Niners’ CEO gives Levi’s Stadium operations a ‘B’ grade

Jed York, Niners CEO, speaking at tech summit at Levi's Stadium. Credit all photos: Paul Kapustka, MSR

Jed York, Niners CEO, speaking at tech summit at Levi’s Stadium. Credit all photos: Paul Kapustka, MSR

San Francisco 49ers CEO Jed York, who caused a stir last week by apologizing for his team’s play on Twitter, on Thursday gave the operation of his club’s new Levi’s Stadium an above-average grade of “B” for the first four months of its inaugural season.

Speaking at a technology-focused fan-experience and innovation summit held Thursday at the stadium’s “501” club, York said “I’d give us a ‘B’ on our execution [at Levi’s Stadium] this year,” citing parking issues and foot-traffic flow into the stadium as problems not yet fully solved for the 68,500-seat facility in Santa Clara, Calif.

Given the new stadium’s complicated location — in the middle of a busy corporate-headquarters area and right next to the Great America theme park — it was probably somewhat of a given that there would be parking struggles the first season, as fans, police, traffic directors and stadium workers all figured out how to make the dance work. Though some progress has been made during the season, York said that “parking and just getting people here” remain the biggest issue he sees at Levi’s Stadium.

While the Niners have tried to use technology to solve the problems of getting fans inside (with app-based parking maps and wayfinding), York said that despite plans to funnel fans through the correct gates to get more quickly to their seats, many fans still just head for the gate that’s closest to their parking or train arrival spot, which has sometimes led to big backups at the check-in lines.

On the networking side of things, York said all seemed to be going well with the stadium’s Wi-Fi and cellular networks, which have performed well in a series of ad hoc tests conducted by MSR in visits this season.

“We haven’t had any [network] glitches, but we’ve been doing a lot of tweaking,” York said. The Levi’s Stadium app has been the center of most of that tweaking, with continual upgrades to add features and fix problems like an Android bug that surfaced in a mid-November revision. York said that the Niners have been careful to make sure the human engineering behind the technology is solid before launching new things, like having enough runners to support the feature that allows food to be ordered and delivered to seats.

Levi's Stadium ready for the Pac-12 championship game

Levi’s Stadium ready for the Pac-12 championship game

And though it hasn’t been officially confirmed yet, York said the team might debut a planned feature of having team merchandise available for purchase and delivery to seats at the next home game, Dec. 20 vs. San Diego. John Paul, CEO of Levi’s Stadium app developer VenueNext, also spoke at the summit Thursday and said in an interview that the Dec. 20 game might also see the debut of a new feature that adds in mass transit and Uber wait times. (A good idea for fans going to the stadium is to check on game day morning for any updates to the app.)

On the app side, York said one surprise was the fairly low uptake of fans using the app’s instant replay features. After fans watched 7,800 replays during the regular-season home opener (the first game replays were available in the app), usage has gone down, with less than 4,000 replays watched during the last home game against Seattle.

“We thought that mobile replays would be absolutely a home run feature, but it hasn’t got that much traction,” said York. The culprit, he said, might be the twin HD displays above each end zone at Levi’s Stadium, which are somewhat stunning in their clarity. “We do have great video boards,” York said.

In his talk York also thought out loud about the possibility of using wearable technology to both better help prevent player injuries as well as being able to provide more rich detail for fans, like how hard a hit was on the field. But he also stressed that technology at Levi’s Stadium was not meant to be used for technology’s sake, but instead to improve the experience of being at the game. And improvement on the stadium staff’s execution, York said, will go a long way to making it all work together.

“When we get to an A, or A+, people will really be blown away,” York said.

Levi's Stadium at twilight

Levi’s Stadium at twilight

Comments

  1. The biggest problem with Levi’s is the seats are too close together. If you have anyone overweight next to you they take up 1/3 of your seat. The rows are too close together as well. If you sit back and the person behind you isn’t sitting back they constantly bump your head.

    Next it takes 3+ hours to get there using public transportation from San Francisco (unless you happen to live right next to Caltrain).

    Biggest problems with the team are allowing players out on bail for domestic violence to play and obviously trading Alex Smith.

  2. I would give it an F on hot days, and a B+ otherwise. That’s why half the stadium is empty when the outside temperature gets above 80.

  3. The Silicon Valley version of the NFL fan experience, while focusing on devices, is missing the real human elements. The place seems to lack character, and the online social aspects can’t replace the value of real human interaction; hence the thousands of empty premium seats during the games. For a successful model of real fan experience, look at Lambeau Field.
    Oh, and a decent playing surface would be nice too.

  4. The app doesn’t work most of the time… at times the WiFi bandwidth is excellent, at other times it’s zero. And the app server just does not respond most of the time, and that’s why there are so few replays being viewed. People like me just give up after a few tries, never to return again.

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