BIG-LEAGUE BUSINESS
Fans take flight — and tickets, rooms
Flights are selling out and tickets are going fast for the next Toronto Blue Jays game, and it doesn’t seem to matter that it’s in Kansas City.
The phenomenon of the Canadian sports fan attending out-oftown games, which has taken hold over the past few years, has moved into overdrive for the American League Championship Series that starts Friday.
“There is one direct flight to Kansas City from Air Canada (per day, leaving from Toronto). It’s sold out Friday. It’s a business route normally; now it’s a baseball route,” said Keith Silverberg, the owner of Suntastic Travel Services, adding late Thursday you could still grab a Saturday ticket to the Missouri city for about $2,200 return.
Ticket reseller StubHub says people north of the border are moving fast to grab ducats off the site — prices start at US$115 for the first game — and reported early Thursday that about three per cent of its sales for Games 1 and 2 of the series are going to Canadians, despite the fact the game is in the U.S. Midwest, about 1,600 kilometres away from Toronto. For the games in Arlington, Texas, against the Rangers that the Jays just won, Canadians bought six per cent of seats sold through the site.
Judging by the numbers, those television images of Jays fans cheering loudly at opposition stadiums are not isolated incidents but part of the travelling pack of people willing to pay big bucks to follow their sports teams on the road.
Silverberg said flights out of Buffalo, N.Y., that use connections to get to Kansas City are filling up fast, too, though the price is a little bit cheaper than flying directly from Toronto.
“I think those are all Jays fans (booking now),” he said, adding it’s still about $1,000 round-trip because it’s a last-minute flight.
He said requests from the travelling sports fan continue to drive business — and it’s not just for baseball.
“Baseball is hot now, but there are fan clubs that follow these teams to every park. The Maple Leafs have a far more intense following. This is all in evidence when you turn on the camera.”
During the regular season, everyday fans will book far in advance and cut down costs for a big trip. The playoffs are a much different story. “This is really only for the people with bread,” Silverberg said.
Part of the reason sports fans travel better today is the secondary market for tickets. While fans pay a premium for those tickets, they can establish the cost quickly and lock down their seat if they decide to book a trip.
Cameron Papp, StubHub’s communications manager, said the Blue Jays’ away experience is becoming a pan-Canadian one. About a third of buyers from Canada using the site are from outside Ontario.
“I’d say (the percentage of Canadians) buying was high for that series,” said Papp, talking about Jays fans who travelled to Texas to watch the team play the Rangers.
He adds it’s early days for the Kansas City series, with Toronto fans finding out who their opponent was going to be only late Wednesday night. Papp expects demand from Canada to continue to pick up for the next two games on Friday and Saturday.
“I haven’t looked this season, but I know before the Leafs were maybe a top five team in terms of away sales (from the visiting city),” Papp said. “I think this is mostly a Toronto thing. The dollar is something people are taking into consideration, but it’s a number that goes into your consideration when you’re buying.”
Even before the Jays made all their trades and went on incredible run to win the American League East, their fans packed the closest hotel to Kauffman Stadium for a series against the Kansas City Royals in early July.
“A lot of them were from Toronto, some from other parts of Ontario. They filled up the top half the hotel,” said Christina Morgan, guest service manager of Four Points by Sheraton Kansas City — Sport Complex, adding that rooms are about US$350 with tax. “I tell you, they were better behaved than Houston fans.”
It may sound like overindulgence for a sports fan to pay $2,200 for a flight, $700 for tickets to two games and $900 for two nights of hotel accommodation, but certified financial planner Ted Rechtshaffen says he can justify a $4,000 trip for knocking something off your “bucket list” of things to do.
“I just told a client who is a big baseball fan, ‘What are you waiting for? Go follow the Blue Jays,’” he said, adding that they have the financial means, and you can’t put a price on memories.
“At a certain point in life, the only thing you have are your memories.,” Rechtshaffen says. “The things that stick out in life are the really good memories and the bad ones.”