The Colorado Avalanche Are Back

Are you an NHL fan? This week hockey is having their mini camp in order to get ready for the abbreviated NHL Season.  The Avalanche will face Minnesota in their first of 48 games on Saturday.  The team will be offering promotions and contests in order to thank the fans for staying with them through this difficult strike.


There isn't much the Colorado Avalanche can do to woo back longtime fan Paul Wampler even though the 49-year-old is precisely the one the club is working hard to keep.

An ardent fan who has attended a few games each year as economics allowed, Wampler said the team's lockout-shortened season was unnecessary and hurtful.

"This was just stupid, completely avoidable," said the wholesale auto parts worker, adding he won't be buying a ticket this go-around. "Hockey is an expensive ticket. Most fans are blue-collar types, and it's not easy to buy into it blindly anymore."

Without the lockout, the Avs' 82-game season would have started Oct. 11 at home. Following the approval of a new contract between players and owners, it opens

a 48-game schedule Saturday at Minnesota.

This isn't the first time NHL owners and players squared off in a lockout. Most recently, the entire 2004-05 season was canceled.

Despite the tarnished history, the Avalanche is pushing a variety of ticket promotions to draw back a fan base that once rivaled the league's best. And although the Avs say 90 percent of last year's season-ticket pool remained true, the team won't say how that number compares with the Stanley Cup years of yore.

"In a shortened season, you have to line things up just right and quickly," said Kurt Schwartzkopf, chief marketing officer at Kroenke Sports and Entertainment, the Avalanche owners.

"With a schedule so quick to be done, it's a game-by-game map-out to be customer friendly. We apologize to the fans that they're not watching hockey," he said.

The team plans to make that clear with an apology letter handed to each fan who attends next Tuesday's home opener, Schwartzkopf said. It will be signed by owner Stan Kroenke, general manager Greg Sherman, coach Joe Sacco and captain Gabriel Landeskog.

Like nearly every other hockey franchise in the league, the Avalanche is proffering deals to entice as well as entertain.

For instance, tickets to the home opener, against the reigning Stanley Cup champion Los Angeles Kings, are being offered at a 2-for-1 price — and season ticket holders can also grab four free additional tickets.

The following game, Jan. 24, is against Columbus, not a game that usually draws a crowd. The Avs' answer: Dollar Dog Night! Oh, yeah, and Guys Night Out, with heavy discounts in the cost of a ticket.

"We understand the work involved," Schwartzkopf said of getting fans back into the Pepsi Center. "The mission is not taken lightly and the fans understand that we get that."

Although last year's NBA lockout gives Kroenke executives valuable experience in winning back fans, it's not a slam dunk.

"I've always felt the Avs were very fortunate to have won early in their history here and there weren't many who became Avs fans when they were bad," said Dan Price, owner of Adrenalin Inc., a sports marketing firm in Denver. "They didn't feel a slide in attendance for a long time."

That means a team that went into the lockout in bad shape was likely to come out the same way, Price said.

But when all is said and done, there's not a whole lot this year that's different than last. While season ticket holders are getting a number of complimentary tickets, they're also getting a few perks such as free jerseys.

"The fair-weather fan will show up to the team that performs, and potentially a short season will benefit them," said Marc Ganis, owner of Sportscorp in Chicago, which runs a number of marketing enterprises. "I'm not so sure the season-ticket base is where the big focus will be."

Indeed. In Minnesota, where tickets can be hard to come by, some fans upset by the lockout are rallying for a boycott of games, espousing attendance at local businesses around the home arena to watch the contests instead.

In Chicago, the Blackhawks have come to running a police-like car about town with a large placard on top proclaiming the few days until opening night. The idea is for fans to tweet when they've seen it and win player-autographed merchandise.

St. Louis Blues fans are allowed free access to all practices and given face-to-face Q&A sessions with the players afterward.

Ultimately, though, no matter the promotion or the discount, the product is what matters — and the Avs control that future.

"If the Avs get the Stanley Cup, no one will remember it's in a short season," Price said. "Winning takes care of everything."



For more information see the Denver Post.