Notre Dame home games bring thousands of new fans, even more for local businesses

SOUTH BEND, Ind. -- With the start of the Notre Dame home football season local businesses are ready to serve all fighting Irish fans whether you're a local or from out of town.  

Notre Dame fans from all around the country are flooding South Bend for the home opener Saturday.  

For the university, football is a core revenue driver, and for local businesses a Notre Dame home games are a major economic event, especially for Taphouse on the Edge owner Jeff Morauski.  

“We’ve been gearing up and waiting for this day for a long time,” Morauski says.  

Jeff Morauski has been the co-owner of taphouse on the edge spots bar for the last 20 years, and still nothing comes close to the kind of impact a Notre Dame home game has on his business. 

“The best time of the year for us has a huge impact on our business,” Morauski says. “We’ve been staffing up the last six weeks in anticipation of, you know, the massive increase in sales we have going on at taphouse.”  

For Morauski, when Notre Dame wins, all local businesses do as well.  

“The impact – you can still see it, you can feel it,” Morauski says. “Even throughout the week people are excited, people want to be in the area more. I get chills even just talking about it, and I believe every business around will benefit because of that.”