Minnesota’s Golden Ticket is a genius marketing ploy

Wanna gamble on your favorite team in a legal way? You can do so with the Golden Ticket, a marketing ploy used by the Minnesota Golden Gophers.

In December, to help drive ticket sales for lower profile Big Ten home games, the Gophers — in collaboration with a company called AudienceView — came up with the Golden Ticket.

The premise?

Buy a Golden Ticket for $75. Attend as many games