JAGUARS PRESIDENT MARK LAMPING
2026 STADIUM AND TICKETING UPDATES
WEDNESDAY, FEBURARY 25, 2026
MARK LAMPING: Most of what we have to share relates to 2026. But because so much of
what’s influencing 2026 is the construction, we thought it would be appropriate to give
everybody an update on what’s going on. You can see there is a tremendous amount of
activity.
Before we get started, while there has been a lot of discussion for a lot of years, and there
has been a lot of moving parts during that time, all designed to deliver on Shad’s [Jaguars
Owner Shahid Khan] vision of a stable Jaguars NFL franchise here in Northeast Florida for
generations to come.
There was a whole sequence of things that needed to happen and needed to happen in a
certain order. What I find particularly exciting is that these things are actually coming to life
right now. So, if you started with one of the first things we had to do is get all the football
staff out of the stadium to enable renovations to occur.
Here we are sitting in the Miller Electric Center. We had to get the whole business staff out
of the stadium so they could come in, do a lot of demolition, because most of the space
that football and business were using is all being repurposed in the Stadium of the Future.
And right across the parking lot, unfortunately that palm is blocking the view, is a new office
building. We moved in there Monday. So, the business staff is settled in, in a new office
building. Football staff has been here for a while. The stadium construction is under way.
You know everything that led up to just getting to the point where you could begin
construction.
The promise of the Four Seasons Hotel, I mean, you can see it right across the way. The
new marina behind the Four Seasons, that new public marina opened late this summer.
2
So, if you got out there you could see all the work that’s actually being done. The river walk
in front of the Four Seasons and this new marina, that will open the same time as the
marina, so you can expect that sometime this summer.
There is a marina building that’s connected to the marina that includes a restaurant, Asado
Life, opening their second location. First location is down in St. Augustine. That will open up
early this fall.
And all the funding is in place to finish the North Bank Parks. So, all of those things were
integral components of Shad’s vision to have a community and a location that not only
would uplift its residents but also create a place where an NFL franchise can thrive for
generations to come.
So, it isn’t just promises. These are promises that are being fulfilled, which is a great thing.
So let me start with a construction update and a lot of this is in the release that’s in front of
you. Now that the season has ended, major construction, as you can see, continues both
in the bowl and outside the stadium.
There are 75 deep foundation elements that have already been completed outside the
stadium. So, if you look at some of that steel right out there and you see that that steel is
connected to a big concrete piece of structure, that goes way down. That provides the
structural integrity for what ultimately will hold the roof over the stadium.
So, 75 of those have been completed. 100 percent of those outside deep pile foundation
elements will be completed by August. So, a lot of work that needs to get done between
now and August.
There are actually six big cranes. They call them crawler cranes because they move around.
As the work progresses, those cranes move. So, there are six of them in operation both
outside and inside the stadium.
One of the interesting things, this crane right here is our problem child in that that one goes
around the stadium this way and you get to a real pinch point. When you come back in a
few months, you’re going to see a large portion of the player parking lot here at the Miller
Electric Center will be removed. On a temporary basis. The players will park out here.
3
So that’s moving along. All of the structural steel will be completed by November. There is
100 steel trusses that are being installed as we speak right now. We opened up a big
staircase by gate one earlier this year. That was open for most of the season.
The second grand staircase is right behind us. That will open early during the 2026 season.
Then there will be similar staircases on all four corners of the stadium along with
escalators that will run in tandem with the stairs. The escalators will come at a later date,
before 2028, but they won’t be this year.
Main concourse expansion is under way. You can get a sense for how wide the concourse
will be. If you look at the outer edge of that steel, that’s the width of the concourse. The
concourse is about four times the width it is right now.
So, if you ever find yourself on the main concourse during a Jaguars game or in the upper
deck, there is significant crowding. All that crowding will be relieved because there will be
significantly more room for our fans to find their way.
But we’ve got a long, long way to go. We’ve currently completed 15 percent of the project.
We’re progressing well. We’re on schedule, but have a long, long way to go.
Currently there is an excess of 550 full-time workers working each day on this project, and
that will continue to ramp up.
One of the other commitments of this project, we always said that if the end result was just
a shiny new football stadium, then collectively I think we would’ve missed a huge
opportunity. So, we are really proud of not only the community benefits agreement, but
also to make certain commitments to make sure that during the construction period our
project benefitted the community to the maximum that it could.
