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Should Children Receive a Free Ticket?

February 9th 2009

Q. We’ve been discussing and debating whether we should admit children for free in an effort to fill empty seats, as well as attract paying adult customers. Is this something you’d recommend college and pro sports teams consider implementing, especially with the struggling economy?

A. It’s a great question, and my answer wouldn’t be the same for all college and professional sports teams. Taking into consideration the fact a sports team is struggling to fill seats, as you’ve shared, college and professional sports teams have enjoyed successful children’s ticket promotions for designated theme nights for years.

This could include ‘Kids Night Out’, ‘Family Nights’, ‘Daddy/Daughter Night’, and ‘Take a Kid to the Game’ to name just a few possible theme nights to consider.  These nights could be held for one game or multiple games, and a team could also brand a particular day, such as Family Fridays.

To ensure a team doesn’t devalue its tickets, I encourage teams to consider having a sponsor attached to these ticket promotions, which could be a value add for an existing sponsor, or an opportunity to secure a new sponsor.

All advertising and promotions would credit the sponsor with the tagline: “Compliments of (sponsor)” versus the advertising, promotions and tickets simply stating “free kids tickets.” This preserves the value of a team’s tickets.

Finally, in an effort to ensure a team takes care of its current share holders, I always encourage teams to extend these types of offers to its season ticket holders, sponsors, employees, suite holders, and group leaders prior to promoting to the general public.

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