Why the Kickoff Classic in Atlanta instead of another home game in 2016?
Georgia will get a $4 million guarantee for playing North Carolina in the Chick-fil-A Kickoff Game in 2016 as well as complimentary hotel accommodations and $50,000 in a scholarship donation back to the university, according to a term sheet for the game obtained from UGA in an open records request.
And most of us will have the privilege of paying more for tickets. A lot more.
The school will get 42,921 tickets for the game from Peach Bowl, Inc., ranging in price from $50 for student seats to $205 for a “super suite” ticket. More than 23,000 tickets are priced at $85 on the upper level.
Kinda feels traditional, doesn’t it?
************************************************************************
UPDATE: Ticket price breakdown.
Get The Picture 
Throw in some fancy uniforms from Nike, and the transformation will be complete.
LikeLike
Those ticket prices to see them play UNC? I’m sure that game will have all kinds of national implications 😉 Pfft, I know where I won’t be on Labor Day Weekend 2016! Yet another example of why watching on TV is becoming more and more the rage.
LikeLike
If this were a home and home series, then maybe it’s a different story as the UNC campus is beautiful and my folks live in NC. However, the club level and lower sideline level seats I currently get for $45 each will now cost me $180 and $145 respectively and I can’t use my UGA parking pass, so that’s extra for mediocre match up. Glad the university will make out well financially…
LikeLike
+1.
LikeLike
+100
LikeLike
Need to get that 2017 kickoff game against tech in the new dome.
LikeLike
^This. If we are going to play Tech annually it might as well be in one of these kick-off type game arrangements. I don’t favor starting the season away from Athens but this would be the exception as it would be a de facto home game for the Dawgs and it would free us up to play some other good match-ups in Athens. That said, alternatively we could do the same thing at the end of the season instead of the beginning.
LikeLike
Playing at Tech is already a defacto home game for us.
LikeLike
Famous “Mark Richt Field”… my bro in law hates it when I say that. 😉
LikeLike
At Vince Dooley Stadium
LikeLike
Yeah, but 42,000 seats at Historic Mark Richt Field are not reserved for UGA fans.
LikeLike
and yet, UGA fans usually end up filling about 42,000 seats. 😉
LikeLike
My main reason for wanting to do this would be so we could move the tech game so that auburn and tech weren’t both on the same cycle.
Play tech at the new dome in 2017 and then play at tech in 2018 and have auburn at home in 2018.
Plus it would be cool to see the new stadium.
LikeLike
I would rather pay $85 to watch us beat some crappy directional tech school at Sanford than pay that to sit in shitty seats to watch us play an opponent that is less appealing than a blowoff game. At least with the game at Sanford I can tailgate on campus instead of underneath some random overpass.
LikeLike
It’s a good deal for UNC.
We already know the Atlanta trip won’t interfere with the players’ classes.
LikeLike
It’s a good deal for Georgia, too. The guarantee is more than the school would gross selling out a home game, without the attendant expenses.
LikeLike
How do these games affect season ticket holders? Do they pay less than they normally would?
LikeLike
If you mean pay for six home games instead of seven, yes. But if you buy season tickets plus the Kickoff Classic, you’ll spend more.
LikeLike
Plus the donation is the same regardless of the number of home games.
LikeLike
Eh, I don’t know…you guys seem negative. But then again I’m not a season ticket holder and don’t attend that many games (1-2 a year). That being said, Alanner is not that far away…maybe a room at the Omni on Friday, stroll down to Stats for some grub & brews, lil Taco Mac action on Sat before the game, then hopefully a UGA victory – something to the tune of 37-14 or in that neighborhood maybe. Hey, if you’re gonna spend your “spending money” on the Dawgs and college football – which I do – doesn’t sound like horrible weekend to me…Yay secondary ticket market!
LikeLike
Did you miss the part about it being in Atlanta?
LikeLike
It might be worth the extra $ to sit in AC for the 1st game instead of a 5pm kickoff in early sept. I am having flashbacks of the clemson sauna last year
LikeLike
Air conditioning…………………………………………………..priceless.
LikeLike
Sauna? Heck that was more like being right up next to the sun. Never been so hot while tailgating in my life. Our friends and I had to climb in my truck with the A/C on just to survive at one point before kickoff. Hell wouldn’t be any hotter
LikeLike
I was at that game too, sitting in the east endzone and BAKING in the sun. I’ll never buy tickets to a home opener again and likely never tickets to a September game either. It was brutal. I’m too old (at 27 ha!) and my living room is too comfy to be dealing with that.
LikeLike
$50 for a student ticket. Never could have afforded that when I was a student.
LikeLike
I don’t care about the additional revenue it brings in. Don’t we think BM will have enough? I hate, hate, hate, losing a home game.
