Judging from some of the pricing schemes we have seen this past spring season, pricing a tournament appears to be one of the trickier things about managing the event. But it needn’t be. The rule is a hard and fast one that has not changed since we began bartering each other for goods and services. Here it is: Price your tournament to what the market will bear.

Something about the rule seems to have been lost in translation, especially pricing for the lower age groups. For example, many events are now offering a 8v8 and 11v11 at a certain age group. From our prespective, the price should be the same since the experience of competing in a tournament is the same and the ability to win a trophy is the same, regardless of the number of players per side. Yet, many events are putting in multi-tiered pricing based on the number per side. This is unnessesarily complicated and violates the primary rule of pricing.

I suspect that much of the pricing discussion runs along the lines of Well, since we have fewer players per team, the cost should be adjusted so the per player cost is consistent or even worse it only cost us one referee pay at 6v6, so we should charge less.

Which brings us to the second rule of pricing: Never price to your costs. Always price to the value you provide.

What many tournaments appear to be forgetting is that the pricing for the lower age groups is designed to create a LOSS LEADER category. Even if you fail to cover your costs for the lower age groups, you will most definately make up for it in merchandise, concessions and repeat business for many more years to come. Younger teams buy more stuff and teams tend to go back to the tournaments they had fun at when they were U8, 9 and 10.

Our Advice: Keep your pricing simple. Most tournament events don’t need more than 2 tiers of pricing; entry level teams that are just starting travel (U8/9-10) and older teams that are looking for more competition. You should be looking to get as much money out of the teams as the market will bear while they should be looking to get as much value out of your tournament as possible. As long as each feels they got a good deal, the price is right. And make sure your younger teams have fun!

Next pricing blog entry: What is your market?

I brought some work home last night, plugged in my laptop and dug in, when my mouse starting acting crazy. It was on its last legs and I knew it. So, I ran down the the local Office Depot and picked up a replacement mouse. I didn’t think too much about it, a mouse is a mouse, right?

After working for about an hour with this replacement mouse, my wrist hurt, my fingers were sore and I felt like I was draggin a brick around. The manufacturer used cheap tactile keys, a heavy cord and .. well, I got what I paid for. But, it moved the cursor, clicked where I wanted and did everything a mouse is supposed to do. It just didn’t go that extra two feet.

It got me thinking about all sorts of other times that an inattention to detail spoiled other events in my recent past. No awning outside the coffee-place drive up window on a rainy morning. A blast of hot air from the furnace vent over my table at lunch. The on-hold time with Verizon Wireless when I just had a quick question. The single window at the Post Office during the lunch rush. When they stated moving the traffic cones on I70 at 3:00pm instead of 3:00am. Nothing huge, just little things that could keep a pleasant experience from becoming an annoyance.

Our advice: NEVER ignore the details. Are your schedules easy to read? Do your traffic directions read to someone who is from out of town or do they make assumptions that everyone knows where something is? Do you have signs posted visibly? On your tshirt table, are the piles clearly labled by size? Do your teams know your web site address by heart? I’m sure you can think of more.

Teams want to come to your event and have fun. By making sure that the details are buttoned up, they are less likely to have a pleasant experience tainted by small annoyances that can become big issues. To quote Joseph Conrad, The Secret Sharer, Exactitude in small matters is the very soul of discipline. Make sure your event is disciplined and your ship is tight!

A friend of mine told me about a holiday tradition within their family. Her family is huge! Several aunts, uncles and cousins. Instead of getting eachother the obligatory necktie and perfume each year, they decide to support a different charity during the holiday season. All interested parties make a donation to the cause instead of purchasing a gift. This money is then given to a local charity of the groups choice the week after Christmas. The charity is always relevant to someone in their family. Giving it even more meaning!

Our Advice: Is someone in your soccer community in need? Do you know of a player from a guest team that is in need? Can you support a local charity? These are all ways your event can give back to the community during the Holiday season. This is more meaningful way to share Holiday spirit within your tournament committee. Set up a Holiday Foundation within your tournament committee and share the funds with a deserving group, individual or family. The recipient will be ever grateful, you will feel wonderful and they will be a friend of your event for life. It is a win-win for everyone.

Recently, I had a conversation with a tournament that is having growing pains. They want to leap into the premier quality tournaments and to do that, they need to accept more traveling teams and start rejecting some local teams that do not provide as much competition. As with most events, they can not expand to more fields because there are none. However, they have a local sponsor who is very much against them cutting local teams.

On the one hand, they need to grow to remain viable. On the other, they could lose their main sponsor if they do.

Our Advice: Growth is painful and doubly so if that growth means the loss of a sponsor. For every local sponsor, there are more regional sponsors. The trick is to convince the regional sponsor that you are a hub site that brings a soccer community together for an experience of their brand and then carries it back to their home towns; like bees pollinating flowers.

Geographic location does not matter as much for regional brands. Market saturation does. And if you can help spread their brand recognition be bringing a group together in one place, your tournament will have value for the brand as it helps them saturate more markets for a lot less cost.

A sponsor should never stunt your growth or resentment will eventually set in, your volunteers and staff will lose passion for the tournament and your event will wither into just another tournament.

I was standing in line at the Post Office waiting for my mail when I overheard a conversation a woman was having with the clerk at the counter. Apparently, she was sent a package through DHL, but it had not arrived. As the clerk tried to explain that the complaint was not against the USPS, but DHL, the woman simply did not know or did not care. To her, a package was sent; she did not get it and so it must be the realm of the U S Post Office to sort it all out.

The clerk finally gave up and told her to call DHL. And she didn’t have their number. They are in the phonebook was the reply. I suspect that customer will be telling her friends for several weeks — maybe months — that the Post Office lost her package and didn’t care. Even though that is not entirely the truth.

Our Advice: When dealing with vendors or third-party providers for your tournament, make sure they have the same vision of customer service that you do for your event. For example, if a photographer provides photos for your event, a parent orders some and does not receive them, the parent will most likely complain to you. While you may not have anything to do with the fulfillment of their photos, the parent will most likely not care. For all they know, they attended YOUR tournament and ordered photos from YOU.

When resolving the complaint, make sure you look up the phone number of the photographer for the parent and follow up with a resolution. If not handled properly, all the parent will ever remember and tell their friends is, I went to that tournament and got cheated out of a photo…