OptionIt Allows Teams to Combat Secondary Market

Last week OptionIt, a ticket futures marketplace, inked the Boston Celtics to a pilot deal, their most high profile team yet. It’s a small deal – only 15 games and a handful of seats at each game, but it’s a direction more teams need to seriously assess, given the amount of value they currently relinquish [...]

Ticket Sales Problems Magnified in NHL

We have focused on lagging NFL ticket sales putting local games at risk of blackout, a recessionary indicator for what is hands-down the most profitable and popular sport in the country. Recent MLB numbers show significant year over year declines in two-thirds of the markets. Hidden behind these stories is the effect on hockey in [...]

New Ticket Offers: Innovative or Another Reason to Worry?

In this blog, I’ve previously lauded the Cleveland Indians for cross-marketing deals with the Browns and creating ancillary revenue streams by hosting dinners on the field and additional events outside the game. However, after the Tribe recently announced another cross-marketing deal, this time with the Blue Jackets, a few weeks after owner Charles Dolan claimed [...]

Nets Ticket Deal Defies Marketing Principles

Below is an adaption of the previous post with edits and more structured arguments:
Nobody will ever accuse Nets CEO Brett Yormark of lacking creativity or innovation. However, the recently announced “Match-Up” 10-game ticket plan raised eyebrows and drew some criticism. The plan bundles arguably the ten biggest draws on the Nets schedule – Lakers, Celtics, [...]

Nets Ticket Deal: Inappropriate or Innovative?

The Nets set off a buzz around NBA and sports marketing circles last week when they released the Match-Up ticket plan – 10 games against the NBA’s biggest attractions and 5 reversible jerseys with Nets player on one side and opposing superstar on the other side. Traditionalists didn’t know where to start, with promoting opposing [...]

Teams Not Adding Value, Exhibiting Innovation With Ticket Offers

Darren Rovell wrote this week that only a handful of teams immediately offered partial season ticket plans following the release of the full NBA schedule, a somewhat surprising revelation given the expected difficult ticket market projected for the upcoming season. It begs the question if teams are doing enough, and how risky is lowering prices [...]

Jets, Giants Learn Lessons / NFL Needs to Change Antiquated Rules

In the past week, the New York Jets have started to call people from the season ticket waiting list to notify them of availability and the New York Giants have taken to reduce game ticket prices in the new stadium by up to 37% to help move inventory. Two teams that had given sell-outs for [...]

Tiger Sets Model for Recovering Golf’s Image

Everything in golf comes easier when Tiger Woods is involved – sponsorships, TV ratings, attendance, media coverage, energy, excitement, everything. So it’s no surprise that the tournament Tiger hosts, last week’s AT&T National, and Tiger eventually won on the final few holes, scored tremendous ratings and record attendance. But how they drew the attendance opens [...]

NBA Warning Signals Premature

The NBA fired off the first Class of 2010 free agent salvo, one year before the festivities begin, with a warning about a lower salary cap. It’s SOP to issue a forecast in the annual league memo, and it’s obvious where the warning stems from, but these projections seem premature.
Flash back to last year, same [...]

Panthers-Rosenhaus Campaign Achieves First Goal, Will it Lead to $$$?

Chalk up a marketing win for the Florida Panthers. Whenever a team gets attention for a marketing campaign before it even starts, you concede the achieved the brand awareness aspect of marketing. Officially launching next week, Florida enlisted NFL super agent Drew Rosenhaus to negotiate lower ticket prices for its fans in a series of [...]