So, we call these community construction metrics. We’re running ahead on all of them.
Local small and emerging businesses, we’re running ahead of what our goal was. Local
business participation, running ahead. As we sit here today, we’ve got over 140 local
contractors that have already been doing work on this project.
That also means a lot of local people are being put to work. There is a big issue in the
construction industry in the building trades as it related to getting labor in the pipeline.
That’s why if you listen to Hays’radio station, you’ll hear “Miller Electric recruiting,” for
employees to come through their training program.
4
So, we had a goal in terms of trying to include as many apprentices as we could. We’re
ahead of that. Had a big “Buy American” goal as well and running ahead of that.
So, we feel good. Still got a long, long way to go and there will be continued progress to be
made, but we are exceeding all of the goals that we voluntarily agreed to with the city of
Jacksonville.
Let me just take a minute. This is a time lapse drone video. So, this was actually taken
yesterday. This is the southeast corner. Some of the things you can see here. During the
playoff game there was a big sky bridge that connected this to this; that has been torn out.
These ramps are in the process of being taken out.
You’re going to see seats that will be taken out in each of the four corners. If you look here
you can get a look about what’s happening in the north end zone. A lot of that seating has
been removed. That’s being removed to put in the additional structure necessary to support
the temporary seats that will go in for the Florida-Georgia game. This is that grand staircase
near gate one that we opened earlier this year.
You can get a sense now for the width of this concourse. During the regular season — well,
you can see it stopped right there, and now it’s eventually going to wrap all the way from
this staircase to the other staircase, eventually around the entire stadium.
If you look inside the bowl, you can see the seats have been removed in the upper deck and
there has been demolition down near the field level. This will be rebuilt in time for this
season but that’s allowed to get in there because all the work that’s being done is those are
some field clubs being put in.
Now we’re coming into — that was that crane that I was talking about earlier. So, this is that
pinch point as you come around here. This is the Miller Electric Center. We’re all standing
right there. I’m standing there. You’re all sitting there.
And you’ll get your first glimpse; here is another look at some of the seats that have been
removed. In this corner right here you’ll actually be able to look from outside the stadium
inside the seating bowl, so this gives a real example of how those seats get cut out.
5
If you recall the design, the reason for that is to create a breezeway in each of the four
corners to not only provide great decks to overlook the river and downtown, but also to
provide ventilation through the stadium to keep it even cooler.
The sky deck at this end, which is usually a group sales/tailgating area, that will be closed
for next year. This is the Northeast corner. As you’re wrapping around you can see all the
work that’s going on.
The first part of the construction for the grand staircase that will be located in that corner.
Again, you can see how pieces of the stadium have been removed. Ultimately, we come
back in because not only the main concourse, but the upper deck will offer 360-degree
circulation. You can’t do that now.
You’ll be able to walk around the entire stadium, both the main concourse and the upper
level. They’re a little further along on this side of the stadium in terms of the steel
construction. Ultimately, all this comes up, all this steel is scheduled to be done by
November, so there will be work going on during the season.
That is one of the primary reasons, the steel will cantilever over the upper deck. That’s why
we have to close the upper deck. It wouldn’t be safe for people to be up there.
And so that concourse will wrap in front of what is currently the club seat entrance. This is
on the east side of the stadium. You can see these ramps are all in the process of being
dismantled.
So, this gets us back to where we are. That’s our office building, we moved in Monday and
that’s the Four Seasons. Behind that is the marina that I referenced a few seconds ago.
We’ll post this on our website. Feel free to access it there.
Okay, so let me turn to 2026, which is really some of the meat of what we’re talking about
today. Remember that when we first laid out this construction plan, we were going to be
playing outside of Jacksonville for the 2026 and the ’27 seasons. We got a lot of feedback.
Part of our community huddles, we heard from fans, heard from other stakeholders, heard
from elected officials, that they really wanted to try to limit that to one season if we could.
We agreed to do that, but we knew there would be some sacrifices we would have to make
in order to make that possible. So, to stay on schedule we have to change what the
experience inside the stadium will be like for our fans this year. Lower capacity, closing the
6
upper deck, and coming into certain parts of the lower deck where some seats are being
removed. Principally to remove those seats in each of the corners to open up the
breezeways to increase the comfort inside the stadium.
