Great Initiative. Hope it works well.

That's great news Ben. I think it's pretty important to form good relationships with the clubs

A good win-win for all.

Getting freebies like that is always great, but I guess sometimes decisions have to be made about ticket specials that won't always be popular with everyone. No doubt you've already done so, but when they call, you can cite the cost of involvement in the sport in your reason for declining the offer and they can use that to understand more about their potential audience.

Not sure if it will suit you (if you have a partner or friend to get interested and take along) but the family tickets always struck me as excellent value - basically add two kids to a couple of adult tickets for $35 total (Gold) or $10 (Silver)!

If you know anyone else who goes to the game or is considering a ticket, you could coordinate efforts to sit together, buy a family ticket and get the children along to the games dirt cheap. Not quite the Junior District deal, but probably your next best bet at this point.

Actually, I don't know why any couples (especially in Silver) don't just get Family tickets by default to give themselves more room (worst case!) or have extra tickets to share with nephews, cousins, etc.

$5 for 14 games is pretty incredible.


BTW, I saw on the 36ers Twitter feed that the club are at around 2,200 season memberships - 100 off last year - and still five weeks until the season starts. That's better than I expected in a year after Brett retired, etc.

looks good. Ben, how do you guarantee the 25% you give back is used for talent development? Or is that simply spin?

HO, "further help" isn't "guarantee". Obviously the 36ers can try to provide a kickback, but can't guarantee anything - how clubs spend their money is at their discretion.

Isaac, i think there were more than 2300 season ticket holders last year. I think it was more like over 3000.

Maybe the sixers/nbl give a % to the club of juniors when they make their debut. Would be a good incentive for clubs to develop juniors.

Make a rule that player must have played at one club only and/or played for a minimum of 5 years at one club as a junior.

Similar to the AFL when a player gets drafted.

NVS, don't think so. I have been working directly with the actual list of them. Are you counting comps/freebies, corporates, etc? Season tickets and corporates together is under 3k.

What about those of us who have already paid for our season tickets? Will or can our club get any benefit?? Maybe this could have been announced earlier??

What about Country Folk?

For 3 years now, I've been asking and for 3 years I've been getting the answer that "after Christmas" there will be special packages etc... For nothing to come.

It costs us an absolute "Fortune" to make it to a game.

Pirie, what sort of package/deal would be useful to those living in the country?

(Please note that a couple of posts in this [and other] threads have been lost due to a database corruption problem. I'm reposting an anonymous one, and my reply to it below.)

again existing season ticket holders get kicked in the guts we pay top money for our tickets and we could have if we had known waited and purchased them through our club - got them cheaper and helped our club

I will add though that I agree that timing is always difficult on these sorts of things, and evidenced by Anonymous' legitimate post.

Season ticket holders make a big commitment and make it earlier than almost anyone else and that will often set a cap on what can/should be offered from that point on in terms of special deals and so on. But I guess the reality (from having seen it happen each year) is that the priority/order is usually:

1 - set season ticket pricing
2 - market season tickets to sell as many as possible
3 - work out a way to bring in other people (Multi-game packs, 2-for-1 vouchers, Entertainment Book, other promos, etc)

No, I am not being paid to write this, just at the office 12-14 hours/day this week, was in early and happened to spot the post in question when checking the site. My reply was about 12 hours after Pirie's post too.

And I beg to differ on your assertion - while I don't approve of every decision the club has made in the past and makes now (I've clearly indicated that there will be some frustrated by this promotion), many many many times over the years have I stepped in to answer questions, clarify things or outline why the club might be taking a particular course of action, all voluntarily. If you're upset about something in particular about my conduct and would like to discuss it, unlike most others, I readily post with my real name, and my email address and contact form are always available.

I'd like a reply from Ben Fitz about whether it is too late, for those us of who are loyal season ticket holders and have already purchased our tickets, to get some benefit back to our local club????

I thought Ben Fitz may have posted a reply instead of leaving it up to Isaac yet again!!!

I thought you might've hit the 36ers site and called/emailed him instead of assuming he checks the forum and individual threads many times a day. ;)

I think this is why the NBL and clubs can often steer clear of forums - make even some use of them and people have an expectation that any and every query will be answered there. Suddenly means they have to man the phones, email, check Twitter, check forums, watch Facebook, etc. Hope you see my point.

