Vikings stadium is 13 percent complete, dollar-wise
Here's the ledger on the new Vikings stadium, as totted up at the Minnesota Sports Facilities Authority meeting this morning. The bottom line: about an eighth of the money has been spent.
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There are some interesting numbers in this chart: the Vikings clearly have a lot of seat licenses to sell. About a quarter of the team contribution will be paid directly by fans who'll pay licenses, ranging from $500 to nearly $10,000 dollars a seat.
Even if the Vikings have covered the $25 million in marketing and financing costs baked into the $125 million gross sale number they set, they still need $97 million in cash from fans to pay that slice of the team's $477 million share.
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It's also interesting what isn't on this chart: the Vikings committed today to another $600,000 to prepare to almost double the size the video board on the west end of the stadium: it's now going to be almost 7 stories high. They're also spending another $630,000 to put video walls in the premium lounges for the Fire and Ice clubs.
Vikings CFO Steve Poppen says that's on top of the $26.4 million contingency that the team committed to in November, which could be above and beyond the original $975 million sticker price.
Poppen wasn't ready to say that $26 million contingency is already gone, but if they have to put in yet more cash up front, that seems a good indication that the stadium cost is now on the books, somewhere, for more than $1 billion.
The $1.2 million in upgrades unveiled Friday puts the team's tentative contribution for the stadium at $505 million, up from the $477 million initially pledged.