At Xcel Energy Center, fans are number 1.
One of the best compliments that can be paid to a venue is that years down the road it still has the look, feel and appeal it oozed when it opened. As Xcel Energy Center in St. Paul, Minn., celebrates its 15th birthday this year, it is one such facility that defies the years and has the same aura of newness and freshness it did in 2000 when the doors first opened.
“Believe it or not, people still call this the new building in town,” said venue veteran Jack Larson, who joined Xcel Energy Center as vice president/general manager the year after it opened after having worked at the Target Center in Minneapolis. “It still has a new-building feel to it, and the ownership group has committed to keeping the building first-class, clean and maintained.”
The 15-year-old, 17,954-seat Xcel Energy Center, which looks and operates like a new arena even today, is owned by the city of St. Paul and operated by Minnesota Sports & Entertainment. Anchor tenant is the Minnesota Wild of the National Hockey League.
In fact, it was the city’s desire to have an NHL franchise that set the wheels in motion for the $165-million construction to even take place. The Minnesota North Stars began playing in the NHL in 1967 but relocated to Dallas in the fall of 1993. Since Minnesota without hockey is like a pancake without syrup, little time was wasted in building a facility that would one day bring professional hockey back to the Land of 10,000 Lakes. When the doors opened on Sept. 29, 2000, for the Wild’s first preseason game, that day had arrived.
“To build this building at the price it was built … it’s unheard of,” said Jim Ibister, vice president of facility administration for the Minnesota Wild and general manager of St. Paul RiverCentre convention center that is part of the downtown complex that, in addition to the attached Xcel Energy Center, also includes Roy Wilkins Auditorium and Ordway Center for the Performing Arts. “This was not a building built on the cheap. It was built with really specific things in mind. We take care of it and want to be good stewards for the building because it’s a place that Minnesotans really, really care about.”
Indeed, Minnesotans are a devoted fan base as evidenced by the 400 consecutive sellout crowds that attended Wild games from the venue’s inception through Oct. 16, 2010. The venue hosts four major high school hockey tournaments including the state high school hockey championship, a two-day event in March with two sessions per day that attract capacity crowds and bring some 100,000 people through the venue for the four sessions. The event is televised and is one of the biggest annual events in the state.
The venue will host the 2016 National Figure Skating Championships in January as well as the NCAA regional hockey tournament. It has been awarded the 2018 Frozen Four, college hockey’s equivalent of basketball’s Final Four. It will mark the third time Xcel Energy Center has hosted the three-game event of two semifinals and the national championship.
None of this would even be talked about had the NHL not awarded a franchise to the Minnesota Wild contingent on the venue being constructed. Locally based corporate sponsor Xcel Energy purchased the naming rights from the outset at a cost of $75 million spread over 25 years.
The original design included plenty of rock and comfortable tones without much marble or glass. It was important to stand apart and go against any of the color schemes or trends of the day.
“Remember how back in the ‘80s everyone was going with teal and mauve?” Ibister asked. “Had they gone with a trend like that it would have looked out of date immediately. This was designed as a hockey cathedral. It’s what the people wanted.”
The people do matter at Xcel Energy Center, sometimes referred to locally simply as “The X” although Larson understandably prefers for folks to call the venue by the full sponsor’s name.
“Before we even played our first game, the team retired the jersey number 1 that hangs in the rafters today and is for the fans,” Larson said. “Our fans are the lifeblood of the organization. You have to make them number 1.”
The venue’s unique design features an open concourse bowl that contains no hard walls and allows people to see fully across the arena. The venue was constructed at angles which creates a feel of being on top of the action, even from upper level seats.
“When I take people on a tour, I often talk about the whole design concept idea and how it works into our relationships with our fans,” Ibister said. “There are connections. From one level to another you can see down, you can see up, you can see through into the concourse. There are a lot of portables and it’s very open. It’s a very fluid space that allows fans to be fairly connected regardless where they’re sitting.”
It’s not just hockey fans who have raved about the venue’s design, either.
“Pavarotti gave a performance in the early years and he talked about how it reminded him of an old-style opera house in that there wasn’t a section leading to a section but was an overlapping feeling of each section and how everybody was on top of the stage. That’s exactly what we wanted,” Ibister said.
The venue includes three levels and one suite level. As dynamics have changed over the years with suite purchases and rentals, so too has the design of those suites.
“We had some loge boxes at the club level in the arena, and removed three sections of seats on the west end club level and replaced them with loge seating called the Bud Light Top Shelf Lounge,” Larson said. “They have been very popular. It’s an all-inclusive purchase and a four-seat loge. Think of them like mini-suites with all-inclusive food and beverage. It’s a buying trend. It is more affordable and smaller for companies or individuals who don’t need the bigger suite.”
Technology is one of the bigger endeavors and points of emphasis for both present and future and is important to keep the venue relevant and premier.
“I would say that the interaction with how guests use technology is one of our biggest focuses,” Ibister said. “Our technology infrastructure is about Wi-Fi and apps and giving our fans an opportunity to make an even greater connection to each other and the team.
Looking ahead, Ibister said that technology must be about the guest experience. If that means trying to guess about the dollar return on Wi-Fi, so be it.
Other additions include a new point of sale system. Bypass installed 250 POS units distributed throughout the arena over a five-day period in July, which went into service at the July 31 5 Seconds of Summer concert. Leading up to the installation, the Bypass services team worked with the Levy team to ensure all menu and inventory data was compiled and entered accurately.
“The Bypass business model diverges from traditional offerings by distributing hardware at cost and charging for software as a service over a specific license term,” said Chad Weiner, vice president of sales for Bypass. “Periodic software updates are made available during the period of the software license. This approach recognizes that a point of sale/commerce solution must evolve with the changing objectives of the venue.”
And that objective is putting the fan first, as Ibister and Larson emphasized.
Other additions include new video boards and ribbon boards installed by Daktronics and new seating handled by Irwin Seating. In order to make all of this function, Larson’s staff includes 55 fulltime employees and more than 400 who work part time.
“There’s the sentiment that maybe it is time to modernize this or get away from the kitschiness of that,” Ibister said. “I’m sure there will be some serious discussions both from a fan perspective and internally because it is beloved as it is. It will be an interesting 15 years going forward.”
Interviewed for this story: Jack Larson, (651) 265-4869; Jim Ibister, (651) 602-6000; Chad Weiner, (512) 960-2142