The economic impact of Optus Stadium

Officially opened on Sunday, 21 January 2018, Optus Stadium is the culmination of three years of construction and over a decade of planning and design. The stadium is the third largest in Australia, with seating for 60,000 patrons in the main stadium and a further 18 specially designed function spaces.

In its first year of operations, Optus Stadium hosted over 2 million patrons across 43 live entertainment and sporting events, and over 400 meetings and special events. These included Australian rules football, international and domestic cricket, soccer, rugby league, and concerts featuring major international artists Ed Sheeran and Taylor Swift, with the stadium achieving record Western Australian attendances in each of these categories.

On the backdrop of the success of the first year of operations, Deloitte Access Economics was engaged by VenuesWest to undertake an economic impact assessment of Optus Stadium. The primary focus of the study was to estimate the economic impact for the Western Australian economy from both construction and the first year of operations at Optus Stadium, along with an estimation of the cumulative economic impact that could be expected from future operations. This report presents the findings of this study.