http://www.canberratimes.com.au/rug...cket-prices-on-home-patch-20130424-2ifdz.html
Raiders defend high ticket prices on home patch
Date
April 25, 2013
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Lee Gaskin
Sports reporter at The Canberra Times
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Watching a Raiders game can cost $38 a head. Photo: Katherine Griffiths
The Canberra Raiders have the most expensive tickets in the NRL for fans who wait to buy their seats at the gate, but the club has justified prices by revealing it needs a crowd of about 9600 at Canberra Stadium just to meet costs.
Rugby league ticket prices have come under the microscope after the poor turnout for last weekend's City-Country game at Coffs Harbour.
Fewer than 5000 showed up, and the cost - $30 for general admission and $50 for a grandstand seat - was cited as a key factor in attracting the lowest crowd in the history of the representative fixture.
At $38, the Raiders have the most expensive tickets in the NRL for those fans who buy their seat at the venue.
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Adult tickets through Ticketek to Raiders' home games at Canberra Stadium are $28, which drops to $17 a game for regular members.
Raiders commercial and marketing manager Jason Mathie defended the club's pricing structure, saying it was necessary to pay for the costs of hiring Canberra Stadium.
Mathie said it cost the Raiders about $60,000 for every game at the stadium and that they needed a crowd of 9600 to break even. The Raiders have an average attendance of 10,927 after their first three home games this season.
Mathie said the $10 saving between online and tickets bought at the gate was an incentive for fans to avoid queues at the ground.
He also said the Raiders provided about 5000 free tickets for those registered to play rugby league in the capital territory.
''People think it's a free pass to go to the footy, but the reality is our club has to pay for every one of those tickets, because we don't own our venue, it's a commercial property of the government,'' Mathie said.
''Every transaction that is done, whether it is perceived as being a complimentary ticket or a paid ticket, the Raiders incur costs from the venue and from Ticketek. Then there's obviously the on-costs that go into running the game, like hiring security and ground staff.''
Mathie said the Raiders provided the best value game-day tickets in the Canberra sporting market because each match-day consisted of an NRL and NYC (under-20s) game, and the access fans had to Raiders players after the game.
The Raiders play North Queensland in Townsville on Saturday, and the Cowboys have the lowest general admission adult ticket price in the NRL at $15.
But unlike the Cowboys' home ground in Townsville, Canberra Stadium is a fully seated venue and doesn't have hills or standing-room only sections.
The cheapest Raiders season membership for all 12 home games for regular adult members is $205, which is $17 a game. That rises to $240 (or $20 a game) for new members. There are also three-game membership packages for $90, and interstate memberships for $70, which includes two tickets to one away game. The Raiders' next home game is against Newcastle on May
