Sarah Marren’s wait on the Chicago Cubs season ticket list lasted so long, she can’t remember when she first signed up.
Her records go back only to 2016 in the form of emails with her number on the waitlist. After the Cubs won the World Series that year, Marren moved up only 16,500 spots over the next three-plus years.
But to her surprise, Marren’s opportunity to purchase season tickets finally arrived this offseason.
For many Cubs fans, acquiring season tickets is a dream come true, the ultimate proof of fandom.
“It feels good to be part of the family,” Marren, 47, said of her new season ticket holder status. “It is a relationship I’m hoping to maintain for some time going forward. I’m just pretty excited to see what it’s like.”
The Cubs, though, are in a transitionary period, and clearly fans are adjusting to a new era after the front office dramatically reshaped the big-league roster at last year’s trade deadline. With that organizational shift comes questions about the demand for tickets, which not too long ago were a tough acquisition.
The Tribune talked with a dozen Cubs fans — from first-time season ticket holders to those who gave up their seats at Wrigley Field this offseason — to gauge how last year affected their investment in the franchise and their view of the potential 2022 on-field product amid a lockout that already has cost regular-season games.
For many, it has not been easy to move past how the Cubs handled the trade deadline, specifically the decision to move on from World Series championship core players Anthony Rizzo, Javier Báez and Kris Bryant.
But Cale Vennum, Marquee 360 senior vice president who oversees Cubs ticketing, said the team’s approach coming off a challenging year emphasized listening to ticket holders’ feedback, analyzing data and attempting to be responsive.
“Certainly there was a lot of emotion with the way last season ended,” Vennum told the Tribune. “I think it absolutely runs the gamut. There are some folks that are a little bit skeptical or a little bit disappointed that we’re not still on that same winning streak that we’ve been on. And then you have folks on the other side that are really excited about going on the journey again.
“We wanted to be really transparent with our fans that our intention was to be competitive quickly and that this wasn’t going to be a full rebuild as they may have seen before.”
First-time season ticket holders
Marren made up nearly 40,000 spots in about a year to jump to the top of the waitlist and get the opportunity to buy season tickets.
Despite waiting years for the chance, the decision wasn’t a gimme. It’s a big commitment and potentially costly. But the half-season ticket plan is the first time the Cubs have offered a smaller non-full season option in at least 10 to 15 years. Those had been presented previously in the 60-game range and nights-and-weekends packages.
Eligible buyers could choose from two half-season options — the red or blue package — and both new 41-game plans included tickets to opening day. Marren decided to split a half-season ticket plan with her sister, Paula Masiulewicz. Marren and her husband, James, and 9-year-old son, Thomas, live in the South Loop and typically attend 12 to 14 games each season.
So taking the plunge on two tickets for 20 games felt reasonable.
“When I did the math a little bit, I thought we’re just going to go for it,” Marren said. “We’re going to see how it works. We’re going to enjoy a little bit of the extra perks that come with being part of the family, and we’ll go from there. So I’m pretty excited to have some fun games this season and get to know my fellow season ticket holders sitting around me.”
Among the new season ticket holders, 28% purchased the 41-game package, according to the Cubs. Less than 5% of returning season ticket holders chose to switch to that option.
The key differences in perks between the two packages: Unlike season ticket holders, half-season plans are not guaranteed for the postseason. Full season ticket holders also have access to a ticket exchange program and can swap select games for better flexibility or receive a credit for next year.
Vennum said the introduction of the half-season plan was sparked by feedback from Cubs fans.
“This was a big change for us,” Vennum said. “We wanted to make sure that it was something that really made sense and that there was an appropriate difference in the value between making that commitment as being a full season ticket holder and making the smaller commitment as a 41-game plan-holder.”
While Marren was disappointed by the Cubs’ trade-deadline moves, she found it easy to root for what she called the “Baby Cubs” and attended a few games during the final two months. Still, the trades sting.
“I am not going to lie, it was just devastating,” Marren said. “It still breaks my heart to think of not so much the fact that our core was traded but I felt like they weren’t treated with honesty and integrity, definitely not to the level that they deserve to given everything they had meant to the fan base and to the organization.
“I understand players get traded, and I understand that it’s a business, but I just felt like it was done in a way that wasn’t truly honest with them.”
Colleen Henley, 32, also purchased a half-season plan. She put her name on the waitlist about eight years ago and never thought the day would arrive. She grew up a Cubs fan thanks to her mom, Kathleen, and grandmother, Mary, watching games on WGN, and decided to “do it for the girls.”
