The Juniors found themselves as victims of their own success when fans were turned away from a game.
The Montreal Juniors should be careful what they wish for.
Montreal’s latest junior hockey franchise finally met the kind of demand they wished to build upon since the franchise’s inception three years ago. The only problem is the demand finally surpassed the supply.
Fans with tickets in hand were turned away from Friday’s game against the Québec Remparts. The doors to the Verdun Auditorium were then locked and fans weren’t allowed to enter or leave the building.
It wasn’t exactly a matter of overselling tickets, as team president Martin Routhier explains, but rather of ticket control. Fans can purchase what the team calls ‘floating tickets’ which can be used as general admission towards any game.
Fans that purchased floating tickets then filled the rink for Friday’s huge tilt between the province’s two biggest-market teams, leaving fans that had purchased game-specific tickets on the outside.
“It’s never been an issue until Friday,” Routhier said.
The league is understandably upset with the situation, but will not talk to the media until after their two games of the Canadian Hockey League Subway Super Series.
Routhier said the team took a list of the names of fans with tickets that were turned away for the game and are contacting them, offering a form of compensation. The Juniors are also looking at changing the provisions of the floating tickets to avoid a similar situation in the future.
Also on the team’s agenda is a meeting with the city over the handling of fans with floating tickets. The city, not the team, employs the security personnel that accept the tickets at the door.
“We know how many (floating) tickets are out there, but we didn’t foresee that most of the people that bought those tickets would decide to come to that specific game,” Routhier said.
Mikaël Lalancette, a Québec Major Junior Hockey League reporter for Metro Montreal, reported in his blog that an announcement was made during the first intermission informing fans they wouldn’t be allowed to re-enter the building if they left.
Like the locking of the doors, Routhier said the announcement was made by the city, and not the team.
“The team doesn’t manage the building, we don’t manage the security,” Routhier said. “We don’t manage the way they calculate the people that come in -- it’s all the city. We’re a tenant.”
That could be a moot point amongst disappointed fans who had tickets for the Juniors-Remparts contest. Games between those two teams are growing in popularity after the two cities’ previous rivalry among their NHL-based teams. Friday’s game was also sportsnet.ca’s game of the week from the QMJHL.
The excitement in Montreal for junior hockey is finally hitting a fever pitch in a city that has seen nothing but disappointment with previous QMJHL teams looking to win over fans. One can’t help but wonder what kind of lingering effects this will have on the Juniors’ growing fan base.
Floating tickets were a way for the team to make in-roads to fans by offering an alternative to buying game-specific seats. Now that success may have turned into a headache.
“It’s kind of changing a little bit the equation,” Routhier said. “You’ve been working the past two years -- your mindset is ‘let’s get people, let’s get people, let’s get people, let’s build this franchise until we’re full.’ But we’re not ready to be that full that quick. It’s kind of the success of our marketing and the success of our team may create that situation.
“We have been caught into, I guess, having a little bit too much success. We had a wide-variety of demand for that game.”
Floating tickets aren’t uncommon for junior games. Some teams will limit the use of those tickets to games with less desirable opponents or home dates. The Juniors did neither and are feeling the negative results.
“Honestly, we didn’t foresee it as being a problem,” Routhier said. “On the ticket it says that it’s subject to the maximum capacity. The tickets would not be good if the maximum capacity has been reached for those tickets.”
The lack of a system which counts how many of those tickets are being used became the team’s undoing on Friday.
The home team won 5-4 in a shootout, leaving the capacity crowd happy with the end result.
“It was definitely a good game and I know a lot of people had a great, great, great experience,” Routhier said.
This game, however, will be remembered for the fans that didn’t have a great experience.
