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"With the Phillies it was like 'bam,' " he said
yesterday. "They're in the playoffs, they won the division. It's like everybody's on board. The initial excitement wasn't as great with the Flyers as it was with the Phillies. But the Flyers now, in the third round of the playoffs, it's like picking up steam.
I think the hype has kind of gradually built up."
That's what the Flyers are seeing, a far cry from a couple of months ago when the team was getting a fair amount of flak after announcing an increase in ticket prices for 2008-09. Shawn Tilger, senior VP of business operations, said Wednesday that TV ratings are up 37 percent over the regular season, merchandise sales are up
30 percent and visitors to their Web site have jumped 104 percent, up to about 300,000 daily pairs of eyes. Even signups at the SkateZone in Voorhees, N.J., for skating lessons have more than doubled over the past few weeks.
Tilger noted that more than 5,000 photos have been posted by fans participating in the team's Get Flyered Up and Flat Stanley promotions.
"Obviously, at a time like this when you're getting as much exposure as this for the tean," Tilger said, "it's our job to cultivate and capture as many fans as we can."
Morgan said his stores are expecting a variety of hockey and Flyers merchandise arriving
today, including dueling Flyers-Pens T-shirts and tees that push a new Modell's campaign called "The Cup Changes Everything." In addition, they are expecting to sell a discounted line of all-orange jerseys, what amounted to the team's third jersey last season. "It's all Flyers, Flyers, Flyers," Morgan said, ticking off the names of the jerseys they got in. Oh, any stray Peter Forsberg jerseys still hanging around?
Morgan laughed. "I don't think so, and if we did those would definitely be half-price." *
- Paul Vigna
Comments on negativity at go.philly.com/line
Join the panel? Send e-mail to vignap@phillynews.com.
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