CIAA Announces Attendance Figures for 2006 Tournament

CIAA Announces Attendance Figures for 2006 Tournament 

Move to Charlotte Sees Tournament and Event Attendance Rise, High Hotel Occupancy Rates and a Substantial Economic Impact for the Region

HAMPTON, VA (April 4, 2006) - The CIAA Tournament, held in Uptown Charlotte this past Feb. 27 - March 3, was the conference's largest event ever in terms of attendance for the basketball tournament and its ancillary events.  CIAA fans came in record numbers to Charlotte and Mecklenburg County to experience the Tournament activities resulting in over $10 million in direct spending and an economic impact of $15.4 million.  The city also experienced some of the highest hotel occupancies it has ever seen for an event with CIAA fans using more than 25,000 hotel rooms during the week. 

Over 124,000 CIAA fans attended game action and Super Saturday festivities at the Charlotte Bobcats arena during Tournament week including capacity crowds for several night sessions.  This represents a thirteen-percent increase from last year's tournament held in Raleigh and was driven by increased attendance for the early round sessions and a record crowd for the Super Saturday activities.  

This year, besides the basketball tournament itself, fans enjoyed The CIAA Fashion Show, CIAA's Showtime at the Apollo and Whispers concert events, the CIAA Super Saturday activities, the CIAA step show and too many business socials, after-parties and reunions to count. 

New to the 2006 Tournament was the CIAA Fan Experience, which offered free admission to everyone and included interactive activities and performances that drew tens of thousands of fans to the Charlotte Convention Center throughout the week.  The CIAA Fan Experience was completely underwritten by the CIAA sponsors allowing the event to be offered free of charge. 

"The 2006 Tournament was our best ever and was certainly our largest in the history of the conference," said Commissioner Leon Kerry.  "The city of Charlotte really proved themselves as a big-time event town and our fans had a great experience this year.  We expect things to only continue to grow from here and our team is already hard at work to make sure the 2007 Tournament will continue to grow in the area".

In addition to the tournament action, which was accessible only through the purchase of week-long tickets books, another 35,000 fans attended the additional CIAA ticketed or free events.  Attendance at the three-day Fan Experience surpassed 20,000 with fans coming to see The Steve Harvey Morning Show, Fantasia, Biz Markie, Food Lion's Cooking Show, Funk Master Flex's "pimped-out" rides, street basketball legends and more. 

Traditional CIAA events such as the Fashion Show, Step Show and after-party also enjoyed record attendance and plans are underway to expand these even further for 2007.

For more information about the CIAA conference or the 2007 Tournament to be held February 25 - March 3, 2007 in Charlotte, please visit www.ciaatournament.org.