Steve Scott Comes Clean

Okay, I've been hiding something baseball related.  It's time to come clean.  It's disheartening, embarrassing and really doesn't make me feel good about it.  But the results are what they are.

After having season tickets for the Giants the last 25 years, my job loss last year prohibited me, my family and my buyers from renewing (some of our buyers had economic issues as well).  We tried every way we could think, but it just wasn't in the card$.  Fifteen years with tickets 7 rows behind home plate at Candlestick, ten years with tickets 9 rows behind the visitor's bullpen mound at AT&T.  All vanished this February.  It was very difficult to swallow, especially in light of our economic situation at the time.

Then it fell out of the sky and hit me on the head.  I've lived my entire life without the Giants winning a championship.  Now that my first year in over half my life is realized without season tickets, I realized that 2010 would be the year the Giants would win it all.  It simply couldn't happen any other way.  I wouldn't have tickets.  Of course they would win.  So, in February I predicted a Giants World Series victory.  I didn't write about it because I was too ashamed, too embarrassed.  But I did tell others, and I stuck to it all year long, even when they were sucking wind.  We did go to a few games this year, but mostly in the bleachers or other cheaper seats.

Maybe when I get a decent job again, we'll buy tickets once more.  The ticket department has already told me that my 25 years will count for seniority, so that might help out a bit.  The good news is that I will remember this 2010 season for ever.  I predicted it, and they not only won, but they completely dominated the post-season with one of the most amazing pitching performances I can ever remember.  It will always be an incredible story.  So, there you have it.

Value Priced Season Tickets (2)

In Part 1 I laid out the idea the Giants are using this year with regard to season ticket prices. I have attached the schedule according to ticket price. One of the problems this idea poses for my ticket partners and I is that we can't pick the number of games in advance with a set price in mind. Traditionally, we've picked the number of games we all wanted to see, then later had a draft. Either we need to do the draft earlier this year, or we need to adjust for ticket prices after we pick. Somehow or other, it should be worked out, although it will surely be more complicated.

Value Priced Season Tickets (1)

The Giants have initiated this year a value priced scheme for season tickets. They have been doing some of this with public sale for a few years now, but this is the first for season tickets. Value pricing is the idea that a weekend Dodger game (or Red Sox this year in interleague) should be a higher price than a mid-week Nationals game for the same seat, etc.

Traditionally, tickets have been priced the same for all games, based on seat location and level of amenity. Back when I first started attending Giants games at Candlestick regularly (1981), box seats were $6, reserved $5 and bleachers $1 (going up to $2 the following year). There were only three price categories. What I always thought strange, was that box seats in the upper deck in center field were the same price as box seats in the front row behind home plate. Most teams today have made many adjustments to seat prices, depending on location.

What the Giants have done is to create four categories of prices, but totalling up over the entire season, the total cost for season tickets remains the same. They are priced roughly 72%, 91%, 115% and 164% of last year's prices. There are more cheaper games than pricier games. This all makes sense from a marketing standpoint, because the Dodgers and Red Sox games will still sell out, while Nationals games (and other lesser draws) should gain higher attendance due to lower prices. And, those dreaded exhibition games the weekend before Opening Day are now far less!

There are three categories of comparables for which tickets vary in value: team played, weekday vs. weekend games, and mid-summer vs. spring and early fall. So, Rockies games in July will be more than Rockies games in April, etc., but Dodger games in April will be more than Rockies games in July. A Thursday night game of a four game series will be less than the Saturday and Sunday games.

I'm hoping this will allow us to sell our tickets in a better way, but there are other problems that have arisen. More on that in another post.

See Part 2

Tickets Have Arrived

I received my season tickets today from the FedEX driver. Bless you. It's always exciting to open the box and find out what they look like this year. Maybe I'll post a scan soon.

The Giants have their season tickets printed in book format, with sheets of tickets. Each sheet has usually five or six tickets, perforated between them, and perforated at the book binding. Tearing each ticket out and dividing them up between all the buyers is a very time consuming task. The sheets must be bent at the book binding, back and forth to weaken the perforation before tearing. Then each sheet must be folded up like a road map, first in one direction, then in the other, again to weaken the perforation. If you don't, the tickets will tear. One year I let a buyer do all the ticket logistical work, making a distribution spreadsheet, tearing out, passing around, etc. He swore never to do that again. I'll be sitting down to separate tickets here soon.

Ticket Draft

This last weekend, our friends and we had our ticket draft for my Giants season tickets. There are a number of players involved overall, and things are complicated, but we get together for a few hours and draft games from the schedule, over snacks and beers/sodas. We draft in order/reverse order fashion and try to accommodate those with special needs. I've developed a color coded spreadsheet for tracking every game and everybody's tickets. Great fun. Now it's time for the season to start. Tickets will be delivered next week. It's always fun to tear out all the tickets and divide them up. Well, actually that's a lot of hard work, and not for the feeble minded.