Sports Writing (Miami, USA), Oct. 7- The NHL’s Florida Panthers fill their clubhouse with Canadian tourists fleeing the cold. His star is Aleksander Barkov, Finn. The franchise’s marketing strategy is to attract foreign fans. A singular redoubt in the state where the sun shines the most.

Hockey plays at a disadvantage compared to other much more popular sports in the area, within a three hour drive, in this area of ​​the United States you can find two NFL teams, two other MLB teams , as well as the NBA, the sports and football engine.

Faced with this situation, and despite the fact that the Panthers have helped in recent years with good results (three consecutive Playoffs), the franchise’s marketing and ticketing department is developing different strategies to attract fans. Since the team’s inception in 1993, ensuring the stands are not empty has become their particular obsession.

It’s common for local fans, and there are some too, to go to the FLA Live Arena and feel like strangers in their own pavilion. The Panthers are a team used to playing “on hostile ground” despite being local, and very often the rival’s supporters are more than the Panthers.

This is due to one of the strategies followed by the franchise, which, through agreements with travel teleoperators and in coordination with the NHL calendar, prepares and launches holiday offers, making them coincide with the game that Toronto Maple Leas, Boston Bruins, Minnesota Wilds or any northern team play in Florida.

Taking a week off, swimming in Florida’s heavenly beaches, sightseeing, shopping, and watching your favorite ice hockey team play can be an irrefutable plan. Especially when the Panthers clubhouse is across from Sawgrass Mills, one of the biggest outlets in the United States.

When it comes to selling tickets, one of the most curious cases is the one trying to attract “snowbirds” who decide to spend their winters in the heat of Florida. They are people of middle-upper level, usually already retired, who live in the northern territories and even in Canada, and who change their residence for a few months when the cold arrives.

According to official data, it is estimated that every winter Florida receives three and a half million Canadians who decide to spend a few months in the state where the sun shines the most, and it is no longer a problem to leave the land where ice hockey is the most popular sport.

One of the most curious initiatives took place in 2009, when the Florida Panthers and the then New Jersey Nets launched a season ticket exchange program among their fans, so that the letting season pass for the NBA was used during the winter months to go see the Miami NHL. team play, and vice versa.

Perfect strategy for “snowbirds” who were guaranteed to practice the elite sport, no matter where they lived. The problem with this amateur profile is that sooner or later they go home and sometimes the season is not over yet.

It is then time to turn to the local public, and given the difficulty of capturing mostly Latino fans who do not know the sport, they opt to reach the large communities of foreign countries in this area of ​​the United States.

It is estimated that approximately 20,000 people of Russian descent currently reside in South Florida, this number is more than any country in Europe or Asia. And a very high percentage live in Sunny Isles or Hollywood, north of Miami, both places about 25 minutes from the lodge.

In addition, and according to the latest census, there are around 25,000 Finns living in the area, which guarantees a high expectation to go and see Panthers games.

In other circumstances, we might be surprised that the team’s current captain and all-time top scorer is Aleksander Barkov, a Finnish player who is the son of the legend of the same name and of both nationalities. But once we know where most of the Panthers’ “hometown” fans are from, it all adds up.

The Florida Panthers’ current roster includes twelve Canadians, four Finns, three Swedes and only five Americans. The important battle of the identification of the public with its players is more than won!

With an average attendance of 87% of the capacity of the FLA Live Arena, the Florida Panthers gathered more than 600,000 total spectators during the 2021/2022 season for an average of nearly 15,000 fans per game. Challenge completed!