New Cubs Owners Raise Ticket Prices
Club looking to raise ticket prices, but optimistic about high demand
The Chicago Cub are betting that most well-to-do fans will be willing to pay more to see their team this year, even though they were awful last year.
So the team hiked prices for its most expensive seats, raised the premium game fee and nearly doubled the amount of premium games. The so-called "cheaper seats" at Wrigley Field, however, will remain about the same, meaning you can still get a bleacher seat for the bargain price of $60.50.
Despite the tough economy, the team’s new chairman, Tom Ricketts, believes demand for premium seats will be even higher than it has been in previous years -- Ricketts also beleives the Cubs can win the World Series -- so he's signed off on a plan to hike the price on the most coveted seats in the park, according to the Chicago Tribune.
Season ticket holders will see their tickets go up as much as 19 percent, and the increased price may lead more and more of them to sell their seats piecemeal.
"We understand our season ticket holders in particular use the secondary market as a way of underwriting their ticket purchases," Cubs president Crane Kenney told the Tribune.
"It's a fact of life. We're over that. That's fine," Kenney added. "So we did the $5 (average) increase on those premium games as a way of trying to push the burden of our ticket price increase on those games, leaving the ticket prices flat for most of our games, for most of our seats."
The most significant increases will affect the most expensive seats at the platinum club infield box level, which go from $100 to $112.
Die-hard Cubs fans with little cash will be able to purchase $9 tickets for an upper dech outfield reserved seat for one of six “bronze” games on weekdays in April, May and September.
“Gold” games will be raised by an average $2 and “platinum” games will increase an average of $5.
Posted Saturday, Dec 5, 2009 - 10:54 AM CST
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