Just drop him an email and ask - ben at adelaide36ers.com.

Thanks Isaac, I will email him. I do realise this is not the place to expect NBL/clubs to reply- but I thought as he posted the original thread he would be checking for comments!

Anon, that's in your opinion. I think the league and clubs should try to make use of forums where possible, though often the best avenue for dealing with individual questions is off-site. I didn't build this forum to operate as a dedicated support channel.

However in my opinion his posting on this forum, once in a thread which had nothing to do with him or the club is unprofessional.

I don't agree that Parent should expect a response from Ben on this site. Ben originated this thread to inform everyone collectively. Individual responses to individual questions should be made to the individual involved. If Ben responded to every question on this forum where everyone has access to that information, it would have a snowball effect where more questions would be raised from those already raised and then turn into debates. Where would it stop?

OK OK I'm not bashing Ben, just made a comment!

EC - if Ben is going to use the platform to make an announcement, then its more than reasonable that he responds on the same platform about that announcement.

Someone had a dig about Isaac, who i think does a tremendous job moderating and managing this forum, responsing almost on the clubs behalf. I probably think Isaac has been a little too defensive on behalf as well.

"parents" question is a reasonable public interest question, as was mine - reasonable that the guy that wanted to use this communication platform to get the message out responds on this platform as well.

Ben posting on here is fantastic accessibility for fans. Well done. Isaac directing questions to Ben's email is smart, as it means that particular case can be dealt with specifically. The fact that the Sixers are on target to eclipse last year’s membership numbers show they are doing something right, and the work of Ben and Isaac plays a role in that.

HO, sure, but this is not the place for on-going support queries. If the AFL advertise a new product in The Advertiser, you direct your questions to them, not write letters to the editor, right? If the 36ers advertised the tickets at the top of this site, would you expect Q&A down in the comments? The initial post in this case is more of an announcement and the thread, IMO, is best for fans to discuss the offer. Direct questions are best put straight to the club - email, phone, physical address - all of those contact methods are readily available.

Yes, social media is a different approach, but feeling obliged to watch many relevant threads to handle on-going enquiries is one thing that would deter companies from digging into forums. This forum has no ideal way for someone to automatically watch for questions/mentions so it's grunt work that detracts from time spent actually sorting out the ticketing with Groves, merchandise, etc.

And Parent, you've done nothing wrong and have a perfectly valid question - I just think you will get a quicker and better result by going straight to the 36ers with your query.

Paul - Ben has not made himself accessible cause he ain't answering questions. Isaac's doing that!

He's advertised (in effect)... using a thread... which makes me think that perhaps the 36ers should be paying to advertise here rather than relying on the forum threads for promotion.

If a club promotes a tryout here isaac locks it and the clubs are NFP, whereas the sixers are FP. perhaps if it nwas viewed as an announcement then the post should be locked.

I am of the opinion that in his position, you should not just post and run. I acknowledge that ben has posted here before, and commented on threads. So it has suited in the past but not now.

Parent has a good question, that should be answered here in the open way it was asked, because it is an many's people's interest that the question gets asnwered here.

HO, club posts are usually locked at their request and to prevent people talking trash about their players/coaches as often happens.

Whether the 36ers pay to advertise or not is entirely at my discretion. They're a client of mine and of direct interest to a large portion of the audience, so it's not really an issue.

Yes, responding to every question would be great, but I don't think it's necessarily efficient in all cases. Last time someone had a question and I directed them to contact the club correctly, they reported getting a resolution to their satisfaction immediately - the 36ers got to deal with their customer directly over the phone and the customer got the answer they wanted. (In this case, I don't think Parent will get the answer they want, but dealing with the club individually gives them a far greater chance of success than doing it in public and creating a broad precedent, if you get my point.)

And yes, for those that want to get excited and start burning "ISAAC IS TEH BIASED!11!" into local ovals with petrol, I am more inclined to go the extra distance to defend a client when they are also a friend who has always done the right thing by me. Human nature. Big deal.