Tournament gate fees

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One thing about fee's

Public parks do not charge their residents to play in them (where I live) But when a tournament is held they employ there workers to maintain the fields, clean up trash, have one or two people on staff during the tournament or more. Pay those weekend employees time and a half wage. Not to metion materials that they need for upkeep. In my city the concession stand is bid out for the summer at a very low amount. those proceeds go to the people that run the youth softball, baseball, soccer, The funds from those go for uniforms trophys, bats, balls, equipment, etc. The parking fees go towards paying those employees and materials to offset the exspense. So there are a lot of hidden things that people do not see. they only see $5.00 a day what a ripoff. Now I can't Talk for other tournaments but that is how it is in the cities that I assign umpires for. Not to mention umpire fees.

So just remember it not always whats up front that you see.

PS: I do not work for the city just been around and no how things are handled

 

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Ump, all those costs you mentioned are covered in public parks by tax payer money, field rentals and by bidding out concessions. Each public park has a budget from which materials and labor is paid for. Anybody who lives in a city and gets charged for entering a park is being double taxed. Admission fees are a tax. Perhaps if every admission fee was 5 bucks nobody would questioning this, but I read on here somebody said a weekend pass for a tournament was 20 bucks.

 

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One thing that bugged me at Berliner was that the players had to pay to get in. Having 16U & 18U games, you know there are going to players driving themselves there. They should have at least let them in for free. We made up the difference by not buying a tshirt.

 

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One thing that bugged me at Berliner was that the players had to pay to get in. Having 16U & 18U games, you know there are going to players driving themselves there. They should have at least let them in for free. We made up the difference by not buying a tshirt.

I never thought about that. How can anybody defend that. Teams have to cough up $450 to play then the players have to pay $5.00 to get to their game. Redonkulous!!!

I know one thing. Next year our coach's shirts are going to look just like umpire shirts. :

 

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One thing that bugged me at Berliner was that the players had to pay to get in. Having 16U & 18U games, you know there are going to players driving themselves there. They should have at least let them in for free. We made up the difference by not buying a tshirt.

That is exactly the kind of stuff I am talking about. I am not begrudging TD's making money but really when alot of teams are coming from out of town the Gate fees are always higher, what choice to parents have at that point? Charging a player to get in is crazy. What is a kid suppose to do, they have no options, pay $5 dollars or dont play. Even though the kid has already paid (parents) for the kid to enter the tourney by their teams players fees.

 

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The girls had to wait for me to pay so they could get in. I'd never thought that the players would have to pay to enter the park in a tournament they were playing in! The rude snot nose kid taking the money acted like they were trying to sneak in. :

 

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Just curious why it is the tournaments that have 16 to 32 teams seem to be the ones charging? Alot of the 8 teams tournaments dont charge why is that. So dont tell me they arent making money. Maybe they just dont manage their money as well as the others. Then they probably give $3 medals to the teams that place thats another subject tho. I know one TD holds his and he usually has 16 to 24 teams a qualifier, entry fee was $350 there is no gate fee no parking fee and the profits are pretty good as he gives a portion to the local HS team.

 

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profits are "pretty good" ---we gotta define that before we have a serious debate ---I'd love to know what others make off hosting a tourney. I've been part of doing 2 now, last year and this year. I'm not sure it's worth it. matter of fact I'm positive it's not worth it. Say you have 12 dads a team , pick 25 bucks an hour , I'd rather work a 8 hr OT shift at $ 25 an hour average , donate the full amount to the team , raise 2-3 K for the team , than work 2-3 days at 12 hours a day and make slightly more than that.

I'll be upfront and share some general figures:
we usually have 24-30 teams
300 plus to get in per team
big amount goes back to sanctioning body.
huge expense is umps . Bless their hearts they even agreed to 25 a game to help us out but that expense was still above 2 grand (2 umps a field) You are now in the hole:
The other 2 sources of income are gate and concessions. If you don't charge gate you are going to have to sell a ton of burgers/candy/water/ gatoraid to make some cash.
We co-op'ed out the tee shirt sales , very little money there. We worked like dogs to make somewhere between 2800-3500K . Does this sound about right for others who have ran tournies. MD

 

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It is alot of work..........if you can make that much it is a huge success! Not much money in the tourneys but a lifetime of memories......anyone who hosts a tourney I say hats off a ton of work for very little return.....think about spliting that profit with your 16's 14's and 12's...comes out to maybe 1200 a team......gets you into the Nationals with some left over for some nets and balls. But nothing to write home about.

