Drinking at the Game

Team Marketing Report released it's annual Fan Cost Index, which ranks all 30 Major League Baseball teams on the costs of going to the ballpark. You will be surprised to find us focused on column four - the cost of beer. We break it down based on obvious rivalries.

Boston Red Sox - $7.25
New York Yankees - $6.00

Chicago Cubs - $6.00
Chicago White Sox - $6.50

Washington Nationals - $6.00
Pittsburgh Pirates - $4.75

The last pairing is less about rivalry and more about how much these fans must pay to forget they're watching baseball in either stadium. (In the spirit of full disclosure, we support the Nats despite the mess they put on the field.) The most expensive place to get a beer ($8.75) is AT&T Park, home to the San Fransisco Giants. Cheapest beer honor goes to the Arizona Diamondbacks at just $4.00.

Cheers!

Second Class Citizens Sit in Fenway's Cheap Seats

That's how it must feel anyway. Having spent much of our entire sporting lives in the cheap seats, we find this story particularly disturbing.

Today's Boston Globe explains that fans in the grandstand can only get up, disturb everybody around them, and wait in a very long concession line to purchase their beer. However, the beer vendors are selling their goods in just about every other part of Fenway. According to the article, "[b]eer vendors at Fenway Park can ply their trade in the field boxes, the dugout seats, and up in the pavilions, areas where customers pay more for their tickets. Fans elsewhere have to fetch their own."

The article goes on to note that this is not the case at other Major League Baseball stadiums or at Gillette Stadium. Part of the problem is that the Boston Liqour Licensing Board is not interested in expanding seat side vending at the park. The other problem is the Red Sox - who fear that increased vending in the cheap seats would add to congestion in the aisles. The article quotes team spokeswoman Susan Goodenow as saying, "fans don't mind getting up" to waste 2o minutes standing in line for a beer. Of course they don't, their Red Sox fans.

The liquor authority sums it up thusly: "It's elitist."

And yes, that is a picture of one of New York's finest selling beer in the cheap seats of Yankee Stadium.