An exploration of discriminatory ticket pricing practice in the English football Premier League

Abstract

This exploratory paper aims to examine the pricing activity of clubs in the English Premier League during the 1998/99 season. Each of the 20 clubs in the league were contacted in January 1999 with a postal survey targeted at ticket office managers. Data obtained from the survey were used to add to and verify data that were publicly available from a variety of published sources. The survey was also used as a point of contact for the second stage of the investigation involving telephone interviews. The results of the investigation were reported by identifying the nature and scope of price discrimination based on season ticket versus single ticket purchase and price reductions based on customer status and seat location. The extent of "price bundling' activity which involved the selling of two or more tickets to different games and "price banding' activity which involves charging different prices for different opponents were also examined. Initial analysis suggests that it is difficult to construct a model of price discrimination in the English football Premier League. However, a pattern is emerging of a group of clubs which appear to be using price discrimination as a patronage-oriented activity. A further group appears to be using price discrimination in a manner aimed at maximizing attendance and a final group appears to be using price discrimination aimed at maximizing income.