Thanks to Cameraman Bruce for finding this ridiculous video, ever notice it’s always about the sports or country music in Sioux Falls. If you like neither for entertainment, you might as well roll up in a corner and cry yourself to sleep.

Of course the stories continue about all the econ impact of the Brooks shows. I don’t deny there will be a slight sales tax and local business bump, but let’s truly look at what goes out the door. Fortunately, the Brooks camp monitors their sales, so they KNOW who is purchasing the tickets, so here are the numbers we ‘are being told’;

While roughly 60 percent of the tickets sold were from the region, Semrau says more than 40,000 attendees will be visiting Sioux Falls specifically for Garth’s shows.

So it is not the other way around, like our mayor claimed.

Let’s start with what Garth will be taking directly from Sioux Falls area residents (I’m assuming his $75 fee does NOT include taxes or Ticketmaster fees) If you assume 60% are from the SF MSA, that would mean Brooks takes $4.5 million from the community that will never be recirculated or spent in SF (this money left our town in one week).

Now let’s take the visitors, who spend all their delicious cash in our hotels and restaurants;

“You have to think about the indirect impact of those people working in the hotels, working in the restaurants, working in the Denny Sanford PREMIER Center, they then roll over that money because they’ve been paid because of the concert to work, so it rolls over in the community three to five times,” Schmidt said.

Not really. First off people who work in the hospitality industry in SF are the lowest paid in the community, basically poverty wages of $14k to $20K a year. Besides the wages that will be recirculated most profits leave Sioux Falls because a lot of the businesses are national franchises.

How about that 36,000 gallons of beer, SMG and Ovations who handle operations at the EC are national companies, that money leaves Sioux Falls also.

While I agree there may be a $20 million dollar impact, only a small portion of that actually goes in the pockets of SF residents and even city hall.

The proof is in the pudding, since the EC has been built, sales tax revenue has actually gone down. Like I have said in an earlier post, we can make some ordinance changes and other changes at the EC to make sure more of that money recirculates in Sioux Falls, but that will take some leadership.

One of the reasons I support local restaurants and shows by local promoters is because I know most of the money I spend at these places will recirculate in the community. Maybe there should be a new push by the CVB to support local entertainment.

7 Thoughts on “‘Shut Up’ & Enjoy the Economic Impact of the Denny

  1. Oh, by the way, welcome to the Age of Trump, where civic leaders have become emboldened to be bullies who tell people to just ‘Shut-up’ when it comes to public policy discussions.

    And would you please explain to me how a facility that could hold or is capable of holding a NBA Daily Showcase is not qualified to hold a concert with let us say, U-2 too?

    And also, when people are confident, they do not need to tell people to ‘Shut-up’ either.

    This lack of civility or shock-jock mentality does little to advance the honest discussion of issues of local concern like the Events Center and its usage, and has no place in the discourse of issues by civic leaders.

    But then again, what can you expect when national leaders act like this?………….:

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gHdF_bmV2Ew

  2. Blasphemo on July 30, 2017 at 8:27 pm said:

    OMG. Never have I heard a more vapid excuse for talk radio than 99.1 FM, when I occasionally stumble across it while scanning stations. I’d say that listening to yo’s gushing endlessly about their latest player bromance is akin to watching paint dry, but I think watching mold form is more accurate. No surprise to hear this muscle brain go off on such a petulant rant.

  3. anominous on July 30, 2017 at 11:10 pm said:

    That dude in the video is on drugs or something.

  4. The D@ily Spin on July 31, 2017 at 7:55 am said:

    Doesn’t this shot of Denny Dome makes it look like one of those metal toilet bowls in a prison cell?

  5. The D@ily Spin on July 31, 2017 at 8:30 am said:

    I heard only one concert is Garth Brooks. The half dozen others are Garth from ‘Wayne’s World’.

    No doubt the Garth concerts will be a local economic boost. He can be notably proud for bailing out some of the Denny Dome debt. Use numbers from city finance and take one tenth as actual benefit.

  6. The Guy from Guernsey on July 31, 2017 at 12:47 pm said:

    Before including Santa Cruz in his rant, I wonder if that loud mouth jock sniffer [Thurn] bothered to check a map to learn that Santa Cruz is located 70-75 miles from either San Fran or Oakland; 30-35 miles from San Jose.

  7. The Guy from Guernsey on July 31, 2017 at 12:56 pm said:

    I appreciate music of the 70’s, 80’s and 90’s as much as any, but to rationalize that because we* built the Denny Bin that we “get” to see acts like Bob Seger and Cher ?? C’mon man!

    * I think we all realize that we didn’t build that. HisManMike (TM) did.

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