So, the capacity will be 42,507. That includes 1,260 standing room only tickets. This is a
decrease from 68,300.
So, of the 27,637 seats that will be taken offline this year, over 22,000 of them are located in
the upper deck. So, the 400 level is closed and there are some seats that are impacted
elsewhere.
On the 200 level in each the four corners; there are some rows in the north end zone. Some
of those being removed to create compliance with new NFL broadcasting rules as it relates
to camera locations. The lower-level south end zone and lower-level club, some seats
being removed, and then will come back and replace most of those seats.
And also, the north end zone spa deck and sky patio in the south end, both of those will be
offline this year. Again, all that is laid out in the press release.
Season ticket renewal information will be shared with our season ticket members in the
coming days. Any season ticket holder whose sets are impacted by this construction will
be contacted individually by their account service representative with the Jaguars.
All of those season ticket holders in the upper deck will be given the first chance to relocate
down the lower level if they choose to. In addition to that, we will be offering some pricing
incentives to those displaced season ticket holders.
We are also accepting new season ticket deposits. We have been for a while. But we are
not assigning those seats until we get through this process of relocating any existing
season ticket holders that are displaced. So we’ll deal with our displaced customers first,
then we’ll begin filling in, assuming we have inventory available, with new season ticket
holders. We do you have room for new season ticket holders, but the interest has been very
high. So that’s basically the major changes as it relates to the stadium for the 2026 season,
okay?
Another component of this, and again, a lot of these things are tied together that are
allowing us, although doing it in a somewhat disruptive way, to play games at EverBank
Stadium in Jacksonville this year.
7
So international games. That’s the next topic. You may have seen an announcement this
morning from the NFL regarding the London games next year.
So, first, it’s important to remind us all that the NFL requires that all 32 teams play certain
games at international locations once every four seasons. Now, this game is separate from
the annual game that we play in London, and our turn to be selected for those was
originally scheduled for 2027. So next year when we’re playing outside of Jacksonville, one
of the games we won’t be playing in that temporary location will be an international game.
The other game was scheduled for 2030, okay?
So, as we looked at the complexities of the construction schedule—and the two games
were anticipated because that was part of our negotiations with the City of Jacksonville. So,
we’ve always known the Jaguars had the ability to play two games outside of Jacksonville
during the 2026 season. One of the reasons that was important is because we have to have
all of our preliminary work done by the end of the 2026 season, because once the season
ends, things go really gangbusters.
So, we can’t be catching up on work we got behind on. That’s why you’re seeing so many
people working now. In the event that we got to where the season was starting and we had
some projects that had to get completed and would’ve been difficult to do that while the
games were being played, it was our hope — and again it remains our hope — that the 2026
schedule would be what we call a doughnut schedule. So, you would have games and a
break in the middle, and during that break, construction could be ramped back up to get
inside the stadium. We know that at a minimum there will be a two-week window. Now, the
NFL schedule is one of the most important things that the league does. It drives so many
things. It’s a subject that the league and all 32 clubs take the greatest amount of interest in.
What the league does is offer the opportunity for teams to provide their suggestions on
what they’d like their schedule to look like. Sometimes you may have some dates that
otherwise your stadium would be occupied, which would make having an NFL game not
impossible but difficult. So, every year we would put down the Florida-Georgia weekend as
we would prefer not to be playing a home game on Sunday when Florida-Georgia play on
Saturday. So, we give all our requests to the league. Again, no guarantee we will get that,
but don’t be surprised to learn that we’re going to ask for a bye week after our second
London home game. If we’re granted that, then that two-week window becomes three
weeks. In addition to that, we’re going to ask that we play a road game either before our first
London game or after our bye week. If that happens, then from a construction perspective
8
we have the optimal schedule which gives us almost a month-long doughnut right in the
middle of the season.
Again, this isn’t guaranteed. The league always tries to cooperate, but there are overriding
issues which outweigh many times what one individual club may want. But we know at a
minimum we’re going to have two weeks. Cross our fingers we could have as many as four.
Again, the two games in London, trying to create this doughnut schedule, that’s one of the
trade-offs to playing in Jacksonville this year. Like I said, this is not something that should
come as a surprise.
