London 2012 Paralympic organisers revel in setting new event benchmarks

More than 2.7 million tickets have been sold for the London Games, which is over 900,000 more than Beijing?s event in 2008. Beijing?s Paralympic Games was attended by 3.4 million people, but only 1.8 million tickets were sold, with the remainder handed out as part of a Chinese government scheme. Paul Deighton, chief executive of the London organising committee (LOCOG), also added that ticket sales are likely to generate nearly ?45 million in revenue, ?10 million more than projected.

?To put it in context of previous Games, we have almost sold 900,000 more tickets than Beijing, which is amazing,? said International Paralympic Committee (IPC) chief executive Xavier Gonzalez, according to Reuters. ?And to put it in context again, we only started to sell tickets to the Paralympics in Atlanta 1996.?

Deighton said that the success of the Games can in part be attributed to the pricing strategy employed for ticket sales. More than half of tickets have been available for ?10 or less, three quarters for less than ?20 and 95% for under ?50.

?If you look at the demographic in the park, it's great to see families come in big groups and have a wonderful day out,? he said. ?The interest in the Paralympic Games and the attendance at the Paralympic Games has been quite extraordinary from the start.?

Gonzalez added that Paralympic broadcast rights have been sold to more than 100 countries around the world. ?We have had outstanding media coverage online, on radio and on TV, both nationally and internationally,? he said.

?As a good example the victory the other day of Alan Oliveira knocked out all the football coverage in Brazil and you can probably understand that is quite a big deal.?

However, the IPC chief rejected claims that Rio de Janeiro will struggle to deliver a successful Paralympic Games in four years? time. ?Brazil has one of the strongest national Paralympic committees; Brazil hosted the Para-Pan-American Games very successfully in 2007,? said Gonzalez, according to the BBC.

Source: http://www.sportbusiness.com/news/186247/london-2012-paralympic-organisers-revel-in-setting-new-event-benchmarks

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