kinnick expansion

RoseBowlBound

RoseBowlBound

Well-Known Member
I got in an arguement lately with a fellow hawk fan about adding seats on to kinnick. I think that kinnick is perfict right now and there is the perfect balance between supply and demand. He thinks that we would sell out 80000 seats easily. imo the only way wr expand is if isu tanks the program and we start finishing tip 25 every year.
what do u guys think
 
I think we can fill an 80,000 plus stadium as long as we don't start having consistent 7-5 or 6-6 seasons.
 
DJL said:
I think we can fill an 80,000 plus stadium as long as we don't start having consistent 7-5 or 6-6 seasons.
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I'm not sure I agree with this. We weren't actually filling Kinnick as recently as 2008. We might have had sellouts, but not everybody showed up. And that was after just a couple of down years.

It's perfect just the way it is, IMO.
 
I think they could easily add another 4000 - 5000 seats by expanding in to the SW and SE part of the end zones which are basically open today and still sell out no problem with around 75,000. That would enclose the entire south end zone and make it really loud.

I'd say the next logical expansion after that would be to build sky box suites along the east side lines above the current seating like Wisconsin did. They would have to get creative from an engineering standpoint as you have the street pretty close to the stadium but it could be done. That could easily add another 4000 seats to get to 79,000 or so.
 
tm3308 said:
I'm not sure I agree with this. We weren't actually filling Kinnick as recently as 2008. We might have had sellouts, but not everybody showed up. And that was after just a couple of down years.

It's perfect just the way it is, IMO.
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You may be right. The years we have some level of expectations, tickets are really hard to come by. For example, I couldn't get season tickets this year, and I can't seem to find tickets for less than $100 for Michigan or MSU, and we aren't setting the world on fire this year. However, I have been to plenty of games over the years where the corners have had some seats open. I'll change my original statement to I WANT us to be able to sell out an 80,000 seat stadium.
 
RoseBowlBound said:
I got in an arguement lately with a fellow hawk fan about adding seats on to kinnick. I think that kinnick is perfict right now and there is the perfect balance between supply and demand. He thinks that we would sell out 80000 seats easily. imo the only way wr expand is if isu tanks the program and we start finishing tip 25 every year.
what do u guys think
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i'll take your side of the deal. with ticket prices the way they are, plus 'licensing fees' it is a pretty steep price to pay, especially for people driving from outside of the IC area. economy is pretty rough.

here is a 'case-in-point' to backup your claim.

Back in 2008 Iowa was riding a 36 straight home sellout streak up until the last home game of the season v. Purdue. The streak ended that day, by a handful of tickets. That was senior day. A good team featuring Shonn Greene. A team that won the Outback Bowl by dismantling South Carolina (I'm sure this is the season, but going from memory here).

If Kinnick could easily sell out 10k more seats at current pricing, there should be no problem selling out a game as described above, no?
 
80,000 seats gets you in tier one. 70,000 gets you in tier 2. Probably fine for Iowa to be there. Just important to stay there. So you need to be cognizant of where other programs are expanding to make sure you keep up.
 
Hawk1960 said:
I think they could easily add another 4000 - 5000 seats by expanding in to the SW and SE part of the end zones which are basically open today and still sell out no problem with around 75,000. That would enclose the entire south end zone and make it really loud.

I'd say the next logical expansion after that would be to build sky box suites along the east side lines above the current seating like Wisconsin did. They would have to get creative from an engineering standpoint as you have the street pretty close to the stadium but it could be done. That could easily add another 4000 seats to get to 79,000 or so.
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IIRC, the grandstands on the sidelines are on a different slope than the south endzone, making it impossible to connect them.

And, even if they could add seats, I don't see them being able to fill them in years where we aren't expected to be good.
 
To my knowledge season tickets have been sold out for 3 years with many people being denied tickets. Continue that for the next 5 years and you have a legitimate case to expand. Remember we lost 1,500 seats with the renovation. 75,000 sounds good, might help keep ticket prices stable for 5 years at a time.
 
I think filling in the South corners makes sense. I'm gonna guess that adds around 2000 seats or so. That would push capacity to near 73000. I think demand is there to justify that type of addition & it would probably not take some crazy amount of $ to do the addition.
 
I really think they should go to 80K just because it is kind of the threshold of the next tier of FB programs IMO. It wouldnt be hard at all and would actually add to the facility. They could even lower the ticket price a little....but we know that wouldnt happen.
 
ISU has absolutely nothing to do...with the fact that we fill our stadium. Never has. We were putting more butts in the seats when they were a bowl team under Johnny Majors and we stunk. (late 70s).
 
There is no need to expand. You always want some extra demand. There is not enough excess demand to add 5000 more seats let alone 10000.
 
I'd like to see the non seat taxed seats get wider so people don't sit in my lap. Put the boxes over the east side seats and widen the other seats making capacity to 75,000
 
Adding 3 to 5k seats would be nice so I could get some tickets at face value instead of buying some of the "Invested" hawk fans outrageous prices to go. My friends and I really enjoyed the 3 game ticket packages when they were available just a couple years ago. Squeezing out the traveling hawk fans is frustrating to say the least.
 
Honestly I could see an addition of 1,500 to 2,000 seats in a few years, but nothing more than that any time soon. I wish we could be selling out games at a 80,000 or 90,000 venue, but it just wont happen with the small population in our state. I think Kinnick is great the way it is.
 
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