Taylor Field needs more seating

Not sure they gave a firm timeline. The removal of the hill had more to do with insurance and fire marshall issues, plus the desire to have an upgraded space for game day sponsors.

The big challenge is renovating while still allowing for temporary seats to increase the numbers for a Grey Cup game. The last GC had seating for more than 50,000 people. Building something more substantial on either the North or South end of the stadium would limit that ability.

The food service IS contracted out! In fact the contract is coming up for renewal and I gather the rumour is that the team is looking at taking control of the concession so that the quality can be improved!

Nasty. If that’s the best contract they could get, then that’s hurtin!

Maybe not the best quality, but def. the best deal for the club. These things are BID on, you cant force quality food BIDS.

Kel

The facilities they are given to work with aren't exactly stellar either.

Actually you can force quality in a food bid, I have done it with food service organizations I have contracted to run concessions for my organizations.

Quality food? What do you want wraps and lattes? Come on this is a football game - dogs, beer and popcorn - I think the quality of these items are more than adequate.

Well they did improve things by adding bratwurst, etc.

How about some good beer instead of the industrial swill?

Better Pizza!

To me the concession issue is not as much about the food quality, but rather the service. I still can not figure out why I have to go to two seperate places to get a hotdog and a burger, why do they not sell both from the same place? Nor why I have gone to the concession at the start a halftime and been told they had no hotdogs…, nor why they have from time to time shut down the concessions at the end of the third (and I am talking food concession here).

Or how about training the stand hawkers to actually speak up and let people know they have something to sell.

Take a look at the options you can find in other stadiums across the country, mini-donuts, perogy’s, good pizza, shakes, floats, icecream, chinese, etc, etc. Yup even lattes at some places.

Why should be get second class stuff? Heck, if it is going to increase revenue to the team, why not?

All good points buddy. I’d wager that you’ve never worked in the service industry, while I worked for Earl Stewart for a few years at the games. Maybe I can give you some perspective here. All you need to do is think about the facilities, visualize them, and realize that they are not set up to accomodate any of your suggestions.

  1. Better Beer. I dont drink beer anymore, but there was a time when I sampled them all, so I admit Im barely qualified to comment. You’ll never find a stadium that serves anything other than premium major brands. Thats a FACT. Molson and Labatt and even GW are in a market where micro breweries, with great tasting beers, such as Bushwackers and the Barley Mill will never be. So feel free to pick a giant.

  2. Better Pizza. Regina is the undisputed, undefeated heavy weight champions of the world in the pizza business. Its a shame that we cant snarf down one or more of the Queen Cities best slices at Rider games. As I’ve alluded to earlier the facilities are not adequate for spacial and food safety reasons to meet the demand for tasty pie. The current Za’s are frozen, cooked downstairs, and catered to the point of sale(POS) where they sit in warmers. What a shame! Could you handle going to one of our fine establishments before or after a game maybe?

  3. Location, location, location. There is a simple and good reason for the location of certain food items. Hamburgers are cooked outside and downstairs and catered to the POS where they sit under a heat lamp. The market research that doesnt take a rocket scientist to conduct says that people generally want fries with that. The deep friers are in the Hamburger/Pizza booths. Hot dogs are at the more accommodating and less used other stand where pops, waters, hot chocolate, twizzlers, and popcorn are on the menu.

  4. Out of food??? Closed??? Whyyyyyy? Well sir that is the kind of day Earl relishes, no pun intended. They make an estimate number of each dogs and burgers based on the predicted crowd. Thats where the good old rule of first come-first serve comes into play. Im sure they regret losing the sale more than you do considering the markup. Sometimes I’ll admit, but rarely, the shipments of product haven’t been adequate in size, but for reasons out of the control of the Riders or even Earl himself. And closed is something no one likes to see but on a day where things have gone wrong from the start(ie:sales, short staffed, irrate customers) sometimes its best for their staff to just close up and go enjoy the rest of the game. Most them also love the Riders but never get to see them as they are too busy catering to our every whim.

