My children have followed in my footsteps as avid sports fans. However in today’s day and age, paying full price seems to cost an arm and a leg. And that’s before they hit you with the added processing, printing, shipping and various others costs.
So before we head out to the ballpark, I do my research and end up saving quite a bit off the face value of any ticket. In today’s post, I’m going to share my #1 tip on how to get cheap sports tickets.
Score Big
The newest competitor in the online ticket sales is ScoreBig. It’s free to sign up and when you do, you’ll get $10 off your first purchase, plus access to exclusive offers and discount codes.
ScoreBig is a ticket bidding site, but there’s a trick: You have to bid blindly.
The biggest advantage of ScoreBig is that there are no hidden fees. You choose the seat section that you are interested in, click how much you are willing to pay per ticket – and then you either get it at that price or you don’t.
If you win, they mail the tickets to you at home. The two times I have won tickets, they were actually FedEx’d to my home, so I had them in less than 48 hours.
If you don’t win, you can bid again for the same tier tickets again in 24 hours.
Moreover, deal a day sites often offer discounted credits, which stacks your savings for an even bigger steal.
I have done this twice. Once I bid $21 for three $10-each tickets to a baseball game in Cincinnati, which I won. I used my $20 credit (which cost me $2) plus another buck. In the end, I paid only $3 out of pocket for $30 worth of tickets! That’s a 90% savings!
More recently, I bought tickets for the last baseball game of the season in Kansas City. Three $34-each tickets ended up costing me $8.50 per ticket on SaveBig, which after my $20 voucher was a total of $7.50 for three tickets, delivered to my front door by FedEx. That’s a savings of 94%!
While the savings are very impressive, I do want you to know about a few drawbacks to ScoreBig. First, you must plan in advance. You can’t make a spur of the moment purchase for the day of game. Second, you can only bid once per tier class every 24 hours.
And the third disadvantage is that you can’t choose your specific seat. ScoreBig divides the stadium/arena into five tiers and you bid on tickets within that tier. In some cases, that could mean not knowing if you are buying tickets in the outfield or the upper deck until after you make the purchase.
What’s the best deal you’ve snagged on tickets to a sporting event?
I’ve been to only one baseball game, and I foolishly never even considered that I could purchase tickets at a discount. I must admit I really didn’t want to go to a baseball game, but my son REALLY wanted to go. It was a lovely way to spend an afternoon, albeit pricey. Even the parking was pricey. Now I will know how to finesse it the next time. BTW, at this-only-game-I’ve-ever-been-to, we beat the Royals. Sorry, couldn’t resist. Have a good Shabbos.