They are among the most popular football memorabilia in online auction houses, but they should soon be found under “Antiques”. Printed tickets will soon no longer be available. At least not when it comes to most of those responsible in the Bundesliga, who took another step towards a fully digitized stadium this summer. This mostly works with admission tickets that are saved on the mobile phone: so-called mobile or e-tickets. The ticketing organizers then also praise their advantages in the highest tones – from Hamburg to Munich.
Michael Becker, managing director of the second division club Karlsruher SC, also emphasizes that he is happy about everyone who buys electronic tickets. “We want to create incentives to switch to mobile tickets, but also continue to offer hard tickets.” And they create incentives: for the game against Magdeburg, a ticket for the newly opened back gate stand cost 29 euros. If you bought it online in advance, you had to pay nine euros less. 20 instead of 29 euros – or a good 30 percent less.
Strictly speaking, there have been no hard tickets in Karlsruhe since this season, only printouts of the e-tickets – this is certainly sad news for collectors. However, most fans like to use the digital offer, they find it practical to get to the stadium with just a few clicks. “It’s definitely a generational succession,” explains Becker.
However, the clubs do not aggressively advertise one advantage of the online strategy – data is currency
Even more obvious are the advantages for the clubs, who save on staff for ticket sales and can settle accounts more easily thanks to the largely cashless payment transactions. In addition, the time-consuming printing of paper tickets is no longer necessary. “It’s also about sustainability,” says Becker, who also knows that most fans go through the turnstile with e-tickets that they have printed out at home: “Of course it would be better to just save the card on your cell phone.”
However, the club management does not advertise the much more decisive advantage of the online strategy. Because of course the data you leave behind when you buy e-tickets is hard currency in an industry looking for growth opportunities. Just ten years ago, clubs only had information about their members and fans who had bought season tickets. Today, thanks to the digital strategy, the quota in the Bundesliga is likely to be well over three quarters of the viewers on each match day, most of whom willingly left email addresses, telephone numbers and dates of birth beforehand.
Just don’t tell the ultras: In the future, thanks to the data, it should be possible to address the individual stadium areas separately.
(Photo: Christopher Neundorf/Imago)
Further digitization – the topic that the new DFL Managing Director Donata Hopfen has taken on the flag – is what some in the industry call the most promising way to increase sales. In the future, thanks to the data, it should be possible to address the individual stadium areas separately. In this way, the vegan range of food could be advertised specifically for the clientele who had previously bought the sustainably produced fan shirt.
For the customers in the most expensive seats, an advertising mail for VIP offers would be conceivable, as well as push messages that draw attention to a sales campaign during the first half. But they can only end up on the cell phones in the seating area – and under no circumstances on those of the ultra scenes, who vehemently reject such marketing campaigns.
But as promising as the digitization strategy may seem to many clubs – the technology often throws a spanner in the works for the organizers in Germany. Anyone who tried to get into the ticket shop of a few randomly selected Bundesliga clubs on Wednesday was usually stuck in the “waiting room” for minutes. And on Sunday, a quarter of an hour before kick-off, hundreds of KSC fans were seen desperately trying to book a ticket online in front of the stadium. However, this failed due to server problems.