Austin Jackrabbits · Year 1

Does a season of JollyBall
actually make money?

A plain-English look at the dollars behind one season of family volleyball entertainment — 10 home games, April through August, in an Austin high-school gym.

+$15,048
Projected Year-1 profit
The big picture

The whole season on one screen

Think of it like a lemonade stand, just bigger. Money comes in from fans. Money goes out to run the show. What's left over is profit.

Money in (Revenue)
$68,025
Everything fans spend, all season
Money out (Costs)
$52,977
Running the games + year-round bills
Profit (what's left)
$15,048
Money in minus money out
Profit margin
22¢
Kept out of every $1 that comes in
In one sentence: for every $1 a fan spends, about 78¢ pays for the show and 22¢ is profit. Across a 10-game season that adds up to about $15,000.
Zoom in: one game

What happens at a single game

The clearest way to understand the business is one game night, at an average crowd of 250 paying fans.

$6,803
Comes in
−
$4,483
Cost to run it
=
$2,320
Profit / game
Each game stands on its own and makes money. The biggest single cost is paying the 14 performers ($1,400/game). Add the gym, refs, mascot, announcer, sound, video, prizes and marketing and you get to ~$4,500 to put on the show.
Money in

Where the money comes from

Five ways fans spend money at JollyBall. Tickets do most of the work — but food, merch and VIP add real cushion.

SourceSeason $Share
🎟️ Tickets ($20 each)$50,00074%
⭐ VIP experience$7,50011%
🌭 Concessions$6,1259%
👕 Merchandise$4,4006%
🤝 Sponsorships$00%
Big opportunity: sponsorships are currently set to $0. Even one local sponsor would drop almost straight to profit — that's the easiest lever to pull.
Money out

Where the money goes

Every dollar of cost is really a payment to someone who helps put on the show.

The people on the court get paid the most. Players (14 per game) take the biggest slice, followed by the school gym rental. Nothing here is wasteful — it's what a high-energy live show costs.
The season, month by month

You lose money before you make it

This is the part most people miss. You spend on gear and the first games before the crowds grow — so the bank balance goes down first, then climbs back up as attendance builds.

Read the line, not the bars. The orange line is "cash in the bank." It dips to about −$16,800 in spring (that's the money you need to have ready), then crosses back above zero in August and ends the year slightly positive. The bars show each month's profit — small or negative early, strong by mid-summer as crowds grow from 150 to 350 a game.
The magic number

How many fans you need

143
paying fans per game to break even

Below 143, a game loses money. Above it, every extra fan is profit. The season plans for an average of 250 — a healthy cushion.

0 fans↑ break-even (143)250 avg
Because each fan spends ~$22 (ticket + a bit of food/merch) and the per-fan costs are tiny, the show only needs a modest crowd to cover itself. Filling more seats is the whole game.
Getting started

What it costs to launch

Before the first whistle, you buy the gear and set things up once. This is separate from the per-game costs.

One-time startup cost
$14,300
Gear, costume, merch, signage, launch marketing
Cash you should have ready
$16,795
Startup + covering the slow early months
Cash at end of Year 1
$748
Back in the black after one season
The honest version: plan to have about $17,000 available to start. You're nearly back to even by the end of the first season — and Year 2 starts without the big one-time costs, so it should be much more profitable.
The 6-month runway

How to get to the first whistle

A mid-aggressive plan to go from idea to opening night in six months. The trick is starting the slow stuff early — a mascot costume and custom jerseys take weeks to build, and you can't practice until players are signed.

Foundation & legal Brand & long-lead gear Team & coach Venue & equipment Practices & show Game-day crew Marketing & tickets Launch
The critical path (don't let these slip): order the mascot costume and jerseys in Month 1 — they have the longest lead time. Sign the roster by end of Month 3 so weekly practices have a full team. Put tickets on sale by Month 4 so the marketing runway is long enough to fill seats.
Milestones — what's done by when
Month 1
Foundation set. LLC + bank account live, insurance bound, startup cash (~$17k) secured, head coach hired, jerseys & mascot costume ordered.
Month 2
Locked in. Gym booked with all 10 season dates, website + ticketing platform live, socials posting, sponsor outreach underway.
Month 3
Team & gear ready. Roster signed + background-checked, all equipment in hand (nets, balls, sound, lights), weekly practices begin.
Month 4
Tickets live. Pre-sale + flyer push begins, first sponsors closing, refs/announcer/staff being recruited, content reels rolling.
Month 5
Show coming together. Jerseys & mascot delivered, game-day crew trained on run-of-show, choreography & trick routines set, community/church/club groups confirmed.
Month 6
Go time. Full dress rehearsal / scrimmage, final logistics + insurance walkthrough, free-ticket seeding — then 🏐 First Game.
Quick definitions

The 6 words to know

Revenue — all the money that comes in from fans (tickets, food, merch, VIP).
Costs — everything you pay to run it (people, gym, gear, marketing).
Profit — what's left after costs. The goal.
Margin — profit as a slice of revenue. 22% = you keep 22¢ per dollar.
Break-even — the crowd size where a game makes exactly $0. Above it = profit.
Startup capital — the one-time money to buy gear and launch before games start.
Keep in mind: this is a conservative projection, not a guarantee. JollyBall has no history yet, so every number is a careful estimate built from the concept plan. The three things that decide whether it really works: how many fans show up, the ticket price ($20 here), and whether you land any sponsors. Change those and the whole picture changes.