That her time has come while living in Milwaukee was not going to stop Henley, a full-time nurse studying to become a nurse practitioner. She purchased one season ticket, picking the same blue plan as a friend with their seats one section apart in the 300 level.
“There is some novelty or something about a team that maybe doesn’t have as much expectations with these big stars that we did,” Henley said. “The trades didn’t really play a factor. I saw I had an opportunity and didn’t want to pass it up because I’d been waiting so long.
“I don’t know if I would be able to justify the full season but I felt like I’m doing my grandma proud and my mom proud. It doesn’t matter what the season’s going to bring. I’m just happy to be there.”
As Jamie Baker weighed the decision after his opportunity arose in the offseason, he kept going back to always wanting season tickets as a child.
“But to say that it was a clear-cut thing definitely was not the case,” he noted.
Baker, 44, couldn’t ignore the lockout. And while reselling his tickets isn’t a huge priority, the possibility of dwindling interest on the secondary market because of it and the uncertainty of the Cubs’ on-field performance couldn’t be ignored.
“If I’m investing in the team, will ownership invest in the team, and what will that investment actually mean?” Baker said. “Like marquee players on the field as opposed to a new bar that’s constructed in the bleachers. Those were things that really weighed on me.”
Despite his concerns, Baker ultimately couldn’t forget his lifelong goal to own season tickets and was financially in position to handle the cost too. He didn’t want to go back on the waitlist for possibly another eight to 10 years before getting another chance.
Baker found a group of people to go in on two tickets, which helped offload the investment.
“I never really paid attention to where I was in the (waitlist) line, but I knew at the end of the year, just by hearing how many people were dumping their tickets then, they were going to jump pretty far into that list,” Baker said. “But even then I didn’t really think that I was going to get called quite yet.”
The size of the Cubs’ season-ticket base heading into the 2022 season is unclear — the Cubs declined to disclose the figure, stating they are still in the sales process.
Vennum indicated he’s expecting essentially two years’ worth of new season ticket holders. The Cubs did not sell any season tickets going into 2021 because they did not know what their capacity would be from COVID-19 restrictions.
A three-hour drive to Wrigley wasn’t going to stop Indianapolis resident Greg Beckley, 54, from buying season tickets. He called it a top item on his bucket list. So when his number came up late last year, his wife encouraged him to go for it.
The pandemic also put things in perspective. Beckley’s parents caught COVID-19 in August 2020. His father recovered. His mother died from the illness.
“I really started thinking about it looking at everything that’s happened over the last few years, and it has been a stark reminder that life is short,” Beckley said. “Nothing is guaranteed. My parents lived life to the fullest, so I never want to look back and have regrets and say, ‘Why didn’t I take advantage of the opportunity?’ “
The tickets also represent a tangible reward for Beckley. In October, he quit smoking after 37 years. The health coach who helped him through it pointed out how much money he would be saving annually by no longer smoking. His savings helped him pay for one of his two season tickets in the bleachers.
With a work-from-home job and his wife a traveling nurse, Beckley expects to attend most home Cubs games during the three-month summer stretch.
“I’m thrilled,” Beckley said. “I mean, to me, it’s the ultimate fandom. It’s as close as you can come to owning a piece of the Cubs without actually owning them.”
Renewed season tickets
Choosing to renew their season tickets for a ninth year was not an easy choice for Carolyn Stein.
Even though she knew the Cubs planned to dismantle the team at the trade deadline, the moves were still disheartening. Regularly attending games can make players feel as if they are part of the family. Stein and her husband are third-generation Cubs fans, and in the end that devotion outweighed everything.
“We just couldn’t let the tickets go,” Stein, 50, said. “We would have regretted it.”
For Kim Cavitt, a season ticket holder since 1999, the decision to renew is not a sign of support for the direction of the organization. Cavitt’s husband has a running joke that every season will be their last. They determined they easily could get cheaper tickets to whichever Cubs games they wanted on StubHub.
But the Cavitts moved up one row in the offseason and are now just one more away from her husband’s dream seats: Row 7, Sec. 220. They calculated it is as close a season ticket holder can get in the section without the prices increasing another tier.
“It’s hard for him,” Kim Cavitt, 55, said. “He’d be giving up this great space going on StubHub. That’s his whole thing. He would be just remiss if somebody was sitting in his seat.”
