Jaguars State of the Franchise Recap

The Jaguars held their annual State of the Franchise address on Wednesday morning (3/8/17).

Following a busy couple of months for the Jaguars, the team held their annual "State of the Franchise" address this morning. With a new head coach, a new boss man (Tom Coughlin), and a revamped coaching staff the Jaguars are sure to at the very least look different in 2017.

The Jaguars addressed the football side of things, provided a local revenue and London report, and also a look at the all new Daily's Place amphitheater. 

The 5th annual address was held at EverBank Field inside the newly renovated US Assure Club.

Shad Khan thanked U.S. Assure, Lenny Curry, and make it clear that "There's no better club experience in the NFL". 

He then shifted the focus to London and pointed out the 55,000 members of the Union Jax fan club, the Jaguars London based fan club. And he gladly informed the crowd that "We are the fastest growing fan base in London."

Khan then set his sights on Tom Coughlin when he said "Tom Coughlin represents everything the Jaguars stood for and what they stand for with a product on the field."

Khan went on to address just about everything under the sun and said "It (Daily's Place) will never be the endgame, it will never be mission accomplished."

He then welcomed Tom Coughlin to the stage. 

Coughlin spoke on the Combine and spoke about players "that demonstrated a clear love of football", "the love of competition and the dominant desire to win . . . Our goal is to surround ourselves with people who display a love for the game . . . Teamwork is the essence of life." His most defining moment sounded like this:

"Team first, team last, team always!"

He went on to talk on Bruce Lee and his emphasis on not limiting one's self. Coughlin then shifted to the term "Grit" which he defined as "the ability to stay focused and simply work harder than the next guy."

The stage was then taken by Mark Lamping who spoke on many things including on the field success, but quickly took a turn towards economics and more specifically revenue. He emphasized winning on the field and local revenue off the field and made it clear those were the two defining aspects of the two respective sides of the organization. 

He displayed a graph that showed Jacksonville has a higher percentage of people who identify themselves as fans of the NFL. But being a smaller market they're still just 30th/32 teams in total NFL fans in the market. And with the influx of non Jacksonville born people in Jacksonville's population due to the military and only 32% of NFL fans in Jacksonville say they are Jaguars fans where as for most NFL teams the number is about 50%.

He went on to television ratings

The average was around 28 for several years and it dropped down to 26.

Local tv just under 23 to just under 20.

The Jaguars dropped from 22nd in the league in local tv ratings to 24th in 2016, mostly due to the waning prospects for the football team down the stretch of the season. 

He focused on making the weekends when Jaguars have home games and said "every evening on the night before a game there will be a concert." 

The Jaguars are introducing several different pricing models in 2017 in terms of single game tickets and season tickets including loyalty pricing and variable pricing. 

On community service the Jaguars gave over $2.5 million to non profits and charities.

On Military Lamping made it clear that Jacksonville is and will continue to be one of the most military friendly cities in the country.

On Local Revenue "Local Revenue grew by 8.6% last year,  we feel okay about that, we don't feel great about that."

And he talked on London which was down in terms of local revenue from 2015.

The Jaguars local revenue was 88.9% from Jacksonville and 11.1% from London in 2016. 

"Honestly, it's hard to raise ticket prices when you're not winning. You better be creative."

The Jaguars have the fourth least expensive tickets in the NFL.

"There's a perception that there's not a lot of tickets sold in Jacksonville" . . . "but we have to get after average ticket price and we have to do it in a big way."

"We haven't kept up with inflation"

Lamping then talked on local sponsors.

Lamping moved on to Daily's Place and mentioned it as a new revenue stream and provided several images of what the facility will look like when complete.

13 concerts have been already announced, 7 will be announced before Jaguars home games, and  about 35 concerts in total between memorial day and the end of the year.

He introduced a lounge box premium seat for Daily's place and wanted to make sure everyone knew they were all available now. There will be a full redesign of the terrace suites that will connect with Daily's place.

Moving on to the Shipyards - The Jaguars completed and submitted a new proposal to the city regarding the ship yards today, part of the reason the State of the Franchise was scheduled for today. The part of the Heart Bridge expressway that runs down Bay Street would be 

The plan the Jaguars submitted included a high end hotel, a pedestrian bridge, exhibition space, low rise office buildings, high energy sports and nautical themed entertainment district, residential, a military veteran themed park, and major interface with the river. 

"We're excited about what this can do for downtown" "We know this is a project that will take many years to compete." "But we are excited to get started."

He provided these artistic renderings of the proposed plans.

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