Ratings bonanza as winning start brings back fans
It’s critical that we perform on the field to generate interest in the sport.
Warriors chief executive Cameron George.
The Warriors’ impressive start to the NRL season has had a direct impact on the interest of rugby league in New Zealand, with television ratings for the team up 20 per cent.
Fresh off the back of their best start to an NRL season since 2002, 26,000 more people are tuning into Warriors games on New Zealand TV than last year.
Ratings are also up for Warriors games in Australia on Fox Sports, having increased 7 per cent and an average of 15,000 on last year ahead of last night’s clash against the Wests Tigers.
Home crowds in Auckland have also lifted 60 per cent compared to this time last year, their average figure of 18,814 boosted by the soldout double header last month and leaving them on track for their most attended season since the Super League war.
It’s also had a marked impact on ground merchandise sales, with the club recording a 171 per cent increase over the opening three home games of the year.
It signals a remarkable turnaround for the NRL club, which lost the last nine games of 2017 to miss the finals for the sixth-straight season and struggled for members over the summer.
‘‘It’s critical that we perform on the field to generate interest in the sport,’’ Warriors chief executive Cameron George said.
‘‘Off the back of the tough year we had last year and the last couple of years it was a really hard sell for our membership and there was a lot of people questioning if they wanted to be members again.
‘‘We were lucky we had a lot of loyal supporters but we’ve had a lot of people come back into the club off the back of our start.
‘‘That flows into the numbers around the merchandise that have been huge.’’
The Warriors turnaround comes at a crucial time in the club’s history, with an arm of the original owners in the Auckland Rugby League purchasing back the club this week.
George made clear his desire to boost the game within the country when he took over as chief executive last August, a prerogative that fits nicely with the new owners.
‘‘We’re going to commence a working group to plan what will be an exciting vision for the future,’’ George said.
‘‘At the end of the day we want to excite kids and rugby league to have an aspiration to be a Warrior.
‘‘And we want all of New Zealand kids to potentially have that in the future.’’