Cavitt’s frustration about the Cubs largely centers on the Ricketts family and what she called a “money-grubbing” vision that puts them “on the edge of ruining what makes Wrigley special.” She recalled when the family first took over the Cubs in October 2009, they had a big season-ticket appreciation event during which Chairman Tom Ricketts was approachable and the team provided free food and access to the field and dugouts.
Cavitt feels that inclusive, welcoming vibe has waned significantly.
“They’ve lost sight of the fans to some degree,” Cavitt said. “Did they make some great changes around the ballpark? Overall, I like them. Now, I don’t like the idea of (the sportsbook) they’re building on Addison and Sheffield. … I don’t understand why you need to ruin that corner. I always feel like they’re fleecing me for money on everything, and so you appreciate places like Murphy’s that’s the bastion of the resistance.”
Billy Tesch, 35, is entering his third year as a season ticket holder. He described a very tough decision to keep his tickets in part because of the financial responsibilities with a growing family and the uncertainties surrounding how good the Cubs will be in 2022 and the lockout’s impact.
“This year especially I will be really, really focusing on their farm system, way more than I do the team,” Tesch said. “I think they’ll have an OK product up in the majors. But the results that we see in the farm system will really tell what the future is to come.”
Tesch has been encouraged by the front office’s plan for the roster and was happy to see them sign starter Marcus Stroman.
Tesch envisions season tickets becoming more desirable in the next three years and hopes he can resell seats to some of the games he won’t be able to attend. Having a group share his four season tickets also helps lessen the financial burden. Tesch is responsible for 50% of the cost.
“It was really close for me to give up the tickets,” Tesch said. “Had my season ticket partners not wanted to go back in, I probably would have not repurchased.”
This season presented a challenge to returning Cubs season ticket holders’ resolve to keep their seats, perhaps the first big test since the 2010-14 stretch that saw the franchise record 87 to 101 losses each year.
Vennum said “across the board” there is at least a slight decrease in season ticket prices at Wrigley for 2022. There is some variance in the size of the decrease depending on the section, but no one received an increase in their cost, he said.
Cubs season ticket holders will receive a refund or credit for the two home games, April 4 and 6 against the St. Louis Cardinals, already canceled by MLB as well as any future games eliminated because of the lockout.
The formula for setting prices involves a two-lens approach. That entails evaluating data, sales and resale trends and analyzing the upcoming schedule while balancing feedback via an end-of-season survey for season ticket holders.
“We certainly try to take a data-driven approach, but not at the expense of listening to our season ticket holders,” Vennum said. “It’s tough to know exactly what the team performance is going to be for next year, so when we’re thinking about ticket pricing, we’re thinking about how we make sure that our season ticket holders feel like they’re getting a great value for their purchase.”
Bypassing on season tickets off the waitlist
Devin Walker, 32, lives only a few blocks from Wrigley Field, an ideal location for any Cubs fan who wants to attend a lot of home games.
Walker, though, wasn’t tempted to buy season tickets when his time arrived.
In September 2019, Walker sat nearly 52,000 spots from the top of the waitlist. At that point, he had moved only 17,000 spots since March 2016.
However, it did not shock Walker when he was informed he was eligible to buy season tickets before the 2022 season. He anticipated a quick ascension up the list because of the Cubs’ decision to trade their best players and a fourth-place finish in the National League Central.
“All of a sudden I’m in the same boat as them,” Walker said. “I don’t want to pay thousands for a mediocre product, especially when you’ve shown me you have the competence to put a contender/championship team together. It’s not worth it.
“They built such a good team over the course of the last decade and then when it was time to pay them, they just didn’t.”
The lockout-imposed roster freeze thwarted the Cubs from any additional notable moves after signing Stroman. Walker said the Cubs making other quality moves might have factored into his decision but doesn’t believe they could have done enough to sway him.
Walker has not put his name back on the season ticket waitlist and likely won’t before the season starts. But he plans to attend some games this summer.
“They seemed to stop trying after 2016, they didn’t seem to have the ambition to put together the makings of a dynasty,” Walker said. “So (their offseason moves) was less of a thing for me because it just did not seem like they’ve been going about being a big club in a big city.
“I need them to get to a position where their priorities are more aligned with just baseball operations instead of these ancillary products around the team.”
Lou Tenore’s frustrations with the organization largely stem from how poorly he believes the Cubs treated their best players, from Yu Darvish and Kyle Schwarber to the trio traded in July. It prompted Tenore, 55, to decline to become a season ticket holder when offered.
Tenore wishes the Cubs would have invested in the roster more the last couple of years, pointing to how the San Francisco Giants built their roster around their aging star players the last two years after their run of success with three titles in five seasons from 2010-14.
