Item — HN Reader

Emphasis added:

>The verdict, which capped a monthlong class-action trial and almost a decade of legal wrangling, includes about $96 million in damages for the bars and restaurants that subscribed to the service, and more than $4.6 billion for roughly 2.4 million residential subscribers.

Wouldn't these establishments that subscribed to the service have passed on their costs to customers? The article doesn't go in depth, but it's unclear to me why the bars and restaurants deserve economic compensation.

Edit: I assume it's compensation for inflated prices.

2 comments

Maybe this doesn't matter but bars that I've been to (and I'm an alcoholic) never charged for watching NFL. Some, rarely, might charge for UFC. So, this is a cost that should go to the bars and not the customers. You might have a small case for UFC but even then, I think it would be so minimal. I've never seen a bar charge a cover charge for NFL... but I've seen it a handful of times for UFC.

Just my 2c.

I can’t read the article, but I’m not even sure that legally they can charge. I would imagine it’s in the terms of the contract that you can’t pay for Sunday Ticket and then charge people admission. If that’s covered in the story, then apologies but I don’t have an account.

Wouldn't these establishments that subscribed to the service have passed on their costs to customers?

They can only do this if they have the pricing power to do so. If there are a sufficient number of sports bars relative to the number of patrons in a given area they won’t have the pricing power to do so.