Soccer supporters in St. Louis are apparently excited about their Major League Soccer franchise. The league reported that the St. Louis City SC expansion team set a new record for season ticket member deposits in 24 hours – actually exceeding the prior record in less than an hour.
It’s official: STL is a Soccer CITY.
We broke the previous 24-hour ticket deposit record in the first 15 MINUTES! To everyone in our region who placed a deposit, thanks for showing @MLS the passion of our CITY. We’re still accepting deposits at https://t.co/HrnjdHEafI #stlCITYsc pic.twitter.com/lXzXxtl7xA
— St. Louis CITY SC (@MLS4theLou) September 17, 2020
Over 50,000 deposits were received in total, with 30,000 coming in the first 15 minutes according to the league. The team, which will begin play in 2023, also set a league record for merchandise sales by a new franchise.
“I’m once again blown away by our fans, supporters and community, and how they continue to rally around City,” said Carolyn Kindle Betz, St. Louis SC owner and CEO, in a statement. “This is just another testament to why I love St. Louis so much. When given the opportunity, our region shows the rest of the nation why we’re a force to be reckoned with.”
Construction is underway on a 22,500 seat stadium with adjacent training facility in St. Louis. Sporting Kansas City, located approximately 250 miles west of St. Louis along I-70, has drawn average crowds of between 18-21,000 fans in each season since 2012, after it opened its soccer-specific Livestrong Sporting Park grounds.
It is unclear how many actual sales the deposit numbers will translate to, despite their being more deposits than seats in the new venue. According to the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, fans were able to request as many as eight tickets with one $50 deposit. Some “may have chosen to err on the side of more seats than they’ll actually need,” though the high amount of deposits reflects that sales are likely to be strong once fully underway in 2021.