Date:
03/21/2008 06:15 PM At the ballpark, all-you-can-eat seats are convenient
for fans, nightmare for dieticians
By JOHN MARSHALL
AP Sports Writer
KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP) _ Buy me some peanuts
and Cracker Jack. And some more. And more.
A growing trend in all-you-can-eat seating
at sports venues is making baseball's summer chorus sound
more like "Take Me Out to the Buffet."
Dozens of arenas, stadiums and tracks have
offered tickets that come with unlimited snacks. The seats
have been a hit with fans, a moneymaker for the venues and
a worry for obesity-conscious health officials.
Instead of paying for a ticket and multiple
trips to the concession stand, the ticket includes everything
and costs about 50 percent more. Alcohol and desserts are
sold separately.
"I don't think you're ever going to get
your value from it food-wise, but convenience-wise, I think
it is a heck of a lot nicer than waiting in line for 20 minutes,"
said Drew Nurenberg, 30, of Malvern, Pa., who bought all-you-can-eat
seats with his wife for a Philadelphia Flyers game last month.
Nearly half of the 30 major league baseball
teams have added the all-inclusive seats, and others are looking
into it. The NHL has nine teams offering the deal; the NBA
has six. The idea has not caught on with the NFL, but NASCAR
has put it in overdrive, selling the tickets at multiple racetracks.
Fans get bargain grub, and the venues are
able to charge a premium for foods they already buy cheap
in bulk.
The result is like a giant hot dog on a hook
— a way for teams to lure new fans to their games or
get old ones to switch to higher-priced sections. In the past,
unlimited food and drink was reserved for luxury suites, which
cost up to six figures a year.
The Los Angeles Dodgers first offered all-you-can-eat
seats in their right-field bleacher pavilion last season.
They averaged 2,200 fans per game in a section that typically
opened only when the left-field bleachers were full.
Last June, the Kansas City Royals opened four
little-used upper-deck sections along the right-field line
for select games. This season, they're adding a section —
for a total of 500 seats — and making them available
at every game.
"When these were first started, there
was a lot of unused inventory, a lot of real estate in the
ballpark where people never visited before," says Joe
Strohm, vice president of ticket sales for the St. Louis Cardinals,
who have offered the seats since 1996. "This was a way
to get people to visit those areas."
Most all-you-can-eat seats cover only the
basics: hot dogs, popcorn and soda.
"Just what the world doesn't need is
another way to get as much food as they want whenever they
want it," says Jeanne Goldberg, a professor of nutrition
science at Tufts' Friedman School of Nutrition.
The unlimited quantity has turned some sporting
events into games of can-you-top-this in the stands, with
fans competing to see who can shovel the most hot dogs down
their gullets. But for the most part, the scene is the same
as in any other section.
"People knocking that stuff back isn't
exactly the prettiest thing to watch," Nurenberg said.
He added: "People looked like they were taking advantage
of it, but not overly taking advantage."
Some stadiums have tried to become more health-conscious.
The Pittsburgh Pirates offer salad bars. The Oakland Athletics
have stands with fruit cups and garden burgers. Just don't
expect too many all-you-can-eat healthy foods anytime soon.
"If you did start incorporating salads
or veggie dogs or things that aren't maybe cost-efficient,
that terrific value of $40 or $45 is going to start costing
people $50, $55, $60 in our market," says Mark Tilson,
vice president of sales and marketing for the Royals. "All
of a sudden it's not such a great deal."
But fans do consider it a deal, even at venues
where they can bring their own foods, as at NASCAR races.
"It's really been a big hit for us,"
says Scott Cooper, spokesman for Lowe's Motor Speedway in
Concord, N.C.
Lowe's was the first track to test-drive an
all-you-can-eat grandstand, offering unlimited food and nonalcoholic
drinks to about 1,100 fans at a Sprint Cup race in October.
The seats were priced from $59 to $99.
Lowe's will offer more such seats at the NASCAR
Sprint All-Star race in May and the Coca-Cola 600. Daytona,
Talladega, Darlington and the Auto Club Speedway plan to offer
similar deals.
The seats also are proving popular with the
NBA.
The Miami Heat tried the seats at a Dec. 13
game, and they were such a success the team added 18 more
games this season, selling about 100 tickets per game in 10
upper-deck sections. Five other NBA teams — Milwaukee,
Minnesota, Philadelphia, San Antonio and Seattle — also
sell all-you-can-eat tickets.
The NFL remains mostly a holdout to binge
seating, but there is an option for big spenders: The Houston
Texans last year opened the 500-seat Director's Club, offering
unlimited food and drinks. Memberships for the 2009 season
cost $1,250.
But beware: If your wallet doesn't mind, your
stomach just might. Nurenberg said he might consider returning
to the buffet — if they expand the options.
"Would I do it again? Probably, if they
changed the food around," Nurenberg said. "In the
current state, I probably wouldn't do it again."
