Major League Baseball teams, looking to fill ballparks over the course of a 162-game season, often turn to fan friendly promotions as a means of getting people to the parks. This week, the Philadelphia Phillies were focused on a particular group of fans: college students.
Baseball fans from colleges around the Philadelphia area showed up on Tuesday and Wednesday for college night promotions. Students were offered four dollars off the price of any ticket. On Wednesday, fans were also given a free "college style" Phillies hat.
"I think the main thing is to get fans that maybe are casual baseball fans, maybe the fan that comes once or twice a year, to come down and see what it's like," Phillies director of group sales Kathy Killian said. "With our new ballpark there's a lot of reason to come down here, even if you're not a hardcore baseball fan."
So far, these promotional tactics seem to be working. The Phillies averaged just over 27,000 fans per game during their college promotion, nearly 4,500 more per game than during a similar mid-week stretch early in the season.
"Last night we had about 1,400 kids that walked up," Killian said. "We've got 10 different schools that bought 25 or more tickets. Temple bought 250 tonight. Wharton school bought 50, Delaware bought 50."
While many teams try to reach out to college students in one way or another, few in the area have done so as successfully as the Phillies.
The Sixers have offered college cards to students, which can be shown at the box office for discounted tickets, but have had little success with this promotion.
The minor-league American Hockey League's Phantoms offer a cheaper ticket price to students on Wednesdays and Fridays throughout the year and has had mixed success.
"That's the biggest thing we do to try to get college kids down here," Phantoms correspondent Kevin Kurz said. "The main focus with the Phantoms is families."
The Phillies, however, insist that their college promotions have been a success, simply by getting more college kids to come out for the games.
"Putting fans in the stands is always a great thing," Killian said. "They're coming in, and they're spending money on concessions and buying things while they're here."
The positive reaction to the promotion was certainly not limited to Phillies management. The thousands of fans in attendance that took advantage of the promotion had nothing but good things to say about it.
"I've never been to a Phillies game before, and it happened to be college night, so I thought why not?" Warren County Community College student Dustin Merunka said. "I think [the promotion] was awesome. I saved a couple bucks and get to see a great game."
"We looked it up online, and it said four dollars off, so we figured we would just come," La Salle student Megan Hellander said. "The discount [got us here], because students don't have any money."
Perhaps the only damper during the two-day promotion was the play of the Phillies, who lost 16-4 to the New York Mets Tuesday, and 7-4 to the Colorado Rockies on Wednesday.
"We saw that it was four dollars off and you get a free hat, so we were like, why not go?" Thomas Jefferson Medical College student Vince Broy said. "I think they should do it more often."
Fittingly, this promotion, which is done every April, was an idea that came from the college community itself.
"We've probably been doing it for about four or five years now, and one of the main reasons is because of our internship program," Killian said. "We have so many kids that work here who are fresh out of college, and they're always trying to think of ways to get more fans here."
The promotion usually features discounted tickets and a giveaway night, as it did this year. In years past, rally towels and red curly wigs have been among the items offered. The focus is on offering a fun item that would appeal to students.
With the success of these promotions, the discounts and the giveaways, college nights should remain an option for students looking to enjoy the beginning of the baseball season for years to come.
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