They Got Game

They got game. Actually, they’ve got games. Lots of games. Lots of high-profile, fan-frenzied sports games that now make for a booming niche of the travel industry representing as much as a quarter of all tourism business in some regions. Want prime seats to the Super Bowl or World Series? Travel agents and tour operators are connecting these days to get agents’ customers into the stadium, and book them at the toniest hotels nearby. And that’s not all: Think Master’s packages that put the agent’s clients within putting distance of Tiger. Or access to the nation’s fastest-growing sport, NASCAR, that is so up-close-and-personal, only the pit crews get closer to the drivers’ cars. Agents, tour operators and networking intermediaries are working the phones and laptops to ensure that traveling fans and business parties get the most unique and star-studded “special access passes” the VIP events where attendees schmooze with current players and Hall of Famers, as well as Hollywood celebs.

According to the Washington-based Travel Industry Association, 75.3 million adults in North America traveled 100 miles or more roundtrip to attend an organized sporting event in the past five years which amounts to nearly 40 percent of the adult population engaging in some kind of sporting-event-related travel. And insiders say that beyond this nation’s often near-obsessive fascination with sports itself, there’s another key trend that’s fueling this boom.

“Since the terrorism attacks of Sept. 11, the trend in vacation travel has gone to shorter distances in shorter time spans,” said Anbritt Stengele, CEO and director of Chicago-based Sports Traveler, which serves as an online marketplace for dozens of sports travel companies and agencies. “So sports travel fits perfectly into today’s trend. Most games and events are on the weekends and within the continental U.S.”

And, let’s face it, booking with an agent who works with a sports-specific tour company simply offers a hotter ticket.

“The advantage is having the opportunity for an ‘all access’ experience that isn’t available or even accessible to the average sports fan,” Stengele said. “My most memorable tour of 2004 was the Indianapolis 500. We teamed with a company that had a race preview party and dinner hosted by legendary driver Derek Daly. Derek gave a fantastic talk all about what it’s like to actually be inside an Indy car on race day. He talked about what it feels like to take that first turn at the Indy track, and how nervous he was the first time he got his car over 200 mph. After hearing him speak, you could hardly wait to get to the track. It really added excitement to the entire trip experience.”

And here’s another trend within the trend: Sports travelers aren’t necessarily there to watch the game. At least, not live. More than 35 percent of visitors to the Super Bowl each year don’t have tickets, but come to take in the festivities, according to the NFL. College bowl games, such as the Orange Bowl, will bring in more than 20,000 fans who will watch the game while tailgating outside the stadium.

Jay Smith, owner of Hatfield, Mass.-based Sports Travel and Tour, gives that trend a decidedly exotic spin: Forget the Super Bowl host-city. For the most recent Super Bowl, Smith arranged for (and attended himself) a Super Bowl weekend in Aruba, with beach activities and casino games at the Aruba Hyatt Resort. On Sunday, naturally, the group attended a big Super Bowl bash.

“No matter what sport we’re talking about, we’re more than willing to come out of the box and customize a program to the budget and wishes of our clients,” Smith said.

According to Timothy Schneider, owner of Los Angeles-based Schneider Publishing Company, which publishes SportsTravel, a leading publication specializing in this niche: “Sports-related travel is resilient and growing. Regardless of what else is happening in the world, people still travel to attend sporting events. The prospects for this market are very bright indeed.”

Plenty of Options

The importance of the sports-related travel market is also reflected by the marketing efforts of the leading hotel chains, many of which have developed sports-specific sales and marketing initiatives in the past five years. Best Western International, for example, is now the official hotel of NASCAR. Best Western also sponsors TEAMS: Travel, Events and Management in Sports, the large-scale sports event conference that Schneider’s company stages every year. After five years, TEAMS now draws more than 1,000 attendees and 250 exhibitors. (TEAMS 2006 will be held Oct. 11-14 in Las Vegas.)

“We’ve certainly seen an increasing level of interest in the sports-related market among travel agents,” said Schneider. “Many of them attend the TEAMS Conference & Expo as a way to learn more about developing relationships in the sports world that can lead to ongoing, high-volume business.”

And agents shouldn’t fret that they’re out of the game if they don’t have a major sports venue nearby. Agent Floyd McCubbins, owner of Columbia Falls, Mont.-based Moving Image Travel, lives in a state where there aren’t any NASCAR tracks, but that doesn’t stop him from selling a ton of race packages for the Nextel Cup, as well as the Busch and Craftsman Truck series events. And, while no major league baseball team is anywhere near him, McCubbins boosts his business by booking Amtrak packages to Seattle for Mariners games.

“The most ambitious package I have ever sold is with one of my regular clients,” McCubbins recalled. “He told me they wanted to go to the Masters in Augusta, Ga. He and his cronies wanted air, a hotel on or adjacent to the golf course, a rental car, tickets to the tournament everyday and to top it off the four of them wanted to play the top four finishers of the golf tournament the day after the tournament ended!

“The tough part is that the tickets for the Masters are drawn by lottery,” McCubbins said. “But I found a tour packager who found another golf packager who had 100 tickets to the Masters and we put together that end of the package. The packager contacted the proper people and was told that the top four finishers would play for $10,000 per person. The golf packager and I put the package together and I presented it to my client. The price tag was $64,500 for four people. My client said book it!”

That’s a success story worthy of a green jacket itself.

Of course, these days one can watch just about any sporting event he or she desires on TV and get a pretty great view of the action. Still, with many fans, that doesn’t compare with the experience of actually being there. In Harrisonburg, Va., James Madison University recently released study findings that indicated that 57 percent of NASCAR fans have personally attended a race, and more than one-quarter attended a race during the 2004 season.

