After the Clippers lost at home to the Warriors on Wednesday night, Blake Griffin was frustrated with the lack of fan support at Staples Center. Griffin may have a point as Clippers fans are not going to home games because frankly, they can't afford it.
From Bill Plaschke of the Los Angeles Times:
Five years ago, at the beginning of the Blake Griffin era, JoLai Draper was paying $34 a game for each of her two seats. Next season she will be paying $60 per ticket.
"Their prices have nearly doubled, but during that same time, my salary hasn't doubled, so I have to figure out a way to make it work," said Draper, a Boeing procurement agent. "If Blake wants to give me $5,000, I'd be happy to keep my seat and cheer for every game."
It makes sense that ticket prices have increased as the Clippers have gotten better. This is basic marketing. The Clippers are good so more fans will pay to see them. This does come at a cost as it seems like long time fans are no longer able to afford the cost of going to a game.
Plaschke notes that Draper sells her season tickets to big matchups to help pay for the cost of her season tickets. This makes sense but is tragic to hear. A fan usually buys season tickets to support their team all season long. But due to the high cost of tickets, Draper and other fans have to pick and choose which games they can show their support.
Gillian Zucker the team's president of business operations emailed Pashcke about the increases in ticket prices.
In regard to rising prices, she wrote, "Most of our fans saw only a 2% to 4% increase in their ticket prices. We are confident that with our low entry-level price point and fair, competitive pricing for a world-class product, we are delivering great value."
As for fans reselling tickets, she wrote, "We have not discouraged fans from re-selling tickets..we just want to strongly encourage them to resell them to Clippers fans so that we can maintain a competitive advantage for our team.''
Until third party sites like Stubhub, allow ticket sellers to pick and choose who they can sell their tickets to, this will never happen. Also, how would one prove that they are an actual Clippers fan?
Despite the high costs, people who could be Clippers fans or could not be, are heading to Staples Center for home games. They have the fourth-best home record in the NBA (61-18) since the start of the 2013 season and have sold out 181 straight home games since 2011.
But being a Clippers fan is a legitimate struggle. Playing in LA with the Lakers, they are always looked at as the second basketball team in the city. Plus as Plaschke's conversations with Draper and other season ticket holder shows, the increases in ticket prices makes being a Clippers fan difficult.
Owner Steve Ballmer is a shrewd businessman so hopefully he can figure this out before the team's only fan is Billy Crystal.
