Why Elevated Retail Offers are so important to a stadiums F&B program.
Our No.1 tip in 2025 to increase your stadium F&B revenues by up to 400%
Summer in Australia brings with it our national sport cricket, and our stadiums get to shine in the spotlight of sellout events. Double down on that with The Australian Open Tennis in full swing and we are spoilt for live sports at this time of year. We got to spend some time with the team across all these events starting with the Boxing Day test at the MCG, into the SCG Pink Test and finally this week at Melbourne Park for the AO. Being surrounded by high quality content and F&B got us thinking about 2025 and what is going to be the No.1 influence in stadia globally on an F&B program across General Admission (GA)
Not so long-ago stadium GA retail offers consisted of typical concession outlets delivering fan favourites such as burgers, pizza, hotdogs, fries and pies. Then along came some branded high street offers to drive a better customer outcome, provide more variety and deliver better quality. More recently innovation has played a role in the retail offer and mix with checkout-free outlets from the likes of Zippin, kiosk ordering, mobile phone ordering for click and collect and in-seat delivery from the likes of Eat From Your Seat all upping the convenience stakes and reducing queuing and service wait times.
All the above has certainly been a great step forward and started to move the needle arguably where it counts most – spends per head (SPH) and overall F&B revenue.
Attraction and Satisfaction are also a key indicator of a good F&B GA program and no doubt some of these offers attract more customer groups over and above the loyal fan, the traditionalist, and the family group, they especially appeal to the experience seeker, and the FOMO bunch, so they provide a more rounded and appealing F&B offer and therefore greater customer satisfaction and spends.
Adding to this, and if you really want to make a statement in your GA F&B program, elevated retail offers are fast becoming a must do.
Why - well to start they attract the all-important occasional fans and socialisers that otherwise may not be drawn to live events, and they absolutely attract the FOMO bunch and experience seekers as they offer more reasons to attend and participate in F&B.
They drive satisfaction and appeal and give the stadium a headline or hero offer to push across socials and other relevant channels to expand reach and interest.
Most importantly however they drive revenue and give the stadium a pre and post game program and offer. They provide the reason to come early and stay late, an increasing goal for stadia F&B. On a SPH basis elevated retail offers such as a premium casual restaurant can increase SPH by 300%, top tier offers such as a chef inspired restaurant can grow SPH by up to 400%. Same customer, different experience and certainly different outcome.
A good breakdown in the table below shows how SPH have been influenced by the above evolutions in GA offers
?
Ground Control Global is Asia Pacific’s No.1 Specialist Stadium & Arena F&B advisory business, with projects spanning, Australia, New Zealand and across Asia and the Middle East.