  5. Yes the hustlers need to speak up. I know I came home with a sore throat every game and a pocket full of bills to show for it.

  6. Mini-donuts, perogy’s, shakes, floats, icecream, chinese, lattes…once again, no room or proper food-safe facilities at the inn. To get into renovations and buying additional equiptment is a major enterprise, that while it would be nice, is not necessary. Another thing that I know is most people come to a Rider game to watch football, not eat dinner. Have you considered eating prior to or after the game before?

  7. Second class stuff eh? You said yourself the quality is there. Sight one person that has gone home with food poisoning(?) which is a regular occurance in restaurants or all types. IMHO the Riders want Taylor Field to be known for great tackles, hits, runs and receptions(of the non-food related kind) rather than a great place to get a bite.

I do wish the city would licence a part of the outside concourse for Reginas great culinary establishments to compete for business, and consider stadium upgrades for the future, on a sustainable level.

Kel

You make a number of very good points.
But there are a number of holes in there as well.
First, Taylor Field has among the worst, if not the worst concessions in the league.
And no matter what you say, it is not all about inadequate facilities.
You are absolutely correct about beer.
As long as Molson’s is a major sponser, you will get Molson products.
That isn’t much of an issue.
But trying to defend being out of hot dogs BEFORE the game has started won’t get very far.
Meeting the bare minimum of not poisoning your customers isn’t much of an objective either.
I don’t know what goes on on the West side, as I haven’t sat there in 20 years.
But on the East side, the logistics are brutal and as this is “the new and improved” facilities, there is no excuse.
You say people come to watch just football?
I doubt that is true, but certainly that attitude is stuck in the 1950s.
People want to experience the atmosphere.
And that means music, cheerleaders, bigscreen TVs, and decent food.
Football and other sports have always been synonymous with “a game and a dog”. People want better.
If the game was great, but they missed a quarter standing in line to get a cold, soggy, nearly inedible hot dog, they will remember the poor service long beyond the score of the game.
There simply are no excuses for not bringing the standard of service and the quality of the food up.

The last time, I bought food from Taylor field I swore I would never do it again. The quality the service and the variety were something I wouldn't feed to my dog. It reminded me of the food a drive inn theatre.

Lets look at the argument that dogs and burgers are cooked in two different locations and therefore you need to sell them in different locaction. It is simple....you can carry them (if need be from one location to another), this is not rocket science. If you can cater burgers or pizza to a POS you can cater anything to that POS.

Under estimating the amount of food required. You only do that if you are not experienced or have quality control. I can understand running out of product say by the fourth quarter...but come on by half time. There is no excuse, that is bad management.

The frozen Pizza issue, I don't think you will ever see the Western or Houston style pizza at the games. Not unless there is a venue to seat down and eat it. Unless they were cooking personal pizzas and not by the slice. The reason I say this is that Houston or Western pizza by the slice most people would loose all their toppings by the time they got to their seats.

With the last big expansion done by the City, the Riders were involved as the primary tennants. In fact, I believed they helped do some of the financing to maintain the long term rental agreements in place.

The comparsion between renting an appartment and renting taylor field is like comparing renting a car to go to Winnipeg for the long weekend and renting a Grey Bus to go to Winnipeg for the long weekend. The only similarity is winnipeg and renting.

The fact of the matter is Regina hasn't had more out door world class events in Taylor field because Taylor Field is an residential neighbourhood. There have always been noise complaints, traffic complaints and until someone stands up and says...the noise isn't going to stop us, then we won't get more events.

In terms of the size of a potential expansion. The challenge and risk of going to small say 3000 is that you have to spend more money to re-do things in 5 years if the demand increases significantly.

Increasing it above 3000 means the city has to take a serious look at the facility. Where would they build, how much is it going to cost. The problem with say a 10K expansion is the potential number of empty seats if the team doesn't get the support. However, having said that Taylor field has held 28K for the last what 20 years. And yes we went through the lean years where there were only 18 or 19K in the stands. Still respectable.

