The NHL Premiere. For the last few seasons it has been a big event in the NHL for not being just the start of the season but also the chance to showcase some of the players and their talent and skills in an international environment.

Over the last few years a whole range of cities have seen teams. From London, to Stockholm, Helsinki, Prague and Berlin. With the NHL continuing its growth in pushing specialized hockey events it seems logical that they would return to Europe again. Or would it?

Why the NHL might not return to Europe:

The Revenue:
Holding games in Europe isn’t cheap and the NHL wants to make money. With the current financial crisis hitting much of the Western world these increased costs could make the game unaffordable to many people at its current prices and a possible ticket price reduction would cause the NHL to lose revenue from these games making them less justifiable. To add to this, people will only pay for teams they actually care about which leads us to the next point…

The Teams:
Getting the team combinations right takes a lot of work. For example, when the Sharks faced the Blue Jackets in 2010 the game wasn’t a big seller. It was argued that the costs didn’t help (tickets were $20-50 more on average than in 2011) however it was evidently clear that the Swedish people weren’t the biggest fans of either team. The NHL takes a gamble when working out what teams to send to Europe and the question is are they willing to take the risk now considering the above aforementioned point. Sure the NHL could just send their biggest names but then they would have some problems with…

The Hometown Fans:
Many committed fans pride themselves on being there for every one of their teams home games. With 2 of their teams games appearing in Europe for some of the hardcore fans this leads to them becoming annoyed and makes them more annoyed at the league. In addition to this the NHL misses out on guaranteed hometown revenue from fans who are more likely to visit the game than in Europe. This problem can be solved by sending one of the teams who isn’t so popular at the moment but this leads back to the revenue and teams problems.

Of course, there are many reasons as to why the NHL will return to Europe.

The Revenue:
The NHL is in it for the money first and foremost and the NHL Premiere games give them the chance to ear a little more revenue than they would receive from a traditional game. With the cheapest tickets retailing for more than many of the more expensive seats in the USA/Canada they stand to make a nice income on the game. Throw in some corporate sponsorship that would not normally exist in a regular game (e.g. Compuware) and the NHL stands to make a nice bundle. This money can then be invested into the league or into side projects that cease to exist after 3 months of hype (The Guardian Project).

Increased following:
The NHL competes domestically with the NFL, NBA and MLB. On the international platform it competes with even more leagues including direct Hockey competitors. To win fans over is a real challenge and by holding 2 games in a country far away from their usual fan bases can have a great impact and create new interests and followings for the game. This leads to increased revenue (see above) and new fanbases for teams which helps them out on an individual level also.

The Players:
Evidently the NHL focuses quite heavily on marketing its players – seemingly more so than its member franchises – and the Premiere games aren’t an exception to this. And at the same time, there are seemingly a number of hockey fans in Europe who are more interested in seeing their country’s homegrown NHLers returning to their homelands than they are the teams. Looking at past events you had Jaromir Jagr’s return to Prague with the New York Rangers, which ended up not happening since he left the Rangers, leaving the fans in Prague disappointed. Then for the most recent games Teemu Selanne made his return to Helsinki while Henrik Lundqvist was pretty much the star of the show in Stockholm. Going back to the point about revenue, the NHL does this so that player jerseys – which are pricier than blank jerseys – can be sold to fans, and therefore more money made.

So putting these points into perspective against the reasons against, I feel that the NHL is likely to return to Europe this year again and possibly keeping the same amount of games as last year or possibly with the addition of an extra couple. The question however is where and what cities. Join us in the next part when I look at the cities in Europe who could be home to fans hoping that they get a taster of NHL hockey.

This is part 1 of a three part series. Part 2 can be found here and part 3 can be found here

I’m KevKev and this is PowerPlayGoal.com – Stay tuned for the next installment.