Dome Graphic, Horrifying Example of Innumeracy

[bisonaudit]

Did anyone else see this or was it just me?
Was it just the graphic on the web site or did they print it that way as well?

Strictly interpreting the information presented in the table one must conclude that the 8 events listed resulted in almost $445 billion in revenue for the year. Exxon Mobil, now apparently the second largest company in the world, did a paltry $300 billion in business over the same period.

Ok, so they messed up the caption, it should have read’ thousands’ instead of ‘millions’.

Now lets look at the NDSU v. SDSU football game. Assuming they intended ‘thousands’ the Dome took in a little over $18 million in revenue for one game. Assuming a packed house of 20,000, that’s $900 in revenue per ticket holder. Sorry, that doesn’t pass the smell test either. Either the graphic is wrong or the folks from the Red River Valley Fair are keeping the books at the Dome too.

Finally, the graph depicting the Dome’s historical net income trend looks very nice. Unfortunately, they call the graph ‘Revenue’ not ‘Net Income.’ These are two completely different things and the terms cannot be used interchangeably. Revenue to Forum Communications would be the $1.25 I pay for the Sunday edition. Net Income to Forum Communications would be that $1.25 less all the costs associated with running the company.

I’d suggest including rudimentary math and finance education for writers, editors, and graphics personnel, or identifying someone with suitable knowledge to review financial information prior to publication. These sorts of errors are completely unreasonable and they harm the Forum's credibility.

[Bison_Dan]

Did anyone else see this or was it just me?
Was it just the graphic on the web site or did they print it that way as well?

Strictly interpreting the information presented in the table one must conclude that the 8 events listed resulted in almost $445 billion in revenue for the year. *Exxon Mobil, now apparently the second largest company in the world, did a paltry $300 billion in business over the same period.

Ok, so they messed up the caption, it should have read’ thousands’ instead of ‘millions’.

Now lets look at the NDSU v. SDSU football game. *Assuming they intended ‘thousands’ the Dome took in a little over $18 million in revenue for one game. *Assuming a packed house of 20,000, that’s $900 in revenue per ticket holder. *Sorry, that doesn’t pass the smell test either. *Either the graphic is wrong or the folks from the Red River Valley Fair are keeping the books at the Dome too.

Finally, the graph depicting the Dome’s historical net income trend looks very nice. *Unfortunately, they call the graph ‘Revenue’ not ‘Net Income.’ These are two completely different things and the terms cannot be used interchangeably. *Revenue to Forum Communications would be the $1.25 I pay for the Sunday edition. *Net Income to Forum Communications would be that $1.25 less all the costs associated with running the company.

I’d suggest including rudimentary math and finance education for writers, editors, and graphics personnel, or identifying someone with suitable knowledge to review financial information prior to publication. *These sorts of errors are completely unreasonable and they harm the Forum's credibility.

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I agree - it seems like most reporters are math challenged. It's almost as good as the alerus counting the city hotel tax as monthly revenue.

[tony]

Well, I know I spent 90,000 USD on souvineers at the Valpo game.

Screw graphs, show us an income statement.

[Herd_Mentality]

actually, it shouldn't have even been "thousands"...just "dollars"

[bisonaudit]

Maybe it should just be dollars if they're talking about the bottom line net income or profit as the article appears to say. But there's no way that the top line revenue for the FargoDome is $1 a seat for a football game which is what the table depicts explicitly.

[MinotBison]

Well, I know I spent 90,000 USD on souvineers at the Valpo game.

Screw graphs, show us an income statement.

As someone with some auditing in his background, an income statement would indeed be what I would like to see.

[bisonaudit]

RE: Income Statement

I looked at the City of Fargo CAFR (Consolidated Annual Financial Report) for 2004 (latest available).

www.ci.fargo.nd.us/Auditors/ 2004CAFR/BasicFinancialStatements2004.pdf

I'm having a little trouble reconciling back from the approximately $100,000 2004 Net Income per the Forum graph and the $3.66 million operating loss per the CAFR. Tried to add back the depreciation and give them credit for investment income but I'm still showing a loss.

[bisonaudit]

Also on note, the 2004 Cash Flow statement for the FargoDome Enterprise Fund indicates an $885,000 cash used in operations.

The audited financial statements for 2004 indicate that, not only was the Dome not profitable but they were cash flow negative for 2004 with a burn rate in excess of $70,000 a month.

[Thunder_Struck]

Was there Balance Sheet presented at all?

[bisonaudit]

No financial statements in the Forum. I wouldn't expect to see them there.

You can see the audited balance sheets and income statements for 2002, 2003, and 2004 on the City of Fargo web site.

http://www.ci.fargo.nd.us/Auditors/CAFR.htm