How the stadium giveaway game is changing as marketers tap into collector culture

The baseball season begins today, and for MLB team marketers, it’s a long one. Each club has tens of thousands of seats to sell, 81 times a year. For more than a century teams have known that a gate giveaway was one way to entice a ticket purchase. But investment in that tactic tended to be low, even when shared with a sponsor and, as a result, the quality of the giveaways suffered, and a generation of fans grew indifferent. “I remember going to games growing up [in the 1990s] and getting giveaways. The big knock against them was always that they were crappy quality items,” said Mike Downey, director of marketing and promotions for the Chicago White Sox. “It was T-shirts that you would never wear, or hats that didn’t fit your head.” Data-Driven Marketing Playbook Join us May 22 in NYC to explore how data powers marketing Learn more here However, today's teams are seeking the perfect fit as they toss aside cheap trinkets and embrace giveaways that involve premium items and tie-ins to pop culture and art in a move to drive fan engagement and attract new and younger audiences. Teams are also managing their promotions more strategically, using them to engage sponsors, drive fan behavior, and balance demand for tickets from game to game, observers say. For instance, structured “rope hats”—the retro nautical-style caps that are hot with Gen Z—are on the giveaway calendar for the White Sox and Seattle Mariners this year, among other clubs. “They look like something my grandfather would wear to go fishing, but my teenage son thinks it’s the coolest thing ever,” Gregg Greene, senior VP of marketing and communication for the Mariners, said of the corduroy rope cap the team plans to give away to 10,000 fans on April 11. “I don’t get it, but the younger generations are excited.” The focus on promotions may be doing its part: MLB attendance in 2024 totaled 71.3 million, a 1% increase over 2023. Downey this year is overseeing a promotional calendar with dozens of events and giveaway items including nine different bobblehead statues, a plush blanket, vintage uniform replicas and a 1959 Comiskey Park model that’s also an AM/FM radio. These items, part of a 125th-anniversary celebration for the White Sox, are to be joined by pop culture-associated giveaways (Harry Potter and Star Wars) and affinity nights honoring ethnic groups and area colleges. “We go for a high perceived-value item and then try to match it with actual quality,” Downey said. “It’s one thing to get people’s attention. It’s another thing to have people satisfied with that item that they paid their hard-earned cash to get.” Without disclosing actual figures, Downey said the White Sox have been able to expand its giveaway budget by 5% to 15% per year by more accurately analyzing the success of its promotions—that’s allowed the team to step up the quality of its giveaway items. Downey estimated this season represents a 20% budget increase to account for the special items associated with its anniversary. Sponsorship and branding The Chicago Bulls are using gate giveaways more often than in past, as it has been an effective way to engage sponsors while also marketing the NBA team, said Jamie Litoff, executive director of partnership marketing for the Bulls. But the practice is evolving. “It used to be a little bit more sponsor-driven. You’re a frozen pizza company, make a Bulls oven mitt, we’ll give it out the gate. That’s what it was. It was very transactional,” Litoff said. “As everyone is focusing in on data, we took a hard look at the data around our theme nights and our promotional items and what they were doing for us from a business purpose, besides sponsorship revenue.” On giveaway nights, the Bulls take note of fans lining up before the gates open, and entering the arena early, which impacts the fan experience and reduces no-shows, in addition to measuring the effect of the promotion on tickets sold. “We see [promotions] as a Bulls marketing campaign as much as they are a sponsorship asset,” Litoff said. “And for that reason, that’s made a really big impact, and a big focus for us.” The Bulls’ marketing, creative services and sponsorship teams collaborate on gate giveaways, and have had particular success with themed giveaways spanning multiple games, Litoff said. This year, the team leveraged its popular mascot, Benny the Bull, as inspiration for a capsule collection of four items—a basketball, a Benny the Bull stretch toy, a duffel bag and a windbreaker, each with a different sponsor, available only to fans who attended all four giveaway games. The BMO hat series gives away Bulls hats designed by five local artists over the course of the season and has been running for seven years. It’s the only program where the Bulls allow their logo to be altered, and it pays off in making memorable connections between the team and its sponsor to local culture, Litoff said. The hat series expanded to giveaway jerseys this year. “Selling tickets is important, but so is the fan experience, and so we make sure that the sponsorship and everything we do with sponsors is a part of that,” Litoff said. “We know our brand better than anyone else, and that’s why partners want to work with us, to draft off us and get that halo effect. The thing that’s great about these giveaway items is it’s checking boxes on all sides, for sponsorship, for ticket sales, for fan experience.” Mystery prize It’s one thing to offer a gift at the gate; it’s another to peddle intrigue and engagement. The St. Louis Cardinals for several years have been drawing fans with mystery giveaways, including one last year where the team shirt they offered came in a mystery size—from adult small to extra-extra large—and encouraged fans to exchange them with one another in the Busch Stadium outfield terrace area (the team reportedly ordered the sizes in proportion to sales figures at the team store). Mystery size jersey acquired!