SAVANNAH ― What happens when the do-no-wrong Savannah Bananas slip on a proverbial banana peel and promise more tickets than they have seats?
About 41,000 disappointed ticket buyers learned this week.
The Bananas copped to what club president Jared Orton called a “completely messed up” seat-lottery snafu. According to an email apology from Orton to ticket applicants, the team mistakenly notified 45,000 would-be buyers of their chance to purchase tickets for games at Savannah’s Grayson Stadium this season, 41,000 more than they intended.
The Bananas’ home ballpark seats 5,000, with a thousand of those seats reserved for groups and premium club members. The team will host 30 games this season, starting with a three-game series Feb. 21-23, and the barnstorming baseball team is so popular that Savannah fans vie for seats through a lottery system.
“Our mission is to always be ‘fans first’ with everything we do, and this mistake was the opposite of ‘fans first,’” Orton’s Jan. 31 email reads. “Our fans truly mean everything to us and to know that our actions today may have lost you as a fan hurts us more than you know.”
The next day, the team offered free tickets to future games to those fans denied the chance to buy tickets for the 30 games scheduled for the Bananas home ballpark. Each email recipient can claim up to five free tickets to any game played outside Savannah between May and September this year.
The Bananas have yet to open sales for those games, including those played in Major League Baseball stadiums, such as Houston’s newly named Daikin Park and San Diego’s Petco Park. Ticket buyers affected by the Savannah seat-lottery error will be allowed to choose seats first.
Credit: Stephen B. Morton for The Atlanta Journal Constitution
Credit: Stephen B. Morton for The Atlanta Journal Constitution
With the lowest-priced ticket selling for $35, the make-good would cost the Bananas more than $7 million in revenue should all 41,000 fans affected by the Savannah error claim all five tickets offered.
Of course, the fans also would need to travel farther than they had planned.
Contacted Thursday for further explanation and comment, a Bananas spokesperson said Orton’s emails serve as the club’s statement on the situation.
The Bananas opened their 10th season last weekend with two sellouts in Mesa, Arizona. They will play in 40 cities over the course of their 2025 schedule, including Atlanta. The two games set for Truist Park on March 29-30 are already sold out, and tickets to those games could not be offered as an option to those involved in the Savannah ticketing mistake.
Credit: Stephen B. Morton for The Atlanta Journal Constitution
Credit: Stephen B. Morton for The Atlanta Journal Constitution
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