Saluting the Sharks

It's Tuesday evening at 7:30 PM - do you know where your friends are?  If you live in San Jose, California, they're probably at HP Pavilion watching the Sharks - last night, I went to my second-ever San Jose Sharks game and saw the home team pound the visiting Columbus Blue Jackets 6-0.  If you told a hockey fan from the 1980's that, in 30 years, an NHL team from San Jose would be hosting a regular season game against a club from Columbus, Ohio in front of a near-capacity crowd, they probably would think you were insane.  But despite the NHL's penchant for overexpansion and terrible markets, San Jose is incredibly a very bright spot for professional hockey in the United States.

I don't know what I "expect" a hockey fan to look like, but it probably involves some combination of pale skin, mullets and Labatt beer.  At a Sharks game, though, the seats are packed with people who represent the population of Northern California - Latinos, Asians, Caucasians and even some African Americans.  The fan base is impressively diverse, suggesting that the Sharks have somehow managed to succeed where virtually every other NHL club has failed - marketing to minorities.  Perhaps more importantly, many of the people at the Sharks game were young (under 25), suggesting that the Sharks will have a steady stream of loyal fans for years to come.

I think the reason people consistently come out for Sharks games is because the team is truly running the best show in town.  Admittedly, part of the reason why this is true is because San Jose is a relatively sleepy city with comparatively limited competition for fans - eventually, this might change as the 49ers, Raiders and/or Athletics move down from San Francisco and Oakland to Silicon Valley.  But it's not just the Sharks' lack of competition that generates their popularity with local fans; the word I'd use to describe a Sharks game is professional.  The pre-game introductions, complete with a giant shark's head / mouth for the players to skate through, is fun and uniquely San Jose.  The arena looks brand new despite opening almost 20 years ago, and the concourses are filled with a good mix of concessions.  The team takes care of its fans with plenty of promotions, in-game entertainment and fan recognition - for example, I led a group of a dozen students from the Stanford Graduate School of Business to the game, and we got our group name on the Jumbotron (see below).

The San Jose Sharks make their fans feel extremely welcome.

Professional hockey teams in cities like San Jose and Raleigh face an uphill battle.  They're stuck in markets where their sport isn't very popular, and have to be a little more creative when it comes to drawing fans.  From what I've seen at both Sharks and Hurricanes games, though, teams in non-traditional hockey markets have been able to rise to the occassion and make the most out of their difficult situations.  Perhaps hockey's core markets (cough - Long Island - cough) should take a few pages out of San Jose's playbook and try to offer a better value proposition to their fans.  If more teams start to offer the game experience that the San Jose Sharks do, perhaps hockey can one day regain its position as one of the country's major sports.