The Baltimore Orioles are no longer just competing on the field with other teams, they are competing with the Washington Nationals for fans. They are offering additional tickets to the O’s home opener against the A’s to their season ticket holders and they are also targeting luxury suite packages to small businesses. From the Baltimore Sun:
Other perks offered as part of the Orange Carpet program include the ability to buy additional tickets at a reduced rate and early entry into Camden Yards to watch batting practice.
Marc Ganis, president of Chicago-based SportsCorp LTD, said what the Orioles are doing is good business.
“The Orioles have to be more cognizant that there is competition in the marketplace,” Ganis said. “Fans are going to vote with their wallets.
“That’s where customer service comes in. That’s where offering perks and special benefits comes into play.
“It doesn’t matter if it’s a baseball team or a supermarket or a bank or an airline. They’ve all got to participate in a world like this.”
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“Everyone will put a full-court press on their suite sales until they get to ‘x’ point,” he said. “Then, these suites become like hotel room nights, just like your ticket inventory. Once the night passes, you’re out that revenue. So better to get out ahead of it and get creative.”
Many people mistakenly think of competition between firms as some sort of zero-sum game – a game where the gains of the winner exactly offset the losses of the loser. But this notion of competition forgets a very important piece of the puzzle that benefits greatly from competition: the consumer.
