Cubs and White Sox owners and players won`t be the only big-money losers in town if the baseball strike turns into a long affair.
The Chicago economy could lose $1 million or more for each canceled game, and more than $60 million if the remainder of the season is canceled, according to estimates by economists, business groups and city officials.
”Sixty million dollars is an awful pop on the economy, and that money translates back into jobs,” said Samuel Mitchell, president of the Chicago Association of Commerce and Industry. ”It`s not just the bars and the vendors near the ballparks. It translates back through their employees, all the way to the soup and bread shelves at Jewel.”
Mitchell`s group came up with the $60 million figure by estimating the losses not only to the teams, but also to their concessionaires and broadcasters, the city`s tax coffers and the tourism and entertainment industry.
The story is the same elsewhere. New York City`s comptroller, Harrison J. Goldin, arrived at a figure of $61 million in estimating the impact of a season-ending strike by the Mets and Yankees.
Edward B. Shils, a professor at the Wharton School of Finance and Commerce at the University of Pennsylvania, projected losses as high as $25 million for the Philadelphia-area economy if the strike keeps the Phillies from taking the field again this year.
Mitchell and the others stressed that the estimates are rough and don`t take into account that fans will spend the money that would have gone for hot dogs and beer at the ballpark on other things.
But he also said they give a good indication of how much is at stake for the businesses whose fortunes are linked to those of the teams, starting with the bars and vendors near the ballparks.
Concern was greatest Tuesday near Comiskey Park, where the White Sox postponed their evening game with the Boston Red Sox.
Ald. Patrick Huels (11th) said the strike would have ”a big impact” on the area.
”A lot of students from the Illinois Institute of Technology have summer jobs at Comiskey Park,” he said. ”A lot of mothers work a couple of hours a night over there, cooking hot dogs and selling beer. Most of them walk to the park.
”A place like McCuddy`s Bar across the street is a natural to lose money, but I`m even more concerned with the people in my ward who work at the park or around it in the parking lots or vending stands.”
Things were quieter on the North Side because the Cubs were scheduled to play in St. Louis. But even around Wrigley Field, some merchants were already starting to feel the pinch.
”Vendors come in and generally buy all of their stuff at the beginning of a homestand, but they haven`t been buying much this week,” said Earl Shaevitz, owner of Sports Distributors Inc., a sports souvenir company at 1027 W. Addison St., across the street from Wrigley Field.
”We have a chain of sports stores that regularly buys from us. They often come in and buy about $5,000 at a time. This week, because of the strike, they bought $500.”
He said he feared a repeat of the 50-day strike of 1981. ”It`s 35,000 people across the street versus nobody,” he said.
Equally morose was Craig Lloyd, a co-owner of a McDonald`s franchise across Clark Street from Wrigley Field. He said business usually doubles on the days of home games. In addition, he rents out spaces in his 150-car capacity parking lot at $7 each.
”The baseball season makes that store,” Lloyd said. ”If there`s a long strike, I`ll probably be flat.”
Mitchell estimated that much of the $1 million in losses per game would come at the expense of the merchants, bar and hotel operators and others who would benefit from the ripple effect of so many dollars turning over in the economy. He projected the direct losses to the ballclubs from ticket and concession sales at $250,000 per game.
He and others said some of the biggest losers would include broadcast outlets and governmental bodies.
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Mitchell predicted that the loss in broadcast revenues could reach $4 million to $6 million if the strike ends the season.
William Baxa, a spokesman for the Chicago Transit Authority, estimated that about a fifth of the fans who go to games in Chicago take public transportation. That can translate into about $10,000 a game in revenue for the CTA.
And Thomas Elzey, the city`s first deputy budget director, said it is not unrealistic to estimate that Chicago could lose as much as $1 million in revenue from the city`s 4 percent amusement and sales taxes from the food, beverages and souvenirs sold at the parks and surrounding businesses.
Officials at the broadcasting outlets for the two teams, WMAQ radio and WFLD television for the Sox, and WGN radio and television for the Cubs, acknowledged they would expect a decline in advertising revenue if the strike continues for any length of time. Summer baseball broadcasts are popular in Chicago, and the executives conceded they might have trouble finding enough substitute programs that would do as well in the ratings.
But Bob Hoffman, WGN-TV`s director of sales, challenged the Chicago Association of Commerce and Industry`s estimate of $4 million to $6 million in revenue losses for all the broadcast outlets.
For many of the canceled games, he said, WGN-TV could substitute Clint Eastwood-type action movies that draw audiences almost as large. ”My guess is that when you throw it all together for all the stations, it would be less than that quote,” he said.
Local tourism officials agreed that many hotels would lose the business of fans who come to Chicago to take in a game or two.
”One of the ladies here at the bureau took off Friday and went to the Cubs` game, and at one of the bars near there she ran into part of a group of 40 people who had come up from New Orleans for the weekend games and were staying out at the Holiday Inn in Skokie,” said Lloyd Van Meter, director of travel promotion at the Chicago Convention and Tourism Bureau.
”There`s obviously many more people coming in like that, but just how many more, I have no idea,” he said.
At the Westin Hotel, where most visiting ballclubs stay and rent up to 50 rooms each, general manager Jim Mogush saw the strike as a ”mixed blessing.” ”On days when we wouldn`t fill those rooms, we wouldn`t have the revenue,” he said. ”But on days when we would fill them, we`d make more money because the rates for regular business travelers are higher than the rates we negotiate with the teams.”