Regarding Stadium Cups

Regarding Stadium Cups

Bear with me.  There’s a point to all of this.  I promise to eventually get to that point, but I’m not in any hurry.

Back in 1975 or 1976, I obtained my very first Hokie Cup.  It was a solidly constructed orange cup with three maroon “Fightin’ Gobblers” decorating the side. I still have that cup. It’s valued and treasured, residing on a shelf in my cluttered garage.

Like many of you, I made it through my college Bill Dooley years drinking from repurposed Hokie cups gathered from Lane after drinking the Hokies to another win or loss.  Those cups were life-savers, hydrators; mixing companions.

After college, I took a small cup collection with me to my first apartment and used them as my primary beverage holders.  In fact, to this day, I rarely use glassware, choosing instead one of my trusted Hokie cups.

I’ve written about the souvenir-sized Hokie cups dispensed at VT games here several times in the past twenty years.  As I recall, back in the mid-late 1990’s the large white cups with HOKIES spelled out in block letters on the side were rugged, HUGE, and eminently serviceable. 

Enter the post-MV1 era.

In an attempt to milk cash from thirsting spectators, the athletic department ordered smaller, flimsier, candy-assed (my new favorite expression) cups.  Holding a full large cup in your hand after a few warm-up parking lot drinks immediately presented the real danger of serious spillage.  Gone were the solid cups of the magic years; replaced instead with an inferior product.

Either in 2003 or 2004, the athletic department decided it was time to beef up its souvenir cup.  Perhaps this was due to my daily email assault on Jim Weaver’s electronic and paper mailboxes.  Who knows? Regardless, a new cup was born.  Flexible, yet sturdy. Large, yet functional. “HOKIES RESPECT That’s what it’s all about” is what it said. Jim Weaver’s oft-discussed attempt to tame the rabble.  While the campaign fell flat, the cups were fantastic! They used these fabulous cups for a couple of years before moving on to a bigger, glitzier black cup featuring various stars from that year’s team.  While I liked those cups, too, they weren’t as auto-friendly.  Too big to fit an ordinary cup holder.  Fortunately, I had relatives that needed them.

 

But as a couple of years passed, I grew concerned that my stash of marvelous 2004 Hokies Respect cups was slowly diminishing.  The cups were not the problem. They weren’t disintegrating.  It was my fault entirely.  I’d misplace one or step on another. Let a friend use one without telling them how valuable they were to me.  It really was all my fault.  At one point, I was down to just two serviceable cups.

The Miracle in Salem.

On June 9, 2012 I found myself attending the Group A, Division 2 state baseball championship at Salem’s Kiwanis field where The Greene Dragons of William Monroe defeated Chilhowie 5-4 in extra innings. At one point, I wandered over to the concession stand to get a Coke.  To my utter shock and joy, the attendant served up my drink in an authentic, brand-new 2004 Hokies Respect cup.  In fact, situated in a corner of the shack, was the largest collection of Hokies Respect cups I’d ever seen.  There must have been hundreds of them.  So I bought drinks for all my friends and collected the cups.  I went around the bleachers after the game nabbing any left-behind cups.  All told, I ended up with about ten mint condition wonder cups. 

So for the past five years, I’ve kept the same four cups in rotation,  They are showing signs of wear and tear though.  The “Hokies Respect” is fading.  The cup now says, “That’s… it’s… -out.”  Fortunately, I still have four or five 2004 cups in reserve.

Which brings me to the point of this whole story.

When it comes to plastic stadium cups, I know what I’m talking about.  I may not know how to diagram a defensive alignment or why a defensive end can’t “gain the edge” on every play; I do understand cups.

At the Delaware game, I purchased my usual souvenir cup just before the opening kick-off.  I was looking forward to the new 2017 design.  Who would be on the cup?  Would it be “Hokies Respect II” or some clever design.  Would the cups be durable?

 

It turns out that the new cup is black like last year’s cup, but it is decidedly taller and thinner, much like the cups at the Bristol game last year.  In fact, when I went back and compared the cups this year to last year, I noted that the capacity went from 32 ounces last year to 24 ounces this year.  But here’s the real kicker. The price for the souvenir beverage went from $5.00 to $5.50. While the cup design was great, the ruggedness was apparent, and the cup’s potential for fitting in an auto cup holder seemed promising, the change in size and price seemed downright miserly.  Last year, the large souvenir cup cost $0.16 an ounce.  Now the large beverage is up to $0.23 an ounce.  That’s almost a 44% increase in cost! Scandalous! This unconscionable greed-grab harkens back to the euphoric post-national championship daze when ticket prices sky-rocketed and flimsy cups became the norm. 

I’m not mad because of the cost spike.  I’m not even mad because the little girl sitting next to me kicked over my drink before I even had a second sip.  I’m just not mad at all, really.

Honestly, that’s what it’s all about.