Follow Up: The Future of College Ticket Sales

Outsourcing ticket sales efforts has been a blessing to many universities in the past several years, and it was a topic of discussion Thursday at the IMG Intercollegiate Athletics Forum hosted by SBJ/SBD. The panel consisted of Roedl; Univ. of Washington Senior Associate AD for Advancement Jennifer Cohen; DiFebo Company Principal Matt DiFebo; Georgia Tech Associate AD Wayne Hogan; The Aspire Group Principal Bernie Mullin; and Penn State Univ. Associate AD for Business Relations & Communications Greg Myford. Hogan expressed how much partnering with The Aspire Group has helped Georgia Tech because the school immediately gained trained experts in the ticket-selling field without having to worry about fighting through red tape to hire, fire and incentivize new staff. Plus, it’s upped the school’s ticket sales significantly at low cost. “This is really costing us nothing because it’s new money,” Hogan said. “If it’s 30% cut per sale, that’s 70% we would not have if we weren’t involved in this process.” Myford lamented the fact that Penn State is currently relying more on its reputation to sell tickets rather than having an in-house or outsourcing strategy in place and that that has to change. Most important, Hogan said, is that by outsourcing ticket sales a stronger relationship between the university and its fans has formed. “We can sit here all day and talk about the revenue,” he said. “But that relationship with our fans has been the biggest bonus since we became involved [with The Aspire Group].” In closing, when asked what he was focusing on in 2011, Mullin replied, “An empty seat is cancer to your brand … and that’s why you want that bum in that seat.”

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