The other piece that was interesting is the second game. Keep in mind I mentioned we were
scheduled to play an additional game in 2030. We worked with the league. The league has
agreed to move that game to 2026. So, what that means is we’re getting a game back that
will be in Jacksonville in the new stadium at full capacity, and we’re giving up a game at
reduced capacity in the stadium here. It also helps us regarding the construction. That’s
happening for sure. Obviously, many fans want every single game to be played here in
Jacksonville. We understand that. But in this particular case, trading a game in a stadium
under construction with reduced capacity and getting a game back in our brand-new
stadium, we think that makes sense for all involved. So, that’s something that we’re looking
forward to.
Obviously, questions about—last topic, this is not in the press release, but I think we’re
getting very close to a resolution on where we’ll be playing in 2027. We have every
expectation that it will be taken up at the upcoming owner’s meeting, which is scheduled
for Phoenix at the end of March. Then we’ll be able to move on at that point and begin
planning.
So, with that, that’s the end of any prepared remarks. If there are any questions, I’ll be
happy to take them.
Q. Is there any consideration looking beyond the ’27 season of trying to get out of that
required annual London game?
MARK LAMPING: We don’t have to get out of anything. In fact, our London commitment
has been something that’s been rolling. It’s been renewed year after year. There is a lot
changing on the international front with the league. There is a lot that’s going to be changing
here locally. I think you can expect us to take a close look at what our London strategy is
9
moving forward. Not to suggest that we’re going to stop playing a game in London, but it’s
something we will look very closely at.
Q. Two questions: Wanted to make sure I had my facts straight. The two games in
London this year, are they both home games, or is it like a couple years ago where one
was officially a home game and one was a road game?
MARK LAMPING: No. These are games that if they weren’t going to be played in London
would be home games here in Jacksonville.
Q. So of the eight designated home games for 2026, two of them will be in London in
2026?
MARK LAMPING: Yeah, actually, we have a total of 10 games including preseason. Two of
those 10 will be played in London.
Q. I remember a few years ago that the ’27 season — the ’28 season was probably one
of the most successful in terms of local revenue created for the club because of the
success of the ’27 season on the field. Considering how well the team did —
MARK LAMPING: 2017 and 2018, right?
Q. Yeah. So, considering how well the team did on the field in ’25, how much will the
reduced capacity impact local revenue creation this upcoming year?
MARK LAMPING: Well, it is going to impact it. You can’t lose a third of your inventory and
expect to generate the same ticket revenue. We’re going to try, that’s for sure.
I would expect that we would have a big change in the supply-demand dynamic. I think this
will be a pretty electric experience for our fans. It will be a smaller capacity but should be
packed each and every game. Hopefully given that we give priority to Jaguars fans first… We
have a strong schedule next year with teams that bring a lot of fans with them. Hopefully
our fans will take up most of those tickets before visiting fans have a chance to purchase
them.
But the other part of this is we’ve known this all along. This was one of the trade-offs that
we knew we had to make. One aspect of this that’s been incredibly uplifting to us is how
supportive our partners and sponsors have been to work with us through this situation. For
10
example, maybe taking other benefits, keeping their investment the same but adding other
benefits to offset for the lack of capacity. The one thing to keep in mind, I don’t want to
belabor it, but this is an important point, is we made a conscious decision collectively once
we figured out it was possible to pretty much do something that has very rarely, if ever, been
done on this scale. That’s produce a new stadium from an existing stadium.
So, there are trade-offs that come with that. One is the one you just mentioned. You’re
going to be doing construction while you’re playing games. There are logistics, cost impacts
of that. There are headaches that are part of that. There are economic impacts that are
related to that. The other thing that we did when we chose this renovation approach, we
were able to do it in a much more sustainable way. We were able to do it much more
efficiently. We said at the time that doing a renovation versus a new build collectively saved
about $1 billion. I would suggest it’s more than that. Look at the pricing of new-build
stadiums out there.
So, all those things weigh. So, yes, we’re going to have to be conscious of what the local
revenue is for the 2026 season and the ’27 season, keeping in mind collectively with our
partner at the City, both of us have come up with a pretty efficient way to deliver a stadium
that convinced an NFL team to sign a 30-year lease.
Q. You guys still control the London game operations at Wembley?
MARK LAMPING: Yeah, the one thing that’s different with these resolution games that the
league refers to, when they can take one game every four years, the league operates that.
