Super Bowl Tickets: To Trade - Firstborn and Favourite Car
by KT
The frenzy that is the Super Bowl is almost upon us and with it comes the yearly race for tickets that are selling online at prices between $2,000 and $14,000.
At the moment, Ebay has some ‘super’ offers for Super Bowl tickets from $60 to $1,100 plus shipping costs of $20 to $45 and if those prices sound like a bargain basement deal it’s because they are the tickets for the Super Bowl Media Day. For $1,100 plus shipping you can sit in the first row and watch both teams and their handlers being interviewed by the media masses.
A 1985 United Press International article opined that fans were ‘bonkers’ saying they would pay $600 to $1,000 to see a football game. The same article cited a number of ads from desperate fans willing to trade just about anything for tickets to the Super Bowl in San Francisco. The offers included:
- ‘24 K necklace, paid $2,400 will trade for tix’
- Trade a week at Lake Tahoe cottage and a week in Hawaiian condo for 4 tix
- Trade a ‘68 Pontiac Bonneville
- Trade a contractors’ licence course
- Trade new roof for 4 tix
- 1st class Round Trip to Paris or Nice, France for 2 tickets
- Cabbage Patch kids (Do remember this was 1985!)
And a section of trade ads offering thousands of dollars in dental services in exchange for Super Bowl tickets.
Pretty tame stuff, but then it was the 80’s and the advent of the internet and social media have driven the stakes higher and higher ever since.
If you can’t afford the game, the hotels, the airfare and the bodyguards to get to Super Bowl XLVI and you didn’t register for the ticket draw last spring then you can simply post something ‘gamy’, outrageous or truly tongue-in-cheek and hope to be caught up in the media feed building towards that fabled Sunday in February.
It worked for a Los Angeles woman whose looks attracted the men’s grooming manufacturer Axe. Sarah Spain posted a date in exchange for a ticket to see the Chicago Bears play in 2007. She saw the game and filmed some commercials for Axe.
Then there’s the woman who received 200 bids to advertise on her ever-expanding pregnant belly, Ubid. Com was the winner there and she had tickets on the 50 yard line.
Last month a couple posted an offer to name their unborn child in exchange for two tickets. They were ‘super’ broke and would consider any name but it has to be a real name; the ad said ‘Batman Fartpants’ would not be considered, only serious offers.
There are a few vaguely interesting offers such as the fellow who offered his left testicle in 2010 while it appears his tongue was buried firmly in his cheek.
‘Will trade left testicle for Super Bowl tix, Miami. High capacity, O negative, well travelled, well maintained, larger than average, only used for 22 years (was in storage before that). History of producing blond haired Caucasian males inclined towards joining the military (results may vary) All sales are final’.
Although the results of this particular pitch aren’t known, you can see a trend here; it’s a long shot but why not make the pitch, if nothing else you will have your fifteen minutes of fame.
There are countless run-of-the-mill offers - a lifetime supply of ice cream, a lifetime VIP Gold Pass to a strip club, an opportunity to smash a station wagon into junk metal and too many ‘take-my-wife, please’ postings to count.
The Super Bowl ticket shtick on the internet has generated marketing hype and gimmicks at every level of the economy.
If you check out Craigslist in Texas, home to last year’s Super Bowl, you will get the usual dozen or so ticket dealer ads and an enterprising appliance dealer who seems to have nailed online marketing. This particularly savvy online dealer posted appliances under: Super Bowl, Black Friday, Thanksgiving, Christmas, Father’s Day and Independence day in addition to ‘appliances, ranges, refrigerators, etc’. This online marketer was savvy enough to know there was no real percentage in posting his refrigerators and stovetops under Mother’s Day or Valentine’s Day.
The 46th Super Bowl will be played before a crowd of 63,000 on Sunday, February 5th at the Lucas Oil Stadium in Indianapolis, Indiana.
Imagine how many trade stories there are to be had in that sampling of cheering humanity!
***Kt is a Victoria-based writer who writes for bestseniorsinfo.com on a variety of subjects.