 

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Not sure what an avg profit for a tourney is MD.

I really dont have a problem with anything other then charging a gate fee into a public park. I would prefer if a team needed to make more money that they raise their entry fee. That way my families cost is controlled not randomly set. There are some TD's that are just flat our greedy IMO. Three weekends in Toledo so far, 1st Tourney 3 day deal $20 weekend pass, 2nd tourney 2 day USSSA states $10 weekend pass, 3rd GLI 3 day tourney weekend pass $10. Tournaments are using the same fields for each week lol, why are the gate fees so random? I can handle the GLI's $10 3 day pass I find that reasonable, its really the $20 dollar pass that is kind of driving me crazy, but for me and my wife in three tourneys we have spent $80 dollars just to get in to watch ;D Sluggerfest next weekend and then GAPPS I wonder where I will stand after those 2 tourneys.

 

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GAPPS didn't charge last year. Hopefully it will be the same this year also.

 

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sluggerfest 13 bucks a weekend MD

 

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at whitehall we paid.....oh, let me check the reciept...um, NADA!

 

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big amount goes back to ?sanctioning body.

???????????? ?Mentioned a few times but give me an idea of ABOUT what that is ??$$$$$

 

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NSA WS qualifier fee is $40 per team. ?For our tournament I am paying $1440.00 in Nsa fees, $200 for a UIC, and $5100 for umpires. ?Throw in $800 for Genshaft fields $700 for trophies, and all the extras and very little money is made on registration fees.

 

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NSA WS qualifier fee is $40 per team. ?For our tournament I am paying $1440.00 in Nsa fees, $200 for a UIC, and $5100 for umpires. ?Throw in $800 for Genshaft fields $700 for trophies, and all the extras and very little money is made on registration fees.

You had 36 teams in your tourney, what was the entry fee per team? Did you get money from concessions? and what was the gate fee?

 

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Wow $5,100 for umpires, how many games is that for 70-100? Most of the umpires around here get 25-35 a game at these tournaments. Maybe its alot more than that other places, but if your talking about genshaft we're at least in the same general area. Most umpires I know do mostly ASA maybe NSA is different. I will do a little research and let you know. I know a guy that holds an NSA qualifier. If it is more than that than i would be alot harder on them.

Last night the umpire argued with me the run rule was 10 for ASA, I told him it was 8 after 5 he said no its been 10 after 5 for years, I told him no OHSAA was 10 but ASA has been 8 for years, so we continued to play, coach showed him the rule book he still said 10, coach went to the TD And he the TD came down and informed him that it was 8. This was 2 umpires and neither one of them got it right. I dont want to here about how they jump from sanction to sanction, its poor job preperation on their part. If you havnt done ASA in awhile you better look at the book before you get there.

 

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sanctioning fees --??? Can someone help me out also , I thought for a NSA WS quailfier there was a per player charge ?? Help MD

 

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It's basic economics. Supply and demand. If the demand goes down, the supply goes up and prices come down to lower the supply and boost demand. If you don't want to pay a gate fee, don't go to that tournament. Simple!

Now, the reality is that we all want our kids to play in the best, most competitive tournaments available and we always do what we have to do for our kiddies, don't we? Tournament operators aren't concerned with grandma and grandpa's fixed income or ma and pa's having to pay $20 a head every weekend for eight weekends on top of the player fee to play for a good organization and the private instruction and off-season clinics and indoor tournaments. It all gets just a bit overwhelming once you start to write it all down.

The vast majority of tournaments are well run operations that make some profit for the group running them. Are people getting rich? I'd say no. The question to be asked by the consumers (those attending the tournaments and paying the gate fees) is, "Where is the money going?" It's a legitimate question that should be able to be answered easily. But whatever the case may be, gate fees are here to stay and are part of the price to play unless the consumers join together and decide to stop paying by not entering those tournaments. Who is first in line?

 

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18over you need to goggle Supply and demand, then goggle price gouging. Then tell me which one outrageous admission fees better fits under.

I took a few economics classes in college and supply and demand is one most misused business phrases. It's the relationship between the consumer and the goods or services they WANT. Not need lol. In this case the admission is neither a good or service and the consumer in many cases Mom or Dad NEED to be there. Unless you also consider family values a want and not a need

I do have a question. When tournaments advertise the say NC 6 game gaurentee entry fee 400Dollars. Why don't they also say 15 dollar weekend pass per adult lol Hmmmmm I am going to say that is business 101 something the teach you in your first Carnegie business class eh?