It's hard enough being a National Hockey League franchise in a market that you don't traditionally associate with hockey. But for the Florida Panthers, this off season around South Beach has been especially daunting, what with the hundreds of millions the Miami Heat has spent on fresh talent. And before those dollars reflect increased wins, they lead to increased public perception and (naturally) ticket sales.
To counteract that wave, the Panthers are trying out a bold, new season ticket-selection process called Perfect Plan. The system is ridiculously simple: Fans need only pick out an area within BankAtlantic Center and propose a per-game price for a specific seat. Then, within 24 hours, someone from the team will notify them to either accept their "bid," reject it, or offer them a seat elsewhere in the arena for a price similar to what they offered.
"When it's the dead of summer, and you're in a nontraditional market for something like hockey, you have to think creatively," Ryan McCoy, a Panthers marketing VP, told Wired.com. "The whole idea has been to try and bring in some casual fans, people who haven't thought about going to hockey games before."
So far, the Panthers are calling the effort a resounding success. With fans submitting bids on three tiers of season-ticket plans - ranging normally from $60 to $130 per game - the Panthers have now approved offers that equate to more than 100 full season-ticket plans and rejected roughly 80. That might not seem like much, but over the course of the 41 regular-season home games that every NHL team plays, the Panthers have already filled more than 4,000 extra seats before single-game tickets go on sale league-wide Sept. 10.
And according to the Panthers' internal data, 85 percent of the people that have bid via the Perfect Plan system are "fresh faces," or people who have never been reached by the team's marketing efforts. Still, the Panthers have committed to this experiment for only 10 days, with the expiration looming a week from now. So if you've missed out on nabbing a season-long package to see LeBron & Co. on the hardwood, the chill of rink ice might be the ticket for you.
Photo: AP Photo/Wilfredo Lee
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