LikeLike
I would rather play home and home. But spare me the directional school crap. Kudos for scheduling a decent…not great Power 5 opponent instead of another Coastal Carolina. Would I rather be in Athens…damn right. But not for that garbage.
LikeLike
I like the opponent. Hate the location. But that’s somewhat self serving as I live here. I hate giving up the tailgate. Tough to do in Atlanta.
LikeLike
ok, air-conditioning in August,great ,will they be serving beer? Inquiring people want to know. Priorities people…priorities
LikeLike
Probably for $6-8 a pop if so. One potential bright side is that the people working the gates at NFL stadiums, at least based on my experience in Jacksonville, aren’t use to scoping out smuggled alcohol since they hardly ever have to do it.
LikeLike
No
LikeLike
just damn, break out the airline bottles
LikeLike
From talking to different friends who differ in their recollections about alcohol sales at the NCAA Dome games,I beginning to develop a theory that alcohol sales vary upon where you are sitting, two friends who claimed they were served set in either boxes( no surprise there) or the club level. Maybe the unwashed don’t get to drink but the elite do. Just trying to connect dots.
LikeLike
They served beer for the Boise game, as I recall.
LikeLike
Nice payout for UGA.
A P5 team we will almost definitely beat.
You can buy/drink beer at the game probably.
While the situation is not ideal, I think overall it is a positive.
LikeLike
I thought the NCAA nixed beer sales in games like this? All the more reason to bring your “Bar”-noculars.
LikeLike
No beer sol when we played Boise State in the Dome.
LikeLike
*sold
LikeLike
I beg to differ. There were people buying beer all around me at that game.
LikeLike
Right you are. Beer was sold, with sales cut off at halftime.
LikeLike
Googled and you were right no one was drinking around me.
LikeLike
I would have been right there drinking with them but I went to that game solo. I left Aiken, SC that morning, watched the game, and drove back home afterwards. That was a long day.
LikeLike
I hate early season games in Athens. On the north side of the stadium it’s brutal! I welcome the a/c in the dome! Besides, it’s my birthday! Wish we could do it every year!
LikeLike
it is immoral to as college students to pay $50 a ticket.
LikeLike
They pay that much or more for any road game or Ga /Fla ticket.
LikeLike
^^^^ This
LikeLike
A lot to like here. National exposure. More $. Easy W against a power school from an area that has been a fertile recruiting ground for us. Keeps Bama out of Atlanta. One less Coastal Carolina.
Yeah, there’s a downside…but this is good IMO.
LikeLike
It’ll be exciting for my house-divided UNC/UGA family. But…I’ve said it a million times and I’ll say it again. Since the 12 game schedule went permanent in 2006, the AVERAGE regular season record for the 5 other traditional SEC power teams (LSU, Auburn, Bama, UT, and Florida) when they played TWO power-5/BCS level teams is 9-3. Mark Richt’s AVERAGE regular season record when playing 2 BCS/power-5 teams is 9-3. While at Bama, Saban faced a schedule like that once, in 2010. Bama played Duke and Penn St. With perhaps his most talented team, Saban went 9-3.
Richt got the benefit of only playing one power-5 non-conference game one time since 2006. That was the 2012 season. Richt went 11-1, won the East, had perhaps his most dominating run late in the season, and we went to Jax tanned, rested and ready for the biggest UGA win since beating #1 Florida in ’85.
That’s just math, fellers. Ain’t no two ways about it. The numbers don’t lie. Conference-wide, the odds are not in your favor if you play two BCS-level non-conference teams.
The good news? In 2015, we only play one: Tech. If we go 11-1, win the East (and maybe more), I’ll try hard not to say, ‘I told you so.’ Of course, it might not matter in 2016, because we’ll still have Nicholas Chubb.
LikeLike
The stats don’t lie, but as a season ticket holder and a football fan, I’ll take the last 2 years’ schedule with Clem’s Son than any year where we have 3 baby seal clubbings + tech.
LikeLike
Tell me we at least get a UNC-UGA shooty hoops series in return…
LikeLike
As a season ticket holder that remembers the Boise State game, I will NOT be attending another “Kick-off Classic” in the Georgia Dome….Tailgating under an overpass with nothing close (restaurants, bathrooms, etc..) My awesome seats at Sanford Stadium equate to rafter seats in the Dome! It was blistering hot up in the rafters desite the so called AC, I could not see (including the trerrible power ranger uniforms) or hear the game (audio was no better than Sanford), and it took longer than Sanford to get a drink or use the bathroom (now that’s seriously a long time)! I will be watching this one on HD in my living room or with buddies at a Bar/Restaurant.
Once again, it’s all about the money with these boobs!
I wish they would take some of the money from the “Kick-off Classic” payout & go spend it on outdated Sanford Stadium. As the TV market increases, somebody has got to spend the money to make going to a home game appealing.
LikeLike