The Jets made a big splash when they sold two personal seat licenses for 50-yard-line, front-row seats for $200,000 each over the weekend. That set a new record for professional sports in our fair land and seemed to offer a good omen for the auction of the remaining Coaches Club seats this week. There will be no recession for the Jets!
As it turns out, the market didn't remain that strong. Oh, the Jets still sold seats for $65,100 and others for more than $50,000 but, as the seats moved away from midfield and back a few rows, the prices began dropping. As of right now, according to Darren Rovell of CNBC, the average price is $19,534 and that's with most of the biggest ticket, er, tickets already off the market. All of which means the Jets are going to be hard-pressed to reach a per seat average of $25,000.
Why does that matter? The Jets are selling other tickets with a fixed PSL price of $25,000. Those tickets don't come with the perks of the Coaches Club seats, however. Perks like free food and soft drinks, the opportunity to stand behind the team's bench and perhaps even kick Eric Mangini in the rear end when he calls a play that they aren't crazy about. When you're offering those kind of incentives, it's hard to ask people to pay the same amount when they get nothing more than a cushiony seat.
The public nature of the auction, you can bid or check it out on StubHub, means that people on the other side of the stadium will know if the Jets are trying to rip them off. That may mean a little less in the coffers for the Jets but it's a better deal for fans of both the Jets and free markets.