#forthelou ⚾❤️ pic.twitter.com/uSNzU3zimJ— Cardinals Cookie (@cardscookie) June 29, 2024 “I’d be interested to see how that worked out from a logistical perspective,” Litoff remarked of the Cardinals’ stunt. “But I think anytime you can get a high quality item that people will wear outside the stadium and get early arrivals and ticket sales out of it, that’s a unique one.” Teams such as the Anaheim Ducks of the NHL strategize on giveaways during a “crunch period” following the announcement of the next season’s schedule (typically in late June for a season that begins in late October). Over the last five years in particular, this has involved strategizing between corporate sponsors and the ticketing department to find a “comfortable space” to maximize ticket desire, said Merit Tully, chief marketing officer for the Ducks. “It’s become more strategically centered around how it integrates with your corporate sponsorships, how it integrates with your ticketing department … and who your opponent is and what day of the week it is,” Tully said. “It’s about demand. And it’s about if there isn’t demand for that game, creating additional demand.” The Ducks can calibrate behavior like early ticket purchases by limiting quantities of giveaway items. “For us, it’s about creating a more even playing field for demand.” The Ducks have an internal merchandise department, facilitating the ability to offer free merchandise at the gate that complements items for sale in the team store, Tully said. For example, fans who receive a giveaway scarf can find a matching sweater or one bobblehead will be given away from a series of four. Hello Kitty Many of today’s most popular gate promotions aren’t sports-related at all. A Hello Kitty bobblehead offered by the New York Mets last season helped to draw 41,000 fans to Citi Field—one of the largest crowds of the year, outdrawing baseball-related bobblehead giveaways such as Darryl Strawberry and Francisco Lindor. Teams throughout baseball also did Hello Kitty tie-ins, as word travels fast on what giveaways succeed, and baseball clubs don’t generally compete with one another for fans. “I think we try to be unique and do creative things, but I will give credit to the entire league, and both Major League Baseball and Minor League Baseball are incubators of creativity in promotions and giveaways and experimentation,” said Greene. Baseball teams tend to like the Hello Kitty brand for its ability to draw casual fans and young people to the park—while the team hopes they can be converted to more frequent visitors. And with a number of Japanese MLB stars, baseball has played up its association with the cultural properties of Japan, including anime and video games. Sanrio, Hello Kitty’s parent company, gains exposure to audiences it doesn’t tend to reach. @vanalejandra At least I watched the game afterwards 😭⚾️💙🧡 #hellokitty #hellokittybobblehead #sanrio #dateideas #nycthingstodo #nycadventures #newyorkmets #mets #baseball #fypp ♬ 80s summertime sadness - barretoedits While teams have taken the bobblehead item in all directions (the New York Yankees last season gave away a George Costanza bobblehead recognizing the “Seinfeld” character’s job as a Yankee employee on the show), the White Sox this year are offering the game’s most meta bobblehead when they give out a doll devoted to Bill Veeck, the Hall of Fame baseball promoter who was also a former White Sox owner. Veeck was responsible for baseball innovations such as integrating the American League, putting player names on the back of jerseys and pioneering gate giveaways such as bat day. He also had a hand in the infamous Disco Demolition Night at Chicago’s Comiskey Park and once signed a player with dwarfism as an on-field stunt. “A lot of the things we do in baseball are because of him,” Downey said. “So we’re going to try to bring back some of the family-friendly stunts he did. How can you do a promotional schedule honoring 125 years of White Sox history and not honor the king of promotions?” The Mariners’ promotional schedule this year includes a DC Comics night Joker bobblehead, an Ichiro Suzuki Funko Pop doll and two Hello Kitty promotions—a bucket hat and a tumbler. “We have an opportunity to create these unique experiences for different communities and interest groups throughout our region,” Greene said. “We love it when the ballpark is full, it creates a great experience, both for our fans and for our players. And we believe the ballpark is a community asset, so we love to see everybody coming out to celebrate.” Greene said he judges the success of promotions by “return on enjoyment,” or feedback from fans, and the impression it makes on them when they leave happy. “I think there’s power in taking home something physical, a part of your brand,” Greene said.

How the stadium giveaway game is changing as marketers tap into collector culture

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