BLACKSBURG — Virginia Tech athletic director Whit Babcock faced a bit of a conundrum as May 7 quickly approached. He could enjoy the Metallica concert from the comfort of one of Lane Stadium’s suites or utilize one of two tickets in the snake pit inside of the massive circular stage.
Babcock opted for the aerial view of the show. He gave the snake pit tickets to his wife, Kelly, and senior women’s administrator Reyna Gilbert-Lowry.
More than two weeks after the concert, which featured opening acts Suicidal Tendencies and Pantera, Babcock had the same reaction to the show that he had when Metallica concluded with “Enter Sandman.”
“It was a heck of a night and really special,” he said last week outside of his office.
From left: Metallica’s Robert Trujillo, Kirk Hammett, James Hetfield and Lars Ulrich perform in Lane Stadium on May 7.
The concert that was a quarter of a century in the making is expected to bring Virginia Tech an anticipated $1.2 million in revenue, a university spokesperson confirmed to The Roanoke Times on Tuesday. The university’s annual revenue budget for Intercollegiate Athletics was increased $1.2 million for concert revenue, according to the auxiliary enterprise budget that will be presented to the Board of Visitors during a June 2-3 meeting.
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Babcock said he is very confident the revenue generated from concessions, parking and small fee per ticket “will meet or exceed our seven-figure goal.”
The show at Blacksburg was the fourth stop on the latest leg of Metallica’s M72 World Tour after previous concerts in Syracuse, New York; Toronto; and Nashville, Tennessee.
The 24 stops on the 2024 tour grossed an estimated $175.2 million, according to Billboard.
“We were really, really pleased and it exceeded our already high expectations,” Babcock said. “And a ton of people in our department across campus worked on it. And really felt like it was a memorable experience that only Virginia Tech could offer. Certainly, some things we learned from it, but in general, a home run, grand slam, other sports analogies like that.”
An historic night for a stop on the M72 World Tour was capped with the song every Virginia Tech fan waited to hear live at Lane Stadium for a quarter of a century.
The bulk of Tech’s revenue from the concert will come from concessions and parking. Babcock said the concessions revenue “was significantly larger than a home football game,” and the parking revenue came from the five or six lots the university controlled.
He added Tech got a small fee per ticket. “Kind of handling fee,” he explained.
Babcock said he doesn’t anticipate the final attendance figure to exceed 70,000 fans that were on the field, in the grandstands and in the suites.
Metallica fans jump at the start of Enter Sandman in Lane Stadium.
It will mark the largest paid crowd to see an event at Lane Stadium. The stadium previously seated 66,233 prior to the seating structure in the West Side Outdoor Club being reconfigured and reduced capacity to the current size of 65,632.
“Looking at the field, probably could have done a little bit more sales on the field, but again, I don’t know the fire code and the safety code, etcetera,” Babcock said. “But yes, it was the biggest crowd, to my knowledge, that we’ve ever had in there.”
The success of Metallica’s performance at Lane Stadium “certainly opens the door” to future concerts, according to Babcock. He reiterated it would have to check multiple boxes to make it work, ranging from being the right band, right type of show and the right time of year.
“We’re looking at a lot of different ways to generate revenue, bring a little more value to gameday weekends, etcetera,” he said. “So we could potentially do some smaller shows on the baseball field, some other places.
“But we now have some other promoters that can see what we can do and there are some preliminary talks going on in that way. But while it’s all run by the athletic department, it’s done in conjunction with the university, so we’d have to work with them.
“But that’s a long way to say yes, another big show that would work in Southwest Virginia and bring that type of crowd, absolutely. And then we’re looking at some more regional acts. And again, things for the community, things to enhance gameday weekends and, quite frankly, things to generate some more revenue for us.”
Metallica’s four band members closed the concert by addressing the crowd and thanking them for attending the show. Drummer Lars Ulrich told the crowd that Metallica will see them again.
Could another show be on tap?
“As far as Metallica again, that kind of depends on them. Maybe one day, certainly. We’d never say no to Metallica,” Babcock said. “But I think a concert like that and for that matter, the Battle at Bristol, you kind of catch lightning in a bottle and that’s tough to replicate. But that was again incredibly memorable, and it was nice to put a smile on Hokies fans’ faces and hopefully we can do that in football season again.”
