Chris Wallace’s Post

I learned so many sales lessons from working in minor league baseball.    While fans are technically there to see baseball, very few come for the actual game.    They are there for the experience.   Everything that happens in the ballpark that day will dictate whether they are happy with their experience or not. Things like:   🟠 Was the person at the box office helpful (yes, paper tickets back then)? 🟠 Was the usher friendly? 🟠 Was the line for food manageable? 🟠 Were the hot dogs hot? 🟠 Was my beer cold? 🟠 Was the souvenir shop neat and organized? 🟠 Did someone help me if my kid drops their ice cream? 🟠 Did someone help me if the kid next to me drops their ice cream on me? 🟠 Was first-aid ready if I got hit with a foul ball?   I could keep going. That is a small sampling of all the variables that the staff has to manage every single game. If one of those things goes wrong, those fans might not come back again.   This biggest lessons it taught me?   ⚡ You can't ever take a customer for granted.   ⚡ You have to listen and empathize to every one of them, no matter how happy or disgruntled they are.   ⚡You have to go above and beyond so the customer feels appreciated.    ⚡You must constantly be reinforcing value to the customer, even if they spent $4 on a bleacher seat.   If you don't do those things, they are not likely to come back.   These lessons apply no matter more much money your customers are spending or how complex your product or service is.   I would not trade anything for the time I spent working for the Syracuse SkyChiefs AAA team. One of my most cherished accomplishments was earning the team's 1998 Employee of the Year award at 18 years old. This pic below is with team's legendary late owner, Tex Simone.    Tex and his son, John Simone (the team's GM) gave me way more responsibility than they should have at my age. That experience has served me across my entire career.   Happy opening day, everyone!    Shout out to Jennifer Young and Michael Iannetta who I know will relate to this experience!