So, while we will be the designated home team for both the game at Wembley and
Tottenham Hotspur, the league will operate the Spurs game, as they do for all the other
games there, and we will operate 100 percent the Wembley game. Then the economics of
those, the structure of the economics are different from our game at Wembley versus
Spurs.
Q. Do you have an agreement with the league — I know you had one I think through last
year — to do that annually still?
MARK LAMPING: I think we just signed the extension that allows us to play the game this
year. That shouldn’t signal anything other than the league likes to keep their options open
for the most part.
11
Q. I think before in one of the older state of the union addresses, London revenue
made up, like, 11 percent of the team’s local revenue. Is that still true?
MARK LAMPING: That was at the beginning. It’s nowhere near that high anymore. We’ve
made significant progress here in Jacksonville and economic motivation will change even
more once we move into the new stadium. So, those are all things we need to consider
when we go back and look at our strategy.
Q. In the past you’ve been able to protect games, big games here. Will you worry about
that with a limited capacity or do you still have the ability to tell the league, hey, we
would like to protect this opponent in Jacksonville?
MARK LAMPING: Yeah, I don’t think we’re going to say, okay, let’s not protect the most
popular game because we’re going to sell it out anyway. I don’t think that’s fair to our fans
that are going to be there. Keep in mind our hope is that most of our seats will be occupied
by season ticket holders, and those are our real core fans.
We’re going to rely on them for a long time. Whether you’re a season ticket holder or
whether you buy single tickets or don’t go to Jaguar games, you can still be a fan, and we
still appreciate your support. But I think we will be guided by protecting — and we can
protect two games — that we will assess which of those games would be best received by
our fans to be played here.
There is also good discussion and probably a better level of communication that we’ve had
since I’ve been here in terms of what football thinks from a competitive standpoint. They
may like a matchup at home against a certain opponent.
Q. How important is that relationship with the football side of things?
MARK LAMPING: It’s incredible. I mean, again, I’m not being critical to anyone who
preceded James [General Manager James Gladstone] or Liam [Head Coach Liam Coen] or
Tony [Executive Vice President of Football Operations Tony Boselli], but this is at a whole
other level. There is a great level of respect for what each side of the organization does.
There is tremendous sensitivity. From a business standpoint, we know the best thing to
meet our objectives is to win football games. Anything we can do to support the football
team. And the football team knows they have a much better chance of winning on Sunday if
the place is packed.
12
Just as an aside, we’ve had some great environments over the 13 seasons I’ve been here. I
don’t think anything showed what this market is capable of more than our playoff game
against Buffalo this year. You saw the stands, unlike a lot of times when the Bills roll in here,
it was still dominated by Jaguars fans. They were loud and it was great. And I think that was
appreciated by the football side and was really appreciated by all of us on the business
side that yes, we’re correct. If we put the right product on the field and give our fans the
right product for them to enjoy in the stadium, we’re going to get an unparalleled
experience.
Q. In terms of the 2027 home game location, you said we may learn about that in
March?
MARK LAMPING: Yeah. I think the process for that is it needs to be first approved by
probably two ownership committees. Ownership committees convene next week in Palm
Beach, Monday and Tuesday so this matter will probably go in front of two committees next
week.
If it comes out of those committees with an affirmative vote, it goes to a vote of 32 owners.
That process was no different than what we had to go through to get our 30-year lease
extension approved, but it looks like we’re on that timetable.
Q. We may not know until March though, correct?
MARK LAMPING: Yeah. Well, it can’t be officially 100 percent guaranteed until the full
ownership body of the National Football League votes on it. That vote can’t happen any
earlier than the end of March.
Q. What factors, if you can explain, are in play in terms of making that decision as
we’re going to play at this stadium or this stadium? What goes into that decision?
MARK LAMPING: A whole variety of things. What do our customers want. That’s why we did
a lot of surveys of our season ticket holders. What do our sponsors want. What do our
employees want. We also want to make sure that wherever the games are played, it’s
played in an NFL-caliber stadium. We think it’s really important that games are played in
front of a full house and it needs to be convenient for Jaguars fans to get there, but it also
has to be in a market where there’s enough football fans to be able to buy what will be
tickets that Jaguars fans will not purchase.
