Amazing!
<<
According to Al.com, Alabama football had “a $53.3 million surplus with revenues of $95.3 million.” That’s a lot of dough and is $6.1 million more than the $47,136,001 it brought in in 2012-13. With football clearly being its biggest contributor, Alabama athletics as a whole generated a surplus of just over $33 million – $33,050,145 to be exact. The athletics department then “transferred $9.1 million back to the university.” How generous.
Much of the revenue the football program reports comes from ticket sales ($34.9 million) and “contributions” ($20.7 million), but the program also saw gains in broadcast/television/radio/Internet rights (from $7.2 million to $9.1 million) and royalties, licensing and ads ($1.3 million to $4.5 million).
Other small forms of revenue included $730,580 from “sports camps” and a whopping $58,622 from concession stand sales.
Meanwhile, the program spent $41,993,027 on its overall operating expenses with its top expense going toward coach salaries ($12.8 million). Additionally, the program spent $4.2 million on fundraising and marketing, $3.8 million on athletic student aid, $2.7 million on game expenses, $2.7 million on facilities maintenance, $2.6 million on university support staff, $2.5 million on team travel, $1.6 million on equipment and supplies and $1.2 million on recruiting, among a bevy of other expenses.
By comparison, per Al.com, Auburn football had a surplus of $33.2 million while the Auburn athletic department as a whole “operated at a $13.6 million deficit.”
So it’s happy times for all in Tuscaloosa. Oh, and just to show how feasible it is for certain schools to pay its players; if Alabama hypothetically paid its scholarship football players $3,000 each from its $53,269,715 surplus, the program would have still brought in $53,014,715 in the 2013-14 fiscal year.
<<<
Roll Tide!
And Auburn operated at a $13.6 Million DEFICIT
It’s actually ridiculous how happy this made me. That’s my school!! 
My DH observed that the state of Alabama doesn’t have professional football. Then in his next breath,“But with the University of Alabama, they don’t need it!”
There were (are) lots of complaints about paying Coach Saban the “crazy” salary it took to get him to UA. Of course that’s nearing half what he makes now, but the success of the football program has definitely played a role in the surge in prominence of the University. I am a FIRM believer that UA should always hang it’s hat on academics and research, but I also think of the athletic department as an extension of UA’s “Public Relations” strategy. Money well spent, especially when they can operate with excellence and return major dividends back to the school financially.
“A rising TIDE raises all boats!”
Good job UA - now convince AU we don’t need a $14M scoreboard!
This confirms what the Provost said in a Sixty Minutes interview–“Nick Saban is the best investment the University of Alabama has ever made.”
Yess! …and we can thank Mal Moore for that! God rest his soul.