Luke Combs' concert brings thousands into Oklahoma City, boosting revenue for many local businesses
OKLAHOMA CITY (KFOR) It’s the biggest weekend downtown Oklahoma City has seen in more than five years with a record-breaking number of people flocking to the city for concerts at the Paycom Center.
Oklahoma City’s downtown arena is hosting the most concert attendees in a three-day stretch of the year this weekend.
Saturday night is the last night of country singer Luke Combs performing at the Paycom Center, bringing in thousands of people to the downtown area.
Local businesses in the area told KFOR the sold-out show is helping revenue.
Around 18,000 concert goers were expected to be at Luke Comb’s concert Saturday night.
Overall, this weekend the arena saw around 47,000 people.
Business owners in the area told KFOR they’ve been super busy this weekend.
“You could hardly walk... We make sure to plan for that when we do have concerts. But it's been very busy. Like, as you can see, it's kind of been like this all weekend, so it's really nice,” said Kylee Zamudio, store manager of Painted Door Boutique.
The Painted Door Boutique in Bricktown brought on extra staff over the weekend to keep up with the demand.
“Typically, I mean, we can operate on like one person, but today that's definitely not possible because we have to (Christmas) wrap everything,” said Zamudio.
The large weekend supports the close out of a record-breaking year for the Paycom Center.
The arena has not seen crowds of this size since the NBA playoffs in 2019.
Approximately 18,000 attendees were projected for each night, which will also make the shows two of the arena’s top 10 attended concerts in its 20-year history.
In Bricktown, the Deep Deuce Bar and Grill owner said he appreciated the effort that the Paycom Center is putting forth to bring big artists like Luke Combs into town.
“It's definitely beneficial to us and surrounding businesses... It's been I mean, insane. So anytime that we get a concert, especially on this magnitude of like Luke Combs, where he's so big that they got to have two nights for him, it just brings a big draw out. And it's been it's been fantastic,” said Kyle Dake owner of Deep Deuce Bar and Grill.
Owner, Kyle Dake said the restaurant is even providing a free shuttle service for concert goers Saturday night.
“It's just an advertisement service and something that we do for the Thunder season and any time that there's bigger concerts at the Paycom center... It is a shuttle service that we partnered with Backstage Limo. It's a big Mercedes sprinter, and it fits, I think like 16 people,” said Dake.
Two Luke Comb fans KFOR spoke with said they came all the way from the Texas Panhandle for the concert.
“Well, it was about 4 hours in a car... But it's worth it,” said Sydney Larkin, Texas resident.
The couple is staying in the city this weekend while also trying out some restaurants.
“We're staying down the street over here. And we've just been Valeting and walking across Bricktown because we haven't visited here very much,” said Larkin.
Another couple told KFOR they traveled across the state to attend the concert and grab dinner before the show.
“We never been here. We're excited,” said Melissa Ascencio, Tulsa resident.
“There's a lot of people coming in town, it looked like. And then last night there was a lot of people also. So, we noticed that too. So, there's a lot of people going to the concert that we've heard talking at the hotel too,” said Rene Ascencio, Tulsa resident.
Luke Combs isn't the only artist playing Saturday night, Rapper Yung Gravy was in town performing at The Criterion.
"We were waiting all week long... and, my gosh, we couldn't get tickets to (Luke Combs) that one. So, we had to settle for gravy,” said Kenneth Southern, Oklahoma resident.
The group told KFOR their hotel seemed busier than normal.
“We're from Durant, Oklahoma, so it doesn't get as busy around there,” said Southern.