‘We are not going anywhere’ Jets co-owner Chipman assures fans that push for more ticket-buying support from business community an operational necessity, not a threat to leave city By: Martin Cash Posted: 7:00 PM CDT Wednesday, Apr. 12, 2023 Last Modified: 7:50 PM CDT Wednesday, Apr. 12, 2023 Updates

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Winnipeg Jets co-owner Mark Chipman stickhandled through fear and anger Wednesday over what some fans perceived as a veiled threat the team could leave the city without a boost in ticket sales.

“I don’t want people to be alarmed or concerned,” Chipman said in a sit-down interview with the Free Press.

“That is the last thing that this is. I know (that kind of reaction) is unavoidable and I know that the history is deeply ingrained, but we are not going anywhere.”

“That is the last thing that this is. I know (that kind of reaction) is unavoidable and I know that the history is deeply ingrained, but we are not going anywhere.”–Mark Chipman

True North Sports and Entertainment — the corporation that owns the National Hockey League club — launched a controversial Forever Winnipeg season-ticket drive Tuesday at the Winnipeg Chamber of Commerce luncheon, kicking it off with a 90-second promotional video asking, “Is Winnipeg an NHL city?”

Chipman told business owners attending the lunch that the team has lost 3,000 season-ticket customers since the beginning of the pandemic, and that the Jets rely on individual fan accounts for 85 per cent of the total sold. The other six Canadian teams in the league enjoy a range of between 45 and 85 per cent season-ticket support from their business communities.

https://youtu.be/MaFSXu5V0V0

Doubtless, the pandemic, runaway inflation and the Jets’ at-times frustrating performance on the ice have, in varying degrees, contributed to the less-enthusiastic turn of events at the box office after the lengthy honeymoon period that followed their relocation from Atlanta in 2011, when games were the hottest ticket in town.

Brad Ritchie, a financial planner who lives in Morden, has been a Jets season ticket holder since 2011. He has attended about 20 games this season.

He didn’t appreciate the new ticket-drive’s tone.

“At first blush, I found it kind of ominous and slightly threatening, with the images (of 1996, when the first iteration of the Jets left the city and relocated to Phoenix),” said Ritchie.

“It’s rather tone-deaf at this moment, to go to your customers, when you sell a luxury item and say, ‘Be careful, we may not be providing this luxury to you any longer.’ Especially when people are having a difficult time with basic living costs.”–Brad Ritchie

“It’s rather tone-deaf at this moment, to go to your customers, when you sell a luxury item and say, ‘Be careful, we may not be providing this luxury to you any longer.’ Especially when people are having a difficult time with basic living costs.”

He said there used to be no risk to having season tickets because, in his experience, they could be easily sold, when necessary, at full price.

“Now there’s risk because the shine is off,” he said. “Try to sell a Tuesday ticket against (cellar-dwellers) San Jose right now; you can hardly give it away.”

Chipman acknowledged there was plenty of concern about navigating the reaction the fan base might have to a pitch for more support.

But he said rather than a threat to the future of the franchise, the campaign is just the normal course of affairs for a commercial entity with 300 full-time employees dealing with the cyclical nature of business.

And the Jets, who clinched a spot in the playoffs Tuesday — in the second-last game of the regular season, following a post-New Year’s plunge from top spot in the Western Conference to possibly missing the post-season derby for the second consecutive year — had to address the changes in the marketplace, Chipman and John Olfert, TNSE’s president and chief operating officer, said.

Chipman, who wears his heart on his sleeve when it comes to his commitment to the city, said he understands concerns people have that this is the first step down the road that led to the departure of the Jets the first time around.

“I don’t know many folks who have been down that path as long as I have,” he said. “That’s how I got into this in the first place. I feel there is a very, very visceral connection between the Winnipeg Jets and our community inside of me.”

Through the windows of TNSE’s new offices inside one of the buildings in True North Square, where the construction of a hotel continues across the street, Olfert said, “Look around. We are seven buildings in.”

The company’s real estate development in the downtown may soon grow again as it is in negotiations to acquire an interest in Portage Place.

Olfert said True North’s initial Drive to 13,000 season tickets — with a wait-list of 8,000 — in June 2011 was so successful it not only provided a secure base of ticket revenue for 10 years, but also effectively skewed the ticket-holder base heavily towards individual ticket holders, compared to business clients.

That was not an issue for the first decade of the NHL franchise’s life.

“We enjoyed unusual circumstances for the first 10 years. We really did,” Chipman said.

But now that wait-list has been exhausted and the market has changed. There could be debate about whether they reacted fast enough, Olfert said.

“There was no need to do a lot of marketing. We were doing awareness campaigns and staying top of mind, but the notion of selling was less a priority in those early years,” he said.

They figure the pandemic cost the team about 2,000 subscribers and then they lost another 1,000 — about 10 per cent of their base — through the normal churn rate.

“We have transitioned in the last two years from being a service operation to a sales operation,” Olfert said.

Chipman was careful not to divulge too much about the team’s financial position, but he did allow the operation has lost money over the last couple of years.

It has not, however, been a result of penny-pinching. The company has spent as much on improving Canada Life Centre as it spent constructing the building — then named the MTS Centre when it opened its doors in 2004 — $100 million.

Chipman is glad that Winnipeg fans are no longer satisfied with just being able to get into the building. They expect the team to win.

“We are trying to win. We are doing everything we can to win,” he said.

“We are trying to win. We are doing everything we can to win.”–Mark Chipman

That includes spending to the league salary cap for players, something that was not the case when True North acquired the Atlanta Thrashers. The cap, which was US$82.5 million this season, is expected to rise by at least US$1 million next year. Players are paid in American dollars.

And with the U.S.-Canada exchange rate that was at par in 2011 and is now at about $1.30, the payroll has doubled in 12 years.

“Being a cap team in the smallest market in the league is achievable, thankfully, but we have to pull on all the levers to do that,” Chipman said.

— With files from Erik Pindera

martin.cash@freepress.mb.ca