The Highlanders do not play a home game for nearly three weeks but their season ticket sales already exceed last year's.
More than 2400 season tickets have been sold, and the franchise has extended the deadline for renewals to next Monday.
"We have currently sold 2460 season tickets, which is 60 more seats than our final number last season, so the uptake has been outstanding to date," Highlanders general manager Roger Clark said.
"We still have around 500 existing ticket holders who are yet to renew, and we have decided to give these members a bit more time to get their forms back to us.
"We have been on the phones over the past couple of weeks touching base with the season ticket holders who haven't yet renewed their seats and the vast majority have indicated that they will sign up again for 2012."
Of the 2460 seats sold, about 25% are new seats, a mix of first-time season ticket holders and members adding friends and family.
Clark said a feature of the new stadium was members being able to organise their seats to be next to friends or family who had joined.
Fans were also being offered weekly or monthly payment plans, and 19% of season ticket purchasers were using that option.
Dunedin Venues Management Limited itself has about 3000 foundation and corporate members, bringing the overall membership total to just over 5400.
The Highlanders get their first opportunity to play at Forsyth Barr Stadium when they host the Crusaders on Saturday, March 3.