“We think this speaks to the visceral experience of attending an event in person,” said study conductor Larry DeGaris, director of the university’s Center for Sports Sponsorship. “For many fans, once they go to an event and get the physical sensations of being there, they are hooked. In past research, I’ve found that NASCAR fans travel an average of 250 miles to attend a race. In college football, it’s about 200.”

Indeed, college sports, especially football, seems to be a gold mine for the enterprising agent, with booster clubs and alumni groups sometimes traveling across the country to see their favorite teams play. And the market appears to be growing. Travelocity recently announced a partnership with TicketsNow, a Web-based resource for event tickets, to offer discounts specially designed for bowl games.

But similar trends can be seen across sports. Sports Travel and Tours’ Smith was barely finished with his Super Bowl business when he was lining up future bookings. Some agency customers take more than 10 sports trips a year with Smith’s company. Its Baseball Road Trips program can range from three to 12 days, featuring a variety of ballparks, appealing to travelers from ages 8 to 80 with every conceivable demographic.

“Baseball is big in March because spring training [in Arizona and Florida] is really becoming a huge niche,” he said. “Our bookings were up 100 percent last year for spring training. This past season, we surpassed that before the players even arrived.”

He also is getting a lot of interest in NASCAR packages, given that the sport has not only perhaps the most loyal of fans, but it maintains the longest schedule. The NASCAR season stretches from February all the way through the December championship awards ceremonies at the Waldorf Astoria in New York.

As for cost? With Smith’s company, average multi-day packages are priced at $1,250 based on double occupancy. These packages can include, among other highlights, hotel accommodations, land transportation by deluxe motorcoach, game tickets, welcome reception, some breakfasts, stadium tours when available, city tours and even Broadway show tickets when in New York. Commission rates vary from 5 to 10 percent, with potential for overrides. For more than a year, Sports Travel and Tours has offered NET rates, which are popular with agents these days.

Leave It to the Experts

Furthermore, agents don’t even have to be sports-savvy to gain a piece of this niche, as Smith’s staff is more than happy to handle the sports details part of the conversation and still cut the agent a commission. Smith says the lack of sports seasoning on the part of agents is holding them back from this growing niche and the sense of intimidation isn’t necessary. Getting a foothold on the sports-travel market is just good business like expanding theme cruise, adventure or family-friendly travel offerings.

“Many agents are afraid to sell sports because they are not comfortable,” Smith said. “We suggest leaving the discussion with our staff so we can service the client more efficiently. Most fans know what they want and the agent is better off letting the client know they are working with a specialist rather than trying to do it on their own. And that kind of approach doesn’t take away at all from the agent’s ability to market sports as part of his or her travel offerings on a Web site, for instance.”

Cary, N.C.-based Premiere Sports Travel is heavily promoting NASCAR and the U.S. Open PGA event in spring, not to mention the Kentucky Derby. For the tour operator, price competitiveness is key.

“We try to keep our package costs low so that we can take more people to events,” said owner Brian Wilder. “We like to say that we’re the Wal-Mart of sports travel. If an agency is putting a group together to go to one of our events, we can put together a group air program and work with the agency on deposit stages so that it is affordable for the group.”

That said, Premiere Sports Travel is far from a no-frills operation. For NASCAR events, agency customers will get into meet-and-greet events with top drivers such as Jeremy Mayfield, Ward Burton and Michael Waltrip at prime races such as the Daytona 500.

At the 2005 NFL Pro Bowl, customers hobnobbed with the likes of former star quarterback and current game commentator Boomer Esiason and attended a VIP party hosted by Super Bowl star Terrell Owens. And the “transfers” the company offers as part of their packages aren’t referring to rickety buses the traveling party left their Hawaii hotel to the Pro Bowl in a caravan of limos. They attended the NFL’s official tailgate party with even more celebs. Then, after the game, they got a limo ride back to the hotel.

“People like not having to deal with traffic at events,” Wilder said. “This way they can also enjoy the ‘refreshments.’”

Just as agents and other tour operators are seeing, Premiere Sports Travel bookings are booming. When NASCAR launched a final 10-race playoff-style finish that spiked fan interest, Premiere’s bookings for those 10 races increased 125 percent in 2004 over 2003.

“Then, in anticipation for the 2005 season, we were sold out of our Daytona 500 packages over a month out from the event,” Wilder said. “In 2004, we sold packages up to the week of the event.”

The phenomenon of sports travel is getting so big that many travelers are integrating the family vacation with a sports event trip. Agent Carol Minker, of Sanders Travel Centre in Fort Worth, Tex., booked her very first sports trip recently with Winnipeg-based Roadtrips Inc., and couldn’t be happier about the experience.

“My client was a family of three generations,” Minker said. “They were celebrating New Year’s and their grandmother’s 80th birthday. They selected Los Angeles for their destination and thought it would be memorable to attend the Rose Bowl Parade and the Rose Bowl. They had a marvelous, stress-free experience and were especially content after hearing the horror stories from people who tried to make their own arrangements.”

Often, tour operators are more than happy to piggyback sports events on top of other sports events. Roadtrips features a Baseball Hall of Fame package that also provides for a fully escorted group trip with stops at stadiums in the Northeast.

“People are now booking for big events a year or more in advance,” said Jeff Wills, vice president of marketing for Roadtrips, “and sales are really picking up in the last three months before an event.”

So whether your clients prefer the links, the hardwood, the baseball diamond or the gridiron, there’s no limit to the possibilities or the commission when it comes to getting them to the games in style, wherever those games may be.