By ALAN SNEL
Las Vegas’ new pro soccer team today released its logo and 20-game season ticket plans, which include its least expensive $200 deal, while also leasing 25 local digital billboards to promote its United Soccer League Triple A team.
The logo for Las Vegas Lights FC features a blue neon light tube design for its “LVFC” lettering, “Lights” in yellow, a pink diamond and a vertical mark that took the iconic Las Vegas welcome sign outline and rotated it 90 degrees for a vertical look.
The 20-game $200 season ticket deal also includes a free team jersey. It’s the least expensive of the team’s various season ticket deals, which include a field level seat close to the action for $1,400 that features free soda, beer and snacks.
A season seat in Cashman Field’s air-conditioned club level calls for a $1,000 payment, plus $4,500 for a front row table of four seats ($1,125 per seat).
“You get one chance to make a strong impression. I don’t want to give anyone an excuse to not to come to the stadium,” Las Vegas Lights owner Brett Lashbrook said about the $200 season ticket deal that translates into 10 bucks per game. The 20 games include 17 regular-season United Soccer League home games at Cashman, plus at least three exhibition and special games.
The Lights will share Cashman with the Las Vegas 51s Triple A baseball team of the Pacific Coast League in 2018, but will be the sole tenant in 2019 when the 51s move to a new ballpark in Summerlin next to the Vegas Golden Knights’ training facility and headquarters.
The Lights received more than 1,000 $20 season ticket deposits, said Lashbrook, who helped a United Soccer League team in Orlando grow into a Major League Soccer team. MLS is the big leagues of soccer in this country.
Of the last 10 MLS teams, six matured from minor league teams while the other four MLS teams were created in the giant markets of New York, Los Angeles, Philadelphia and Atlanta. Lashbrook hopes to take the first-year Las Vegas club in United Soccer League — a Triple A minor league — to the MLS one day.
But for now, he’s focusing on his new United Soccer League team logo and season ticket plans. The team starts play with some pre-season games in February and begins its USL schedule in March. Las Vegas will be one of 33 United Soccer League teams, including the Reno club that plays at the baseball park of the Triple A Reno Aces.
The Lights’ logo is consistent with the look of an international soccer team mark, is simple and represents the city of Las Vegas, Lashbrook said.
He noted the logo includes the traditional “FC” that the “futbol club” purists like, while showing the Americanized soccer team features such as the contemporary “Lights” name that represents Las Vegas. The logo colors are the colors of the Las Vegas city logo, Lashbrook said.
“The balance of the traditional and Americanized created a very unique crest that no other soccer team has,” Lashbrook said. “We were playing up the FC neon tubing look.”
The team’s staff listened to many fans’ suggestions regarding the logo. The Lights’ graphic artist worked with a local graphics guy to create the logo that will be featured in a 60-second video that will be posted on social media today.
The vast majority of fan-submitted logo suggestions included the current team colors.
Lashbrook said he liked the bright colors because they are a nice contrast to the black and silver of the Raiders, which come to Las Vegas in 2020 to play in their new stadium, and the Vegas Golden Knights’ black and gold.
“When you can own a color, it helps,” Lashbrook said.
Lashbrook didn’t conduct a scientific market analysis to set the ticket price deals.
“It’s just having a feel for the market and the sport,” Lashbrook said. “In recent years, some teams are beginning to price out the common fan. We have to make sure it’s open for everyone. We will bring an authentic soccer experience. We will create this experience and good things will happen. We’re pricing this so nobody in the community has an excuse to say no. We need to get people there and we know they will come back.”
Contact LVSportsBiz.com founder/writer Alan Snel at asnel@LVSportsBiz.com