Mike Matheson plans to target his pitch to small businesses based on metrics for the website so far, although consumer sales have also been growing.
"So far it's been predominently small business where it's been that organic growth (in sales)," says Mr. Matheson, who recently obtained an MBA at Queen's University. The institution provided $15,000 in seed funding.
"It's more a different audience that isn't really an easy audience for the traditional corporate sales tickets, that we might be able to service by bringing those relatively small businesses together with the 67's or other clients in a way they they haven't been able to do in the past."
The pilot-project website is intended to address a perennial supply-and-demand problem in entertainment by selling packages to people who may not be interested in attending shows or games at full price, he says.
The service is a contrast to traditional group-buying sites as the fans set the price rather than iPricedit.com, he says. This allows the 67's to run a profit on an average. His business is still in startup mode, but he hopes to achieve the same.
His first trial run is taking place with the Ottawa 67's, where he is selling Friday night and weekend game packages until Aug. 24.
After that, the service will go offline and be refined for a time, based on customer feedback, as he determines the success of the endeavour. Web traffic is about 20 per cent above his expectations, he says, with a high conversion rate to sales.
Larger potential customers, he adds, typically already have their own sales channels to get tickets, which is why he's avoiding local heavyweights like Alcatel-Lucent or Ericsson when making the pitch.
Mr. Matheson already is in talks to do entertainment packages with other clients in town, but he's keeping the names close to his chest until the agreements are finalized.
In the meantime, he says it is a boon to the 67's that he is able to bring this service to fans.
"They will be able to bring in fans they may not otherwise have brought in; that is certainly good for them," he says.
"For the fans it will typically mean fuller houses, full-building excitement, which I'm sure everyone has been to a game would agree with. It's more fun to be 10,000 people in an arena rather than 10."
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