How Much Does It Cost To Operate a College Softball Team?

[USCpride]

Someone ask if USC would ever get a softball team. I was told we would need
land or access to fields and a generous sponsor.

I wonder do any college teams operate in the black? It's not like football where it's an obvious
money maker.

Does anyone know of any softball programs that support themselves or close to it?

[tbjd33]

Someone ask if USC would ever get a softball team. I was told we would need
land or access to fields and a generous sponsor.

I wonder do any college teams operate in the black? It's not like football where it's an obvious
money maker.

Does anyone know of any softball programs that support themselves or close to it?

USC has the land. They signed a 100 year land lease on the entire land area surrounding the Collisium and Sports Arena. They need by my humble guestimate $20m for a stadium with facitlies. Oregon is spending $15m on their stadium and Cal $12m on there's. But both have facilities near by. I understand South Carolina spent about $20m or so and most believe they are have the best facilities in SEC. So a safe number is $20m by those estimates.

In major conferences only three sports run in the black. Football, men's Basketball and that's right Softball. Just so happens those sports get the most TV exposure also. There are more games on TV then baseball. Crazy.

Softball is growing and TV ratings for WCWS out do both Women's Final Four and Men's College World Series.

So can someone tell me why USC hasn't invested in Softball?

[USCpride]

I wish I knew. I've been part of a committee that's has met with ex AD Garrett and
now Haden over the last 10-15 years. Garrett, was adamantly against softball.

Haden, has been a little more receptive however it comes down to funds and land.
After hearing what you said about 100 year land lease, I guess that means find
your own facilities or land.

Before I got sick I must have written hundreds of letters to alumni. 20 mil? I guess If I
want softball I better suck it it up and write a few more

I really didn't know softball was one of the 3 sports that made money in major
conferences. That gives me a lot to think about or at least find a
different approach.

Michelle

[DonnieS]

Some one posted a list of what it costs annually to run softball programs - this was a few yeas ago , in the last 5, and it was probably here on HB, but I cant find it now. I remember that #3 was Texas A&M, i dont remember the others at the time, but the number varied from $400k for some very small college schools, up to - i think it was around 1.6 million for the top , this didnt not include capital expenditures. That would be a good list to have to do your research.

[AlwaysImprove]

Annual budget for higher end teams was 1.2Mill. I posted the numbers, I looked quick but did not find my post. I will try to dig in a bit more later.

The teams that seem to get into the $1.2M numbers seem to be close to breaking even on Softball.

I know that Illinois did an internal study. They showed based on a pure advertisers look at things. When a sport like softball is on the Big10 network they get X number of free commercials. Based on Big10 viewership and advertising they were able to show that just taking the money they were using to buy those same number of impressions in regular advertising they were able to get almost 3x impressions putting that money into their sports programs. The study also expressed the belief that normal viewers nowadays largely skip commercials showing for normal television programming, but when watching live sports they watched commercials the majority of the time. They also believe the consumers they are reaching on the Big 10 network advertising are more the people they want to be aware of the school They still want some broad based advertising, but by taking marketing budget and using it in sports they are able to be more effective.

The 20Million dollar palaces are top-top of the line second generation stadiums. Notre Dame has a great stadium around 5M. That also is a second gen stadium. You can get a lot of stadium and get your program and up and going in the $1M range.

Most of these stadium projects come about by finding a lead benefactor. These often come from the existing list of people that donate to the college. The AD's know who these people are. You are looking for someone that is considering a sizable donation. Naming a field or a complex can push them over the top on the decision and up in their number. Sometimes these benefactors are Women's sports people. Sometimes they are interested in softball specifically. Often they are someone that graduated from the university and want to give back, and having a field named after them seems cool. Helping in this search for donors process can definitely get your project off the ground.

Think out of the box. For instance call someone like Sue Enquist and ask her to take a lunch with you. She is doing this type of work for UCLA. She could be a huge resource and would likely help just to see the sport grow.

[PDad]

NCAA annually publishes a Revenue and Expenses Report for each division. For major D1 schools (i.e. FBS), the median values for 2013 were expenses of $1,014,000 and a loss of $707,000. Reports can be downloaded from NCAA Pubs.

DIY Rankings provides easy-to-use access to basic Average D1 College Softball Expenses for 2009-2013 by school at How Much do D1 Colleges Spend on Softball Programs?.

Note: Operating Expenses are all expenses an institution incurs attributable to home, away, and neutral-site intercollegiate athletic contests (commonly known as game-day expenses), for (A) Lodging, meals, transportation, uniforms, and equipment for coaches, team members, support staff (including, but not limited to team managers and trainers), and others; and (B) Officials.

The Office of Postsecondary Education has the data with tools to either view or download data at Equity in Athletics Data Analysis Tool. The "Download selected data" function allows you to select Softball data.

[PicklesnKoolaid]

USC Pride, if you start up your letter writing campaign again, I'll assist. I work at SC and I tell my DD if USC ever gets a softball team and I'm still sitting here at my cubicle, you're going to be a Lady of Troy. Sorry UCLA