The lost money has to be made up somewhere
No Big Ten football this fall, and football WITH fans in attendance (& likely not many when it does return) may be in question when this conference does reinstate its highest revenue sport. But when UW sports do return in a full Camp Randall Stadium & other facilities, how about selling beer in the general seating area? Why isn’t the Univ. of Wisconsin already selling alcohol in its main sports facilities anyway? Other schools in the conference already allow it.
It would be up to the chancellor of the Univ. of Wisconsin-Madison, and her name (if you don’t know) is Rebecca Blank. Dr. Blank has held this position since May of 2013. So take a guess on what side she is on regarding expanding the alcohol sales at Badger football games (again, IF you don’t know)? She’s against it (you probably knew that already with her being the chancellor for now over 7 years and yet no alcohol expansion where other schools continue to do so). Chancellor Blank has said through a spokesperson; “The university believes that there is already an atmosphere of energy and excitement around Badger game days. The addition of alcohol to general seating areas isn’t needed to improve that experience and could detract from it for our students and fans.”.[1] So, what about AD Barry Alvarez, let’s go to Barry! Unfortunately, he is underneath the chancellor, but nevertheless, what is Barry’s opinion? Well, believe it or not, almost seven years ago, he said he wouldn’t even bring up the matter to Wisconsin’s administration. But in spring of last year, he had said that making beer available (in the seating area of the stadium) could encourage tailgaters to not keep tailgating where they don’t arrive into the game itself until midway through the 2nd quarter. There is no known rhetoric of Alvarez or his staff continuing to promote the idea within the administration however.[2]
How much in revenue would beer sales bring to the school? That remains to be seen, but the Univ. of Minnesota says they’re averaging 1.3 million dollars a year in sales at their football games since they started selling beer stadium wide in 2012.[3] Ohio State in 2017 reported $1.23 million in PROFIT (not revenue) at their football stadium in selling beer. Their arrests however went up 50% over the year before (their first year selling beer stadium wide) but their profit was also up 5.6% from that debut year of 2016.[4] Hmm, hope they used some of that profit money on hiring more security officers.
The thing is here, beer brings in revenue, revenue and schools go together like…. . Attendance has also been slipping lately for Badger football games. There have been reports of heavy numbers of no-shows as well (tickets were sold but “they didn’t make it in”). So this combined with other factors such as; other Big Ten schools giving the go ahead to sell alcohol at games; room for improvement at the turnstiles; our state being recognized as a leader in beer drinking (same with the university); and, now most importantly, all this lost revenue with no collegiate sports this fall. Wouldn’t instituting beer service throughout the seating areas of Badger football, basketball & hockey games be a no-brainer? It should’ve happened already.