands empty and generates no cash flow. Why not make it into a winter sports park and generate some cash during the offseason? That鈥檚 why we have concerts and football games at ballparks, even if some ballparks are a bit for a gridiron.
It鈥檚 certainly possible that getting people downtown is an actual goal since the stadium is owned by the city of Cleveland and is managed by the Gateway Economic Development Coporation, a public body. If so, they鈥檇 set a lower price to attract more people to the area than if all they cared about was customer traffic at the stadium.
The admission price for 2 hours of snow tubing at Progressive ($20) is higher than the ($13) at our local ski 鈥渕ountain鈥� in south central Minnesota, Mount Kato. It鈥檚 also more expensive than 2 hours of tubing at ($16), a ski area just east of the Twin Cities. Tubing for two hours at A, a ski area 30 miles from Cleveland, costs $15. I鈥檓 no tubing price expert in any way, shape, or form, but $20 for tubing at Progressive seems a bit steep to be the result of an attempt to bring people downtown. Maybe it鈥檚 a novelty thing.
Lastly, is this a signal that the Indians are in financial trouble? Not at all. The stadium is going to be empty during the winter months regardless of team profitability. They might as well put it to some use.
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