The sports world is going mobile, and teams are catching on. In an effort to make sure their stadiums are mobile-friendly and intuitive, the Charlotte Hornets are the most recent team to enlist a four-year-old company called VenueNext to reboot nearly every aspect of the in-stadium fan experience.
In 2014, the San Francisco 49ers were the first to implement VenueNext into their brand-new Levi’s Stadium. “They looked to improve the fan experience, they looked to put in a great network of 4G and WiFi, center things around the smartphone, and do what we could do make going to an event pleasant,” VenueNext CEO John Paul told SportTechie in a recent interview.
“The competition was the couch,” Paul quipped.
The launch at Levi’s Stadium consisted of an app that simply gave fans access to what the stadium had to offer, Paul said. Exactly a year after that, in 2015, VenueNext paired with the Orlando Magic to bring the Amway Center’s services to fans’ attention. The Magic launched a brand new mobile app with VenueNext’s platform that included parking help, wayfinding, mobile ticketing, merchandise and food ordering, and other capabilities.
Mobile ticketing may be the most significant aspect of the stadium experience that VenueNext offers. According to Paul, mobile ticketing uses a QR code-based system — akin to the more recent emergence of mobile boarding passes — that allows for easy entry into the stadium and that facilitates the transfer of tickets to friends or even secondary market buyers.
Just this month, the Miami Heat, who have not partnered with VenueNext, introduced mobile-only ticketing at the AmericanAirlines Arena in downtown Miami.
After the Magic implemented VenueNext, the Minnesota Timberwolves followed in June of this year by bringing VenueNext to the U.S. Bank Stadium in Minneapolis. Every team that has partnered with VenueNext has rolled out a brand new app that supports VenueNext’s platform, which itself leverages partnerships with service providers such as Uber, HP, and Ticketmaster, Paul told SportTechie in 2015.
Most recently, on Aug. 3, the Hornets joined with VenueNext to bring a reimagined stadium experience to the Spectrum Center. The partnership will bring about a reimagined Hornets mobile app that includes all of VenueNext’s functionality along with exclusive team content that has been on the app, according to Nicole Blackman, who oversees the Hornets app.
“We started this process almost a year ago and we had great success in re-branding and transitioning from the Bobcats into the Hornets,” Kate Hussman, who has overseen the process of bringing VenueNext to the Hornets, said in a phone interview. “But we were so content-centric; we offered no functionality within the building.”
The previous Hornets app did not have mobile ordering functionality, and only 11 percent of event attendees used mobile entry, Hussman said. Because of that lack of functionality, she added, the team could also not capture data on who was in the arena, a key component of VenueNext’s platform and a useful tool for team marketing efforts.
“The biggest problem sports teams have is they actually have no idea who’s in their building,” Paul explained. “They sold a ticket — when you buy a ticket, that system may know who you were when you purchased the ticket, but if it’s a paper ticket — even if it’s a mobile ticket and gets transferred — you may not know who actually presents the ticket to get in.”
The new app, Hussman and Blackman said, will be available Oct. 2, a couple of weeks before the Hornets open their NBA season — their first home game is Oct. 20. Among its functions, aside from mobile ticketing, will be mobile food ordering and an express food service, where fans can order food before they enter the stadium and then pick it up on the way to their seats, Hussman and Blackman said.
Hussman said the mobile food service, which includes in-seat delivery, is being scaled and will be offered first to those who had the service last season. The new app will also offer select merchandise through mobile ordering.
The pair in charge of the VenueNext implementation said that fan feedback regarding concessions was influential in the process of mobile food delivery and express pickup. Though the Hornets are not also installing stadium services such as WaitTime, the new app will be able to tell fans when their food is expected to be delivered, the duo said.
Though the Hornets are the third NBA team to implement VenueNext, Hussman and Blackman are not worried about losing any competitive advantage. In fact, they said it’s sometimes better to let another team take up a new technology first.
“Honestly in this case, the fact that Orlando pioneered the VenueNext relationship was beneficial to us — sometimes it’s better to be second or third than first, because it’s a brand new technology with Orlando, and we’ve learned a ton from them,” Hussman said.
“We’re really excited with what we feel like this is going to do for our fan experience, and the targeted marketing this is going to enable.”