The Denver Broncos NFL team has unveiled a range of upgrades to Empower Field at Mile High ahead of the new season.
The upgrades, which cost $100m (£79.4m/€92.5m) to carry out, include improvements to the stadium’s videoboard, suites and team store. The Broncos have also unveiled the brand-new Breckenridge Bourbon Club, while new murals are in the process of being fitted on the concourse of the stadium.
The improvements were unveiled on Friday ahead of the Broncos’ pre-season friendly against the Los Angeles Rams on Saturday. The Broncos’ season gets underway on September 10 with a home game against the Las Vegas Raiders.
The Broncos confirmed plans for the upgrades in December last year, with the investment marking the largest capital improvement to the stadium since it opened in 2001. The upgrades were announced after the $4.65bn takeover of the Broncos by the Walton-Penner Family was completed last August.
In May, the Broncos unveiled plans for the Breckenridge Bourbon Club, a new premium experience that will offer members exclusive access to a ground-level space, all-inclusive food and beverages, complimentary parking and 100-level bowl seating.
The wider upgrades were unveiled on Friday by Broncos president Damani Leech, along with stadium general manager Jay Roberts, and Zach Myra, the team’s senior director of facilities, construction and planning.
Leech said: “Obviously, we had an overall vision of wanting to enhance the game-day experience, and there’s different ways you can do that. Some are ways that are operational, and that’s with things like the elevators.
“Some are very much visual, from an entertainment standpoint. Obviously, that’s the videoboard, but that’s (also) LED screens. Some are about hospitality, so you see that on the suite level, you see that in the Breckenridge Bourbon Club. So we created a framework and really wanted to check as many boxes (as possible).
“What was really important is we wanted every fan who comes to the stadium on game day to be able to experience something. They may not be able to experience everything, but they can experience something that’s new and different.”
Elsewhere in Denver, Kroenke Sports & Entertainment, which owns the NBA’s Denver Nuggets and the NHL’s Colorado Avalanche, has announced that it is conducting market due diligence to enhance the fan experience at the teams’ home venue, Ball Arena.
In a statement reported by NHL reporter Ryan Boulding on Twitter, KSE said that it has partnered with a third-party advisory firm to assist in the planning process, which has so far included tours of recently renovated NBA and NHL venues, evaluation of local and regional market characteristics, review of industry trends, and focus group sessions with ticket buyers.
KSE will send out a survey to fans today (Tuesday) to obtain feedback that it says will assist the company in making “data-driven decisions” regarding the future of Ball Arena, which was previously known as Pepsi Center before rebranding in 2020.
Ball Arena has served as the home of the Nuggets and Avalanche since opening in 1999.
