Ticket Sales Tip of the Week #34
Yesterday I highlighted the recent losing records attached to home field advantage in the playoffs. Most recently, in the ’23 MLB playoffs the “home field advantage teams” have a W-L record of 3-7.
Today we look at the business side (mainly ticket values) to see what happens when you start at home and in particularly if it’s unexpected which happens all the time. Recent case, round #2 at last years NHL playoffs saw the Leaf’s host midweek (2 day runway to sell out) Florida for Game 1 with ticket inventory priced for what was suppose to be Game #3 on a weekend vs the Boston Bruins. Needless to say, the secondary market floor dropped well below the Membership price and the Members, Box office and playoff retention feature were all negatively impacted.
Toughest of all, try being in @ Dan Morrow shoes (SVP F&B at MLSE) trying to secure kitchen staff for unexpected midweek shifts?
Solution: Reward the teams with the higher seeds (typically better regular season record) with the right to start on the road and play the 7 games series (NBA, NHL and MLB’s Conference Finals) as a 2-3-1-1. Games 3 and 4 are more valuable than 1 and 2 (win for your members, box office and F&B staffing challenges) and recent history shows it will increase your teams chances of winning the series.