Oakland A’s to offer new season ticket

The phrase is part of the lexicon of sports, signifying a fan’s ultimate expression of devotion to a team: season tickets. For every game, the fan would be there in the same seat, never missing a moment of the action.

To the Oakland Athletics, the concept is due for a twist. On Monday, the team announced that it would cancel its current season-ticket program for 2019. Chris Giles, the A’s chief operating officer, said that though many fans still wanted the traditional season-ticket experience, a fast-growing group wanted something much different.

“The whole notion that you would sell them a product that had them sit in a single seat for the entire game was unappealing, let alone sell them an entire strip of tickets for that seat,” Giles said. “They wanted something that was much more social, much more flexible. So we set out to ask: How can we develop a model that continues to serve that core group of fans but is also attractive to this new, smaller, growing group of fans?”

On Friday, the A’s began selling packages called “A’s Access,” which start at $240 and give fans generaladmission access to all 81 games at the Coliseum, plus a reserved-seat plan and discounts on parking, merchandise and concessions. Fans can pay more to be eligible for seat upgrades, but they will always be allowed into the ballpark.

“We have to be thoughtful about what their experience will be if they show up to a game in which they don’t have a reserved seat,” Giles said. “So we really have three options for those folks.”

Those options, he explained, are general admission seating; social areas and standing-room party decks; and upgraded seats. Essentially, the program puts the fan in the ballpark, but the fan’s level of investment determines where he or she can sit, and how often.