Fall is upon us. For many, it's a time where sports season is in full swing. In every part of the country, you can expect stadiums filled with passionate fans rooting for their favorite teams.
Whether it be a classic rivalry game in College Football, an early NFL matchup between two Super Bowl contenders, or the seventh game of an MLB playoff series, if you look around the stadium or ballpark, chances are you’ll find fans enjoying the action with a cold beer in hand. To kick off the fall sports season, we wanted to dig deeper into why beer is a staple in the live sporting event experience and how Cooler Concepts can make gameday easier for concession stand operators.
Just How Popular is Beer in Stadiums?
When it comes to game day, sports fans prefer beer over any other alcoholic beverage. According to a recent survey, 76% of fans will head to the concession stand to grab a beer over a mixed drink or wine. Whether it’s a light beer for a warmer fall afternoon or an IPA for when the weather starts to get a bit chillier, fans tend to gravitate towards a refreshing beer to pair with their hot dog or nachos during the seventh-inning stretch.
Beer companies have taken note of their popularity at sporting events. Back in 2015, Anheuser-Busch InBev completed a $1.4 billion deal with the NFL to make Bud Light the league’s official beer sponsor through 2022. Additionally, they pay upwards of $40 million per year to the MLB for similar rights.
It’s not just the beer companies that are profiting off of the beer sales, the stadiums are also making a fortune. A 2013 report revealed that the NFL’s Indianapolis Colts’ Lucas Oil Stadium made roughly $500,000 in revenue per home game on beer sales alone. Using that number as a barometer, and with 256 total NFL games per year, that would total out to $128 million in revenue for the season.
Getting Your Stadium Beer Cooler Ready For Games
As you can imagine, the staff at a stadium concession stand pours a ridiculous amount of beer, using countless kegs over the course of a game. So when it comes to preparing for high volume usage, you want to make sure that your beer cooler is properly organized in a way that will help deal with the fast-paced atmosphere of sporting events.
Before you do anything, you’ll want to take note of what beers are your most popular amongst fans. We call these beers your “fast movers”. When a keg of this high-selling beer gets kicked, you’ll want your backup kegs to be easily accessible and quick to identify.
In a past project we completed at Soldier Field, home of the NFL’s Chicago Bears, we incorporated Double Deep Keg Shelf (DKS) models with a front Facing Beverage Panel (FFP) along the walls of the beer cooler. As you can see in the image below, the fast movers are on the ground floor level which increases efficiency and eliminates a lot of safety risk of having to constantly lift, move, and shift kegs in and out of the way.
Our Stadium Work
In our nearly three decades of providing businesses with custom beer cooler shelving solutions, we’ve partnered with many stadiums and concert venues over the years. We’ve worked with numerous professional sports teams across all the major sports leagues, helping them un-tap their beer cooler’s potential by maximizing their space, increasing their efficiency, and improving the overall safety of their operation. Since 2005, we've worked with well over 40 stadiums to improve their beer cooler storage. Below are just a few of the many stadium projects we’ve done over the years.
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Need Help Getting Ready For Gameday?
At Cooler Concepts, we know that every beer cooler presents its own set of challenges. To help get a better understanding of what obstacles you face on a regular basis, we want to hear from you! Click below to get started.
