Triad’s Ayden Sanford (34) catches a pass during the 2019 game against Fairbanks. Triad officials will offer a digital ticket option for 2020-21 athletic contests. (Journal-Tribune photo by Tim Miller)
Triad athletics will be bringing ticket sales to all sporting events into the digital era. After some consideration, the school has decided to offer ticket sales to all games through a partnership with Hometown Ticketing, a company that provides a platform to sell tickets online to events.
Athletic director Logan Dunn said the move to the new ticketing option came as a way to improve athletics at Triad and save some money.
“Huddle Tickets is what a lot of schools were using,” he said. “This year, due to the coronavirus, they (Huddle) are requiring payment, most likely due to lack of sponsors.”
Dunn started looking around for another ticketing vendor, which prompted the move to Hometown Ticketing.
“They will print tickets for us for free for five years,” said Triad superintendent Vicki Hoffman.
Hometown Ticketing will not only print tickets, but will also offer a digital ticket that can be sent directly to the purchaser’s phone. Hoffman believes this could potentially save the district upwards of $3,000.
“What we need at Triad is $1,500 in tickets and $1,500 is passes,” she said. “So we could save $3,000 by going with electronic tickets.”
Hoffman says not everyone will want to purchase their tickets online.
“Some people are comfortable with paper tickets and some people are leery about purchasing online,” she said. “Myself, I’m old school and I like to have a ticket in my hand. Either way there is no expectation. We are just offering another purchasing option.”
Dunn says it is a way to help with sales and lines when spectators come to games.
Once the ticketing site is established for Triad, Dunn will be able to offer sales of tickets on Triad’s athletic page at oh.8to18.com/TriadOH.
If those tickets are purchased electronically, ticket takers at games will use an app provided by Hometown Ticketing to scan a QR code.
Hoffman said there will be two lines at games, one for electronic tickets and one for cash payment.
“It will help save people time from standing in lines,” she said.
Dunn also said the switch to the new ticket provider would also offer the school the opportunity to customize its printed tickets.
“Huddle has generic tickets, but with Hometown we can put the official Cardinal logo on the ticket,” he said.
Hoffman said the school could also get local ticket sponsors to offer coupons to local vendors.
“If someone wants to leave a football game they can go get a pizza using a coupon on the back of the ticket,” she said.
Other schools with the Ohio Heritage Conference are also looking into the ticketing provider, according to Dunn.
“If everyone in the league has Hometown, it would make it easier to purchase tickets for games at other schools,” Dunn said.