Tournament gate fees

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See, I said you were sharp, McLovin ? ?

 

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Anybody defending $15 to $20 dollar gate fees per parent for a weekend is not being honest with themselves and are strictly defending themselves or the Org they are assicoiated with.

Rant off ;D

 

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Dan, fees from/for the sanctioning bodies range from $25 to $40 per team. Depending on whether they are qualifiers or not.

 

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Dont you have to be sanctioned to get into tournaments Im asking im not sure on this I thought as a team they sent in a sanctioning fee and then they send you a card. Is this fee above and beyond that fee. I thought once you were sanctioned it was good for a year.

 

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What I hate is when they charge for kids. Anyone under 12 should be free. Charging for kids tends to make one parent stay home with them and miss out on their DD's memories. And if the kids come and are free they will probably spend more at the concession stand.

 

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[quote author=agoch link=1213822595/25#34 date=1214044910]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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yes, we have 36 teams in our tourney next weekend. Registraion fee was $325 for normal registration, we offered a $300 early registration, which about 1/2 the teams got in for. We also offered organizations discounts for organizations that sent 2 or more teams, in which about 5 0r 6 organizations took advantage of. we get NOTHING from concessions, Massillon parks & rec sod their concessio stand and we are not allowed to sell concessions. We are charging $4.00 a day, $1 for 10 and under. Unfortunately, if we don't it would not pay for us to run a tournament. I think this would be the case for most tournaments.

I have said it before, if tourney's don't make money, you will see less of them, which means less teams will have a place to play which means less teams, which means less girls playing,. So you can pay for your family to come watch your daughter play travel ball or you can watch your daughter play rec ball for free. To me its not a choice. Anybody who went into travel ball and thought it would be cheap is fooling themselves.

I expect I will get ripped here within a matter of minutes, but I do not believe people understand all the costs involved with running a tournament and that is the problem.

 

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Why not charge more for entry fees and allow free admission?

If you changed your entry fee to $425 and said no gate fees you would make 3600 more dollars from entry fees. Thats roughly 8-10 dollars a player more then your charging now.

I dont think your admission fee is high, its reasonable although charging anything for anybody under 12 needs to be re-thought lol.

However, my original post has nothing to do with tourneys making money, I know what would happen if they didnt. My post is about how TD's can charge an admission fee into a public park Paid for and maintained with tax payer money. It also has to do with the random prices charged at the gate for the same fields weekend to weekend. Anywhere from $20 dollars a weekend to $10 dollars.

 

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Tribefan, ?yes, different from each teams sanctioning fees. This is a fee that the sanctioning bodies charge the sponsoring organization to santion the results of the tournament.

 

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I don't think I would have had 36 teams if I charged $425, but thats just my opinion. I would bet though if all tournaments charged $425 that would cause coaches to raise their registration costs when joining the team, thus causing the parents to pay more anyway

 

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NSA tourney are not cheap. We all have to remember, no one mention that these are actually FUND Raisers for the organization; we all supported one another to continue the great sport of fastpitch softball. NSA is also the most expensive for an organization to represent as a "qualifier". I do agree with the remarks of charging players, that is just not right. What we started doing was raising the entry fee and charging no gate fee. We proably still lost about $2000 in doing that, but as an organization we felt it was easier on us. Our total revenue is about $12,000.00 on a NSA tourney and our expenses are at about $8000.00. A Huge part of that is NSA fees. We evne thought of going Pony next year, they are a lot cheaper.

And if we are lucky and it does not rain we do better. But if it does rain an organization will probably spend an average of about $800.00 plus on Oil dry on the fields (oil dry is a lot cheaper). And that comes right off the profit. I am a coach and sometimes I forget a pass or if they do not ask me at the gate if I am a coach or not, I'll pay; I know I am helping that organization for their Fund Raiser.

 

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I don't think I would have had 36 teams if I charged $425, but thats just my opinion. ?I would bet though if all tournaments charged $425 that would cause coaches to raise their registration costs when joining the team, thus causing the parents to pay more anyway ?

agoch, this next few paragraphs are not related to your tourney, again I think 4 dollars a day is reasonable and I wouldnt be ticked to pay it,it seems like a good fee to donate to a travel softball org. Funny thing is if they had a big tent set up where they collect gate fees saying $15 dollar donation for our travel organization I would pay it without thinking twice ;D

These are my thoughts on tourneys in general, not a specfic tourney.

Yes as I have been saying they would raise their prices to off-set costs of tourneys, but then TD's could not randomly charge at the gate. Leaving costs controlled.

