🔒Hoping to put pandemic in rear-view mirror, Hartford Yard Goats look to draw more fans with new promotions, food and celebrities

Hartford Yard Goats players will take the field opening day on April 8 for their fifth season at Dunkin’ Donuts Park, as the minor league baseball franchise looks to showcase a winning team and, more importantly, boost attendance with new promotions, food and entertainment offerings.

The Yard Goats, a Double-A affiliate of the Colorado Rockies, are somewhat of an anomaly in sports. While they had the worst record in the Northeast League in 2021 (39-79), they managed to lead all teams in attendance for a third consecutive year, despite having one of the smallest stadium seating capacities. (The Northeast League has been renamed the Eastern League for the 2022 season.)

Dunkin’ Donuts Park in 2021 was also named the best Double-A stadium by Ballpark Digest for a third time.

That’s the good news. The pandemic has presented significant challenges. It wiped out the team’s 2020 season and led to a shortened 2021 home schedule.

Overall, 287,752 fans attended 60 Yard Goats home games last year. Attendance was down 30.7% from pre-pandemic 2019, when the Yard Goats welcomed a record 414,949 fans.

But team officials say they are ready to look past the pandemic. The Yard Goats’ 6,000-seat stadium, which can hold up to about 6,850 fans total, this season will host a full 69-game home schedule without COVID restrictions.

Masks won’t be required, and as COVID-19 infection rates remain well below their most recent peak levels from earlier this year, the hope is fans will flock back to the stadium.

“This will be a new and even more exciting year,” said Yard Goats President Tim Restall. “We will be getting some new merchandise, some new exciting food and some amazing promotions.”

Coming attractions

Restall, who is in his fifth year with the Yard Goats, is no novice to the game. A New Hampshire native, the 49-year-old worked for the New Hampshire Fisher Cats as vice president of business operations for a decade before taking the general manager job for the New Britain Rock Cats. In 2016, the Rock Cats relocated to Hartford and became the Yard Goats.

Restall stayed with the team during the transition and has grown his responsibilities over time. He was promoted to team president in 2017.

Restall said the team’s goal this year is to at least match 2019 attendance numbers. Key to drawing minor-league baseball fans is creating a carnival-like entertainment atmosphere.

Fans are typically less concerned about wins or losses, than they are about having a good time with friends, family or co-workers.

New creative food items — a staple at Dunkin’ Donuts Park — and merchandise will be announced in the coming weeks, while the promotions calendar is packed with some old-time favorites like weekly fireworks and bingo nights, and new attractions.

Part of this year’s strategy includes welcoming celebrities to the stadium. This season actor Leslie David Baker, who played Stanley Hudson on the hit television show “The Office,” will take part in a fan VIP meet-and-greet during a game in May. In addition, Mike Johnson, of the “Bachelorette and Bachelor in Paradise” TV show, is scheduled to appear June 2, on Ladies Night. YouTube celebrity and American food critic Daym Drops will be in town May 31.

Other new promotions, Restall said, include several bobblehead and jersey giveaways, and a first-ever pajama party on June 18.

There are also numerous special night events throughout the season including College Night on April 21; Women in Sports Night May 3; and Country Night on Aug. 18, with music and line dancing.

Restall said promotions are a key part of the Yard Goats’ marketing strategy.

“We like to think outside-the-box quite often,” Restall said. “It’s about putting smiles on people’s faces and it’s about doing things like making sure you have the right music, the right video clips, and the right entertainment for your fans.”

He also predicts the team will gain some attendance when the long-awaited North Crossing mixed-use apartment development debuts later this spring across the street from Dunkin’ Donuts Park.

The 270 apartments and retail space are part of a larger development that will hopefully generate much-needed property tax revenue to help pay off the approximately $70 million the city borrowed to build the stadium.

So far, the city has been losing money on the ballpark as it makes more than $4 million in annual debt payments. The Yard Goats do pay rent and make other payments to the city to offset some of those costs, but development around the stadium is supposed to be the key revenue driver to pay off the debt.

“It’s an opportunity for people to walk out their front door, walk across the street, and catch a game,” Restall said of the North Crossing development. “I think it will definitely help with attendance.”

Revenue streams

Restall declined to discuss team financials. The Yard Goats are owned by Boston real estate developer and investor Josh Solomon, although he doesn’t pay the players. That’s the responsibility of the Colorado Rockies.

The Yard Goats organization has 30 full-time and 215 seasonal employees, Restall said. And its key revenue streams include merchandise, tickets, concessions, sponsorship and suite sales.

Game tickets generally run from $14 to $23, Restall said.

While group ticket sales and suite revenues declined in 2021 due to the pandemic, Restall said he expects both to rebound this year.

“We see a lot of school groups returning and a lot of companies are coming back to entertain their clients,” he said.

The team also expects to add about 15 new corporate sponsors this year (to reach about 225 total), including Canadian IT and consulting firm CGI, which recently opened a permanent downtown Hartford office in the Boat Building, at 1 American Row.

“We wanted to expand our office presence in downtown Hartford and we are just doubling down on the commitment to the community,” said Scott Burghoff, senior vice president of consulting services for CGI, which has 80,000 employees globally and about 200 in Hartford.

Burghoff said one of the company’s core missions is to raise awareness for careers in science, technology, engineering and math, so it’s sponsoring the Yard Goats “STEM All Star of the Game.”

“We are looking for brand awareness,” said Burghoff, who declined to disclose financial terms of the sponsorship. “We are doing it in a way that is meaningful and that is important to our company.”