If they expand to the north, there is not much room left without blocking of the street. And buying some of the homes. The last time they did that, it caused all kinds of problems for the city and league.

Personally, I would like to see the stadium expanded by closing of the complete north side...and built up in a horse shoe to the bottom of the upper deck on the West side.

Well Kel, I have been in and around the food industry for 30 years,so I do have some sense of what can be done, just as long as one does not face such negative attitudes.

Lets start with beer, the fact is that BC Place has RB micro beer, ok, not the best micro, but it is possible! Heck Big Rock would be ok with me, but please not the Barley Mill, Bushwakker would be great. I understand that Molsons is the sponsor, and will likely continue to be, so yes, change is unlikely, but as I have pointed out, it is possible to have do so AS OTHER CFL Stadium HAVE!

Pizza, other places make it work, why not TF? I can even live with fozen pizza's, just use a good supplier. Heck I have bought a pizza in a box at the end of the game.

Facilities, heck, I was just in Manhatten and got great kabobs, tacos and pizza all from steet carts!!! Anyone that thinks the facilities at TF are not capable of producing good food either do not know how to cook or do not care about the quality of food that is produced!

As for the inability of cooking hotdogs and burgers in the same place, oh please, the hotdog machines are countertop equipment that could easily be move or as has been pointed out, it is possible to move food! Heck I have catered to large groups of people in place that were miles from water, power or gas and still managed to serve them quality products.

How can you excuse not having hot dogs reading for the start of half time????? Or for that matter running out of food!! Afterall its not like one could not keep hotdogs in their frozen state in a freezer!

The fact is that for far to long, people have been willing to accept mediocre products in Regina. When I first moved here from BC I wondered why there were no sushi places, I was told that they would never work in Regina... now they exists.

Yes there is lots of bad food in Regina, but heck there is also some great food, China Pastry makes some of the best BBQ Pork buns I have tasted in the world, the Italian Star is a great deli, the new Afghan place makes some unique dishes, Ngoc Van makes some of the best Vietnamese soups and subs in the country.

The reality is that making good food does not have to cost much more, but can return much greater profits.

The fact is the reason we do not see better stuff at TF is that far to many people have your attitude that it can not be done. WRONG, WRONG, WRONG! IT CAN

You guys are incorrigible. I'll see about BC Place and the beer this weekend as I am going. And I'll just say this instead, (without being too negative because Id love to see some changes myself) IMHO there will be no changes to the food services at TF any time soon, despite the contract changing hands this offseason. Hence proving the mere facts and realities that I have outlined previously.

Kel

Well except you had your facts wrong, other stadiums do have alternative beers, other stadiums do have better quality food. You also stated that it is not possible to contract food quality IT IS I HAVE DONE IF MANY TIMES!

Hope you enjoy the RB beer, mind you Phillips, Lighthouse and a number of other BC micros make better product.

Anyway Kel, enjoy the game, you might want to try out some of the following at the stadium:

Chinese: Shanghai Noodles, Asia Kitchen
Italian: Panini Grille, Pizzamore
Continental: Market Grill, Henry’s Chicken, Caffe Fresh

Thanks man…as I will be a guest in Vancouver I cant expect my sister to prepare me a huge pregame meal. Henry’s intrigues me as long as they have fillet style sandwiches. Maybe we should talk about a bid on the TF contract since we share the interest? I’ve got credit out the yin yang and God knows I’d quit my job to go in another direction…lol!

Kel

I wish I could get to Vancouver... lol

The services at BC Place are only marginally better. I missed almost all of the 3rd quarter of a game once waiting in line for beer.

As for stadiums that have it right? SafeCo Field in Seattle. That place is amazing. They have lots of food services, all brands of beer - micro brews too - and lots of different kinds of food.

Taylor Field will never compete with SafeCo...and that's a real pity.

Interesting to see how many consessions they have and alternative foods at BMO field:

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