“They weren’t 35-year-old guys who stunk,” Tenore said of the former Cubs. “I don’t care about their stats. I don’t care about that because you know how you make your stars not perform? You stop putting talent around them. … They just never invested in the team.
“It just bothers me how it all played out.”
While some Cubs fans are willing to take on season tickets living out of state, Aaron Pinkston’s move to Madison, Wis., a year ago made it difficult for him to justify the commitment.
It represented his main factor for passing on season tickets, though Pinkston acknowledged he likely would not have bought them even if he still lived in Chicago. He is not considering rejoining the waitlist unless he moves back to the area.
“I just don’t know if it’s a great investment anymore,” Pinkston, 37, said.
The lockout and uncertainty of the season soured Pinkston on top of what would be an approximately 290-mile trek to attend games. Pinkston understands there are nuances to the collective bargaining agreement negotiations between the league and union, but he generally will always take the side of the players.
When he received an email indicating his time on the waitlist was over, Pinkston responded that in light of the owners locking out the players, he is choosing not to spend money to support the Cubs owners. Pinkston knows the Cubs will sell tickets even if he doesn’t buy them but felt it was important to take a stand.
“Players could be in Arizona today, but they’re not because the owners don’t want them to be,” Pinkston said. “I mean, that speaks volumes to me.”
Giving up season tickets
Tony Mullennix senses a disconnect between Cubs fans and ownership.
When the Cubs won the 2016 World Series, Mullennix had been a season ticket holder for more than a decade. In the years that followed, Mullennix was disappointed to watch pieces of the team get traded. He felt he was watching a minor-league team during the final two months of last season and couldn’t envision who the organization would build around.
Mullennix’s declining interest started with Rizzo, Báez and Bryant getting traded, and his desire to closely follow the Cubs hasn’t bounced back. His wife became a big proponent of getting rid of their season tickets after that.
“Why am I going to waste my time?” Mullennix, 49, said. “COVID afforded people the opportunity to turn off the TV and do other things. Baseball has had a hard enough time keeping fans and keeping younger fans engaged.”
Mullennix’s job as a nurse already had limited him to about 20 games per season. Combined with food, beer and season ticket prices, on top of competitive concerns, he deemed his two season tickets unnecessary.
“It’s not like the club’s management is going to reach out to the fan base and say, ‘Hey, who should we be cutting?’ because I understand it’s a business,” Mullennix said. “But they made a very poor business decision.”
Patrick McCarron, 42, gave up his season tickets and the opportunity to buy more. He had split season tickets in a group since 2014 and went on the waitlist years ago just in case a friend didn’t want them under his name anymore. That’s what played out this year, except McCarron ended up not being interested either.
McCarron’s biggest concern was his season ticket group’s struggle to sell their 200-level tickets close to face value. He passed on his own season ticket opportunity when the Cubs contacted him because of that same concern: Too many tickets that will be available in-season and not enough demand to watch a potentially non-playoff contender.
“I’m not even talking about like, a couple dollars under, I’m talking about half price or lower,” McCarron said of the resale value. “The prices we were seeing for our section was around $10 a ticket for a $40-$50 ticket, and that’s just not a good investment for us.”
McCarron considers the perks Cubs season ticket holders receive to be minimal and not enough. Even so, he signed up for the waitlist again, partly in curiosity to see how long it will take to reach the top of the list.
Vennum pointed to the Cubs’ 1,978,934 home attendance total in 2021, the seventh highest in the majors, as an indicator of still-high demand at Wrigley.
“It’s also incumbent upon us to continue to restore value to being a season ticket holder beyond just the price of your tickets,” Vennum said. “We need to continue to do that honestly going into next year. We couldn’t do enough of it over the past two years. It was really just buying a ticket or in the case of 2020 not being able to come at all.”
A reliable season ticket base is vital for many organizations. While a team’s market can influence the potential growth and year-to-year consistency, season ticket holders provide a baseline revenue stream. Finding ways to retain them annually is always important, even for marquee destinations such as Wrigley.
For some Cubs fans, they likely will remain season ticket holders independent of the team’s performance. Others want to see clear improvement from the big-league team before committing long term.
The Ricketts family’s investments in Marquee Network and around the ballpark, including Hotel Zachary, has at least Beckley believing the Cubs will put a good team on the field soon because of what ownership has riding on the organization.
Clearly, though, Cubs fans are divided on the path forward for the organization and whether season tickets are still coveted.
