The Colorado Buffaloes paid a pretty penny to bring in former NFL star Deion Sanders as their new head coach. Fortunately, it already seems like the move is paying dividends.
Sanders signed a five-year $29.5 million dollar contract back in December to join the Buffaloes. He has completely revamped the roster in his image, and seemingly renewed interest in the program to fans.
Colorado athletic director Rick George recently discussed the revenue from the team’s spring day in April, revealing that it was “a good day for Colorado athletics.”
“Just the merchandise sales was the largest we’ve had of any home game this past year, so that in itself was good,” George told Brian Howell of BuffZone.com “Obviously when you have 47,000 people there, there’s revenue that’s generated from that, and concessions. It was positive revenue for us and it was really good exposure for us to be on national TV. It was a good day for Colorado athletics.”
On top of that, Colorado generated about $343,000 in ticket sales and roughly $143,000 in concessions for the event. In total the Buffaloes walked away with a net $200,000 profit from the game.
It’s pretty shocking to see this kind of drastic turnaround in terms of fan engagement in just one off-season. For a team that finished just 1-11 in the previous season to completely sell out its spring game is pretty much unheard of.
If this is any indication of how the Colorado fanbase will turn out to support their team this fall, bringing in Deion Sanders on a massive deal will have paid off in a big way.
