Analyzing 15,000+ Sports Bar Visits - Mayweather/McGregor will Bring a Crowd

  OMAHA, NE - 08/24/2017 (PRESS RELEASE JET)

Sports Bars Expected to see Increased Customer Traffic for Mayweather and McGregor Fight Night. 

2017 NBA Finals = 5% Increase in customer traffic
2017 NHL Finals = 22% Increase in customer traffic
Floyd Mayweather Jr. vs. Connor McGregor anticipated having record breaking customer traffic for sports bars around the country. 

Gazella Wifi Marketing solution tracks the number of visits to restaurants around the country. Allowing restaurants, cafes, bars, and other small venues to make better marketing decisions, and collect unique customer profiles to keep in touch with their customers keeping them up to date on whats going on at their favorite BBQ joints, coffee shops, and other fine eateries.

The upcoming Floyd Mayweather Jr. vs. Connor McGregor fight is set to break box office records. The uniqueness of the event is attracting both boxing and UFC fans. The hype has even attracted non-boxing and UFC watchers to join in the fun. Watchers can view the fight on Pay Per View or visit a local sports bar to view the historic fight.

In anticipation of the fight, the Gazella Wifi-Marketing team analyzed just how sporting events affect customer traffic in local sports bars. Pay per view events can attract additional customers as the scarcity of restaurants and sports bars purchasing the events.

After looking at a sample of over 15,000 sports bar visits over the last few months in locations across the United States. (sports bar defined as having 5 or more televisions.)  A few key highlights were shown. For example:

On June 11th, 2017 during the Stanley Cup Finals between the Penguins and the Predators an additional 22% more customers than average made their way to a local sports bar to watch the finals. 

The very next day on June 12th, 2017 the NBA Finals also took place, however many sports bars showed a slight decrease in customer traffic than normal, but did show an uptick in overall Monday traffic by about 5%.

Our team anticipates cities in which the finals took place saw a greater uptick in customer traffic, however for the purposes of the study neutral locations were chosen. 

Interestingly day of week traffic in sports bars throughout the year was relatively unchanged. As most sporting events take place on the weekends or the heavily watched Monday Night Football we anticipated a greater uptick on these days, but data did not indicate a significant change. While a slight increase in visits on the weekends the relatively low change signals diversified offerings from the sports bars such as lunch and weekday specials. 

Monday- 12.53%
Tuesday- 13.43%
Wednesday- 12.12%
Thursday- 13.43%
Friday- 16.12%
Saturday- 16.43%
Sunday- 15.94%

To purchase the PayPerView McGregor/Mayweather fight in a commercial establishment such as a sports bar is not cheap. The fees are calculated by the capacity of the location. Most estimates show that for a sports bar to purchase the pay per view it will be $30 per person. For example if a sports bar hasana occupancy of 200 (Occupancy determined by Fire Marshall) it would be 200x$30 or $6000 just to air the event in your local sports bar.

It is not unheard of for Sports Bars to be charging a hefty cover. For example "DJ's Dugout" in Omaha, NE on most nights is a family friendly sports bar, but come fight night their locations are charging a $40 cover just to enter the establishment. It is expected DJ's Dugout will be at capacity and recommended to arrive early. 

In conclusion, a sports bar with a group of loyal customers willing to spend money on both cover charge and food and drinks, an investment in purchasing the pay per view event will likely return a positive return on investment. However, as sporting events did not show a clear increase in foot traffic across our sample of sports bars proceed with caution.