AT&T Stadium strengthened its reputation as a premier destination for sports hospitality during Monday night’s CFP National Championship. Legends Hospitality, the Cowboys’ concessionaire, reported a $75.60 food and drink per cap for the event, a number on par with some past Super Bowls. The figure represents all concessions and premium catering inside the stadium, as well as the Championship Tailgate party in a parking lot. The total gross sales for food and drink approached $6.5M, tied to official game attendance 85,689. By comparison, Centerplate two years ago generated a $46 per cap for the '13 BCS title game at Sun Life Stadium. Per caps were not available for last year’s championship game at the Rose Bowl. For Legends, the numbers almost doubled the per caps it posted for the '14 Final Four at AT&T Stadium. At that event, the Saturday semifinals drew an average spend of $44.39 with gross sales of $3.5M. “This venue lends itself to doing high-profile events due to the [300] suites,” said Legends Senior VP/Operations Michael Bekolay. “The fans were rabid. There was an uptake on higher-value items and no pushback on prices. It was Super Bowl-esque.” For this particular event, Legends rolled out some new menu items such as a cheese curd burger, shrimp po’ boy and jalapeno sausage. Those hefty portions were priced at $15-20. On the alcohol side, draft beers cost $9.50, bottled beer was $9 and cans $8.50. Wine started at $8 and mixed drinks cost $10-12. At the Championship Tailgate set up in parking lot 4, margaritas sold for $17. The tented tailgate party ran from 12:00-6:00pm CT. Legends employed more than 4,000 workers for the game, an increase of 35% staffing over a typical Cowboys game. More than 50 Legends GMs from across the country worked the game. CFP merchandise sales numbers were not available. Legends ran the retail operation in a partnership with Facility Merchandising Inc., the company holding the contract for the event.
