Fresno State Athletics
Bulldog Business Report with Thomas Boeh- Sept. 30
10/4/2005 12:00:00 AM | General
Oct. 4, 2005
DOG ZONE: The 6 p.m. kickoff for the Sept. 27 game against Toledo made it somewhat challenging for fans arriving from home, work, etc. to purchase concessions. Is this issue being looked into?
Thomas Boeh: "Last week was only my second game but I did receive some feedback as far as concessions. I'm not sure that we were prepared enough with the game being a 6 pm. kickoff. A lot of people were not able to go home or tailgate and I think they were counting on eating dinner at a game. We take responsibility for that; we just did not anticipate that and the same goes for our concessions. I can tell you we will try to do a better job of that in the future, specifically the Boise State game being a 5 p.m. kickoff. We are planning to also kick around the idea of putting some packages together, so people know they can come right to the game from work...At the same time, we are going to work closely with our concessions supplier (Ovations) and delve into the concerns and constructive criticism of our fans. We are going to work on this very seriously because it is certainly part of the entertainment package."
DZ:Who sets the prices for concession items in the stadium?
TB: "Normally, it is set by the vendor with some kind of approval from the institution. Just talking with a few people who have been around for a little while, it looks as if our prices have gone up recently. That's something we can negotiate. Now we might not be able to negotiate until we get to 2008- that's part of the deal. We do get an opportunity to have approval over prices but if we want to demand a certain percentage, then we have to give those vendors more leeway to charge what they believe the market will bear. We will look into that and negotiate as we continue discussions with Ovations."
DZ:What are your thoughts on alcohol sales at Bulldog sporting events?
TB: "When you talk about alcohol sales, there are really two forms of income when speaking about Bulldog Stadium. You have the advertising sales from the signage and with that signage, you can do anything you want (responsible consumption messages, designated driver messages, etc.). Then of course, you have the sales themselves. Where we differ from a lot of our peers around the country is that we do sell beer on site. We stop sales at the beginning of the second half but it is still unusual to sell beer at a collegiate event. It's just not done that much out there. The reality is we have to determine what is in the best interest of the institution, the athletes and the appropriate thing to do. Other organizations are managing it as well and it may get mandated to us eventually. If that happens, then it happens. It's not something that we will have any recourse on, we would just have to accept it. In the short term we have to make sure we are being responsible on site and that our fans and student-athletes are as safe as they can be in that environment. Hopefully we people will be responsible and we can continue to have a good time."
DZ:What can be done to minimize the amount of time standing in line to purchase concessions?
TB: "We're going to leave it to the folks in that industry. A lot of times it's the equipment and I've been around those people long enough to know things like speed-pours or automated equipment can help speed up the process. Sometimes it's your personnel and how quickly they can make change or pricing changes might affect that. We will talk with those folks and see what we can do. When you have 40,000 people in one place and everyone is going to the same place at halftime, it's just unavoidable. It doesn't mean we can't be more efficient and I can assure you we will look into that."
