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Florida State

FSU Football's early success serves as 'springboard' for ticket and merchandise sales, NIL donations

by: Austin Cox09/09/22AustinRCox12
Florida State's Doak Campbell Stadium from above.
Florida State (Logan Stanford/Special to Warchant)

Fresh off a dramatic win over LSU last weekend, the Florida State Seminoles are looking to capitalize on fans’ early season excitement with increased ticket sales, booster donations and NIL support.

On the field, head coach Mike Norvell has FSU off to a 2-0 start for the first time since 2016. Off the field, and behind the scenes in FSU’s athletic department, optimism is high as the administration looks to seize on renewed interest from the passionate Seminoles fan base.

“We’ve been game-planning for the LSU game since November [2021] and how we were going to attack it,” said Jason Dennard, FSU associate athletics director for new revenue generation and marketing. “To be perfectly honest, we expected to win. The strategy we put forward was, ‘This is what we’re going to do when we win.’ So, we were prepared. …

“We can use that as a springboard for the rest of our season. We still have six home games left, and we are selling a six-game season ticket right now.”

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In what was essentially a perfect storm of positivity for FSU, the ‘Noles not only brought home a huge win in front of a national television audience, but the more than 30,000 FSU fans in attendance for the neutral-site matchup were treated to a memorable performance and a thrilling ending.

“We had an allotment of 30,000 tickets. We got on it early, and we sold all of our tickets,” Dennard said. “[Selling] 30,000 tickets in a neutral-site game, three states over, is a pretty significant feat. There are a lot of bowl games where a lot of schools don’t sell their allotment, and they don’t get 30,000 tickets. …

“Florida State, for the longest time, has had a really good reputation as a team that travels and supports their team. We certainly did that this past week.”

And the interest isn’t slowing down after the team’s strong start to 2022.

Seminole Boosters, the athletics department’s fundraising arm, announced Friday that the organization now has more than 12,000 members — a substantial increase over recent years.

“Tickets are certainly selling. The phones are definitely ringing,” Dennard said, adding that the athletics department is seeing strong response to marketing emails being sent out to prospective customers. “The open rates on our messages to people about ticket opportunities and things like that — people answer, despite the outcome — but when the outcome goes in our favor, against another top-branded school, it puts things on another level.”

FSU fans have other ways to show their appreciation and interest as well.

Matthew Quigley, CEO of Rising Spear, the largest NIL collective that supports Seminole student-athletes, said his organization has seen a spike in contributions since the LSU game.

“The money that has come in over the last week, because of that LSU win, has allowed us to take care of more players. That’s what this is all about,” Quigley said. “And these aren’t from million-dollar booster donors, this is a guy happy that his team has won and he wants to show appreciation for that.”

State laws in Florida prevent schools from formally working with collectives or facilitating NIL opportunities, but Quigley said their success is definitely intertwined. The better the product on the field, the more fans are willing to show their support, the more groups like Rising Spear can provide support directly to the athletes.

Quigley said there is “massive momentum” around the program right now, and as long as that continues, he believes it will help FSU when it comes to attracting elite recruits and transfer prospects in the future.

“It allows us to provide a proof of concepts to recruits,” he said. “Obviously, nobody from Rising Spear can talk to them, but we are able to provide a proof of concept and take care of the guys on the roster. Word of mouth: It gets spread between players and recruits.

“It’s why we need more momentum and more people to donate so that we can continue this and be able to take of our student-athletes.”

While FSU doesn’t have a game this weekend, Dennard said that might not be a bad thing. He believes the time off before next Friday’s game at Louisville will give the Seminoles time to “build the crescendo” of interest even more.

Florida State stirred things up early Friday morning by announcing the team will wear alternate “icy white” uniforms for that game at Louisville.

“People were already buying tickets and joining as donors and buying our merchandise, [but] it certainly helps,” Dennard said of the LSU game. “Any time when you’re the only game in town, the only game in the country, and there’s over 7 million people watching it, it makes an impression. People are excited. We play an exciting brand of football. There’s a lot to like, there’s a lot to build on right now.”

Despite the fact that FSU entered this season coming off of four consecutive losing seasons, Dennard said the strong finish to 2021 — when the Seminoles won five of seven games, at one point — already had the program, “heading in a good direction.”

“I think people see the program that Coach Norvell is building here. They see the commitment from the athletic department, they see the commitment from our donors. You can just feel that the program is heading in a better direction. You can just sense it,” Dennard said. “I think people, they have bought in to that optimism and they see where we’re going. People want to be a part of it. That was trending that way before we lined up there at the Caesars Superdome.

“But when something like that happens, it just validates what people already knew. We just have to continue to stack wins. I think we’re well on our way to doing that. … We’re definitely going to shout from the mountaintops that we did win, we’re 2-0. There’s a lot of optimism, and we are going to use every ounce of it.”

The early season buzz is much appreciated by local merchants as well.

Tara Kennedy, who is the buyer and operations manager at Garnet & Gold, said there is a direct correlation between how fans feel about the football program and trends in merchandise sales. And that point was hammered home almost immediately after Sunday’s win.

“When we are winning, our fans are happy,” Kennedy said. “They are more willing to spend money on product to show their pride when we are winning. Internet sales after the game Sunday were great! Store sales leading up to the game were also great. People stopped in on their way out of town to get ready for the game.”

Said Dennard: “You can just feel the trajectory that we’re on. We’re all excited about it. You can definitely sense that from the fanbase as well.”

Dennard also pointed to the strong television numbers for FSU-LSU — it was the second-highest rated game of college football’s opening weekend despite neither team being ranked in the top 25 — as another sign of the strength of the Seminoles’ brand.

“You look at some of the top 20, 30 games of all-time in terms of ratings, you’ll find Florida State firmly implanted on those lists,” he said. “Whether you love Florida State or you dislike Florida State, you watch Florida State. It is absolutely true. It really speaks to the brand. The brand is good. I think it’s one of the top brands in college football.”

And the Seminoles are looking forward to seeing Doak Campbell Stadium packed for the rest of the home schedule.

Along with the six-game season tickets, FSU is offering single-game tickets and three-game packages, which include seats for either the Florida or Clemson games and two others.

“For us to be who we intend to be, it takes everybody — from the support staff to the teams to the fans,” Dennard said. “We’re all in this thing together. If we pull in the same direction together, there’s no limit to what we can do.”

Talk about this story with other die-hard FSU football fans on the Tribal Council.

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