Kind of funny though what your saying, if teams knew what it was actually going to cost them at my tourney they wouldnt come. Its kind of like the cell phone companines ;D Hide the cost to get new customers then once we have them who cares.

 

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I have said serverl times on OFC that we can put together an OFC committee to get standard rules for tournaments. That includes time limits, tie breakers and yes gate fees among many other things. We can sanction all tournaments that follow the guidelines. If coaches choose to go to a non sanctioned OFC tournament, than so be it, if you chose to go to all sanctioned OFC tournaments than yu would have consitency. Of course, sanctioning body rules would still exist, this would just be tournament specific stuff. Everytime I bringit up, no one ever takes me up n it.

 

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This is always a touchy subject but the truth of the matter is that entry fees barely cover the sanction fees, umpires, trophies, game balls and the help needed to keep the fields in good condition. Yes, concessions help but we all know far more time is spent tailgating than buying from the concession stand. It's not as lucrative as you may imagine considering all the work that goes into running a major tournament.

i agree with you. I know Chain Reactions Fathers Day Classic charged $3.00 a car on Saturday and Sunday. Anything we made off of concessions and parking goes towards our girls when they go to nationals.

Scott Saluga
Chain Reaction Black

 

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i think you need to have gate fees in perspective....

why doesn't anyone freak out when you pay 10 bucks for a playoff high school football game? even regionals at Pick Central were, i think, 6 or 8 per adult didn't see anyone from those respective teams gripe on the OFC....

maybe the gate fees get compounded with wins and losses...if you lose, you tend to gripe about anything, you win, who cares, drinks are on the house, right?

maybe it was how the tourney was ran, but then again, you are talking about wins/losses probably most of the time....now not ALWAYS, but i would say 7 out of 10 gripes come from being salty you didnt win....it's the same with teacher complaints here in Columbus....the parents who complain have the worst kids, or the most challenging ones...the ones whose kids are smart and fly straight, they are almost embarrased to come forward in defense of their kid EVEN when a teacher is in the wrong...anyway...

plus, and dare i say something else that might offend a huge contingent of softball parents, but I've been to about the same amount of tourneys over the years as some of you, ofc-ers, I've seen the cars you drive, the phones your DD's have, the team bags and the glossy uniforms and the 300-dollar bat, and then we get complaints about 5 bucks? (ringer, get this soap box out from under me before i explode!)

yes, i (we) pay gate fees too....in the end, the amount of time you spend complaining, you could already be parked and eating a walking taco.....i remember going to drive-ins and sneaking cousins in the trunk (that's what a burrito really is, people, mexicans in a trunk of a Chevy) or covering a pizza with a beach towel...you do what you can...if anything, having no coolers would be my biggest gripe, but i guess i'll be drinking less that weekend of Tealtown....

some people here get more riled up than you do about the Dice-man, bigtrain or the lasers! :-X

 

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excellent post statman!!!

 

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I never hear anyone complain about the cost to get into 1 high school football game or basketball game. We are talking about a whole day or weekend of watching fastpitch softball games and watching our dd's have the time of their lives with their closest friends. Go to a movie with your family and I can bet you'll spend more at 1 movie then admission to a softball tournament.

Don't get me wrong here, I love the tournaments that don't charge admission fees(Elyria last weekend). I would love to not have to pay for weekend passes for my family- but it is what it is. What I do disagree with is charging my 11yr old for an adult pass and tournaments that say NO COOLERS!

 

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I dont like to pay them either. The worst was when I had to pay to get in H.S. games to watch my oldest cheer. >

 

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The last time I checked, football players aren't charged to enter the stadium or basketball players asked to fork over $5 so they can get into the locker room so they can play! That's my beef with the gate fees at Berliner. I'll pay them for myself & the rest of the family, but to charge a PLAYER to get into the park so she can play is down right bull. Mind you, this was 2 girls full uniform, with cleats on & 2 bags full of gear. The kid at the gate at Berliner acted like they were trying to sneak in. : It has nothing to do with wins or losses or sour grapes. It's about the city of columbus being greedy jerks.

 

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I'll go hand in hand on that one too, warrior! did they charge the little banana too!

 

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With the lizard playing 16U now, another player picked her up so we didn't have to be there so early. When they got there, the gatekeeper wouldn't let the girls in even though it was obvious they were there to participate in the tournament. He acted like they were going to an elaborate scam just to get in for free. I had to haul it over there with $$ so they could get in to warm up. The girls were charged a gate fee each of the 3 days. I made up the difference by not buying a tournament shirt for her.

This was all about greed. Why are you going to host 16U & 18U and not let those players in the park unless they fork over more money?? Unnecessary.