13
Those are principally the things we looked at. There is no secret. We spent a lot of time
looking at Florida’s field in Gainesville, we’ve talked about some of the challenges there.
Spent a lot of time at Camping World Stadium in Orlando.
The NFL has certain requirements. The logistics have to work out, not only for the home
team but also the visiting team. Locker rooms, space on the sideline so that you can
continue to support a high-quality television production. Those are probably most of the
things we considered.
Q. You mentioned the steel beams being constructed. You said that is to support the
roof?
MARK LAMPING: Yeah. Eventually what will happen is those steel beams will encircle the
stadium, and then all of the load that is created by the new roof will be supported by those
steel beams.
Q. Those should be in place by November?
MARK LAMPING: Yeah. Steel beams on the outside by November. Then the next thing that’s
the most important piece, which is really critical, and I don’t want to get into too much
detail because if you ask me questions I’ll probably have to make something up, there is
what they call a compression ring which sits on top of those.
It’s that compression ring that ends up supporting the roof. There is a steel cable net
structure that basically lays on the field, lays over the seating bowl, and once you got the
compression ring in place, and the compression ring is expected to be in by next February
and we can’t miss that. That is really a critical path date.
Once you get that compression ring, then slowly you can raise that cable net structure up
to the roof, and to that structure is what you attach the roof structure.
Q. Is the build on pace to be on budget? Or how far over?
MARK LAMPING: That’s a hard question to answer right now. What I would say is this is
different than other projects.
14
If we were building on a green field site, it would be a lot easier. For example, with new
stadiums a lot of times they’ll discover differences that were unforeseen conditions. We
didn’t know there was environmental problems under the ground.
Early on in the process – and most of the unforeseen conditions in new stadiums are all
subsurface stuff. If we were building new, we would be through that which gives you more
certainty.
Unfortunately, that’s not this process. Because it’s a renovation and there is existing
systems in the building that will be reused, some will be removed. As I’ve said before, there
are surprises around every corner.
So, discovering these unforeseen conditions lasts a lot longer for us. Our cost projections
literally change in real time. If I gave a number today, it would be outdated a half hour from
now.
I did say this a few weeks ago and I will repeat it; we will be over $1.4 billion. What that
number will be, we won’t really know with great certainty until we get through a lot of the
renovation stuff that’s going on inside the stadium.
Q. You mentioned briefly international games in 2027. Do you have an idea on how
many?
MARK LAMPING: Well, in 2027 our agreement with the city of Jacksonville would allow us
to play up to three. We know we’re playing one for sure because that’s the resolution game
that the league is going to take from us, okay?
Then beyond that we haven’t determined yet. I would think we will continue our annual
game in London, but there is a lot of pieces that need to fall in place for that.
Beyond that, one of the reasons we had the ability to go to three games was done if there
were scheduling issues or something like that.
Q. How much pride do you and Shad take in this project being here? Seeing the Chiefs
possibly moving Arrowhead out of the state, seeing the Bears possibly moving a new
stadium to Indiana, how much pride do you take that you were able to do this here?
15
MARK LAMPING: Well, that’s all a credit to [Jaguars Owner] Shad [Khan]. Shad spent a lot
of time doing due diligence on the purchase of the St. Louis Rams, so he knows that market
well. I was born and raised in St. Louis. I know what it’s like to be a young sports fan in a
community to lose your team. We did it multiple times in St. Louis.
Owners that move their teams from one city to another, their legacy in that city is never the
same. Now, they may have a greater legacy where they moved, but it affects them. I think
Shad and his family are extremely proud that they could make it work here without having
to sacrifice those things that were important to everybody in this community: That we have
a stable, financially strong, consistently competitive football team that provides our fans
and the community the type of experiences they deserve.
So once we were able to work closely with the city to come up with that approach, I said,
yeah, I certainly don’t want to near the end of my career be moving a team or be part of
moving a team. It wouldn’t be my decision, but I think Shad and his family, you can visibly
see the commitment that that family is making to Jacksonville. Just look. If you look at that
building [Four Seasons Hotel and Private Residences Jacksonville], I can see where Shad’s
new condo is and I can what [Jaguars Chief Football Strategy Officer] Tony [Khan] and
[Executive, President, Khan Family Office, and CEO and Chief Design Officer, Iguana
Investments] Shanna [Khan] are moving. It’s a big commitment.
Q. Talking about supply and demand as it impacts ticket prices next year. You probably
have a lot of interest in purchasing tickets, fewer tickets to go around. Do season
ticket holders get a priority?
MARK LAMPING: Yeah, season ticket holders always get a priority. Season ticket holders
always get priority pricing as well. I can tell you if there are tickets that aren’t sold by our
season ticket holders to try to deal with the revenue impact we’re facing, we will probably
be pretty aggressive on the secondary market to have the price of the ticket reflect the
value based on the demand.
So, if we have unbelievable demand for tickets, I don’t think that it should be a surprise to
think that that’s going to be reflected in pricing on the secondary market. I mentioned
earlier the Bills playoff game, that same dynamic occurred. Season ticket holders were
able to purchase their tickets, I think the average increase was seven percent for the playoff
ticket for season ticket holders, so if you talked to season ticket holders and they heard
people claim, ‘I’m going online, the tickets are so expensive.’ The season ticket holders are
16
saying, ‘you know what?’ Mine were pretty reasonable. What was left, there was such
market demand that pricing moves it.
It’s not always the Jaguars doing that. There are so many tickets available on the secondary
market that don’t come through our approved ticket market. Ticket brokers sometimes if we
can’t identify them buy tickets and they sell them on the secondary market and their focus
is to simply to try to maximize the revenue they can get from the resale of that ticket.
Q. You mentioned ideally that you wanted those four weeks over the BYE Week and the
London games for construction during the 2026 season. How much of a boost, if you
get that from the NFL, could you see in construction and could we see a half and half in
2027, where half could be in Jacksonville and half could at the other location?
MARK LAMPING: No, that window is more of creating a backup in the event we don’t get all
the work we need to get done by the start of the season.
There is certain work that has to be done as soon as the season ends. Hopefully, we’ll get
all of it done by the start of the season. But if we don’t get it done, this will give us a window
to get in there. It also will allow us to get ahead on some stuff but not so much it would
change in any drastic way the availability of the stadium going forward.
I mentioned that compression ring and that process of raising that cable net. That process
takes about ten months. The stadium could be totally done, and you couldn’t play games
there because it takes ten months to raise this cable net structure up to the roof.
Q. What percentage of tickets next season at this point do you expect to be held by
season ticket holders?
MARK LAMPING: I’ll let you know when we finish the renewal process. Renewal notices are
going out to our season ticket holders in the next 48 hours.
Q. Where do you stand on identifying a sponsor for the new stadium?
MARK LAMPING: A lot of discussions going on. It has to be the right fit for the sponsor. It
has to be the right fit for us. It has to be the right fit for Jacksonville. That’s a priority for us.
Keep in mind that’s not the only thing we’re working on. We have all the other commercial
aspects of the new stadium. We’re working with sponsors to try to keep them on board in
17
2026, and then we will be thinking about how do we fit sponsors into our 2027 plan once
that location is determined. So we have a lot going on. Not surprising as part of that, we’ve
really added a tremendous amount of staff on the sponsorship and the ticket sales front.
And in fact, if you drive by the fairgrounds site you can see a building that looks like it’s
under construction. That was an existing building that’s being remolded, and that will open
as our sales center for season ticket holders primarily to come in and take a look at their
seats and chose their seats for 2028 and we expect that to open sometime late this
summer.
Q. When will we see the shiny new roof start to take shape?
MARK LAMPING: I think the first of that will go in the second quarter, 2027. So, first half of
- Now, what will happen you’ll see the shiny part of it going on the sides first then
what’s on the top will go in last. You don’t really see that unless it’s a blimp shot or you’re
inside.
Q. Have you started looking at changes for parking or entering into the game or getting
out of the game as far as fans are concerned?
MARK LAMPING: Yeah, on one hand we’re not going to have as many cars parking because
we are not going to have many people at each of the games. That’s a blessing way in
disguise.
If you look out here, I mentioned earlier we’re going to have to make place for our players to
park out here because we’re going to have to get access to the player parking right now.
There’s a lot of construction work that’s out there.
I don’t think the parking experience, I don’t know if this is a good thing or bad thing, I don’t
think it’ll be much different than last year. There maybe some more lots that are
encumbered, but that will be offset by fewer cars coming.
Probably similar to this year, which was an adjustment to our fans but we don’t think it was
intolerable.
