Tennessee's reinvestment into hoops program drives increase in ticket prices

Following Tennessee’s announcement of renovations this summer to Food Center Center, athletics director Danny White announced Tuesday changes to ticket pricing for men’s basketball for the 2025-2026 season.

On average, ticket prices are going up 6% in non-premium areas. There is also the arrival of the 10% talent fee as well. The talent fee will be in place for all sports in the 2025-2026 athletic seasons as revenue sharing in college athletics is on the horizon.

“Just like what we did for football renewals,” White said, “we evaluated all the secondary market price points and what our seats are valued at. It’s not the same in every section, but on average it’s a 6% increase, which we think gets us more competitive in the league. But it’s reasonable and it’s certainly not at the top (in terms of cost).”

The increase coincides with renovations to the facility on multiple levels.

“We have been planning this for the last couple of years,” White said. “We wanted to sync the new club with the new video board and audio system, which are both significant upgrades to the fans experience.”

Vols announced Food City Center renovations last week

The Riverside Club, which will be the first 13 rows on the side court both on the river side of the arena as well as the first 13 rows behind the team benches, will also be getting new, wider seats that will create the elimination of 260 seats in those 26 rows. 

Adjusting the pricing will also mean that everyone in the various pricing sections will pay the same amount per that section. Meaning, just like in football, there will no longer be grandfathered seats.

Currently, there are a little more than 500 arena ticket holders who are original season-ticket holders and have not been paying the same pricing as those sitting beside them. Tennessee fixing that is an adjustment in the pricing change as well. 

“When we separated out the giving model from Neyland Stadium and the arena,” White said, “we reduced ticket prices in the arena by about 60% across the arena to right size it and we haven’t touched those prices. We were waiting until we got to this point and did it right where just like in football we are eliminating grandfathered in deals.

“It’s a fair and equitable system where people in the same seating area are going to be paying the same amount. It’s a reasonable approach. I’m confident in that, in terms of benchmarking across our league and in terms of top basketball programs around the country. It’s not at the top, but it gets us a lot more competitive across the board.” 

‘We are doing projects like this to reinvest in (the fans’) experience’

For those affected by the loss of seats, Tennessee will offer two options. 

“Just like what we did in football,” White said, “they will be at the top of our priority list. Anybody affected by this will have the first opportunity to purchase club seats if they want to do that. If not, then we will find them somewhere in the building that is at a price point that they are comfortable with. That is exactly how our staff worked through folks that were sitting in the bleacher seats that are now a part of the lower west club in football. That process went really well.

“We are not trying to displace people outside of the building. We want the folks that have been supporting us to have somewhere that they feel great about and continue to support us at a high level. Our fans as you know are the reason we can build the best athletic department in the country. We are doing projects like this to reinvest in their experience and allow us to generate the kind of revenue to allow us to reinvest in our programs to be as competitive as they (the fans) want us to be.” 

White, since his arrival, has made it clear that the correlation between winning and investing in programs is obvious. That’s certainly been the case at Food City Center. The Vols are 56-5 on their home floor the last five years including Saturday’s 66-46 win over top 5 Florida.

Tennessee basketball has sold out men’s basketball season-ticket allotment the last three seasons, selling 14,500 season tickets. Below is the new ticket prices and how they compare to ticket prices this past year.