VenuesNow (04/18/23) Muret, Don

Some Major League Baseball teams are extending alcohol sales deeper into their games because of shorter playing times tied to a series of new rules. The Arizona Diamondbacks, Milwaukee Brewers, Minnesota Twins and Texas Rangers were reported as extending beer sales into the eighth inning as a test case after seeing average game times decline by 31 minutes over the first three weeks of the season, mainly because of the pitch clock rule speeding up the pace of play. The New York Yankees have terminated alcohol sales in general seating areas two and a half hours after the scheduled game start or at the end of the eighth inning, whichever comes first, according to Stacey Escudero, a spokesperson for in-house concessionaire Legends; the cutoff used to be two hours after game start at Yankee Stadium or the end of the seventh inning, whichever came first. Food vendors said teams are impelling these changes, while the vendors are closely watching sales data to determine whether those changes could become lasting and whether more clients could accommodate the extension. “It's still a long event and people get up and down and step away from the game more than any other sport,” noted Food Service Matters CEO Mike Plutino. “Teams [and vendors] in all leagues have become more sophisticated in developing a variety of approaches to revenue optimization beyond just annual price increases, and in the post-cash world, are deploying multiple pricing strategies.”

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