A growing number of sports teams are exploring dynamic ticketing models to help sell more tickets, according to a recent report in the New York Times. The San Francisco Giants were the first Major League Baseball (MLB) team to begin utilizing the practice, with the help of ticketing software company Qcue, and now officials with both MLB and the National Basketball Association tell the Times that they expect the practice to be the norm among teams in the future. Dynamic pricing uses computer algorithms to look at various factors in pricing tickets in the days or hours leading up to a game, such as the weather, the opponent or specific star players. “We’ve made a conscious effort to not make this like the airlines, where if you want to fly to L.A. the day of, it’s $800 from here,” said Russ Stanley, vice president of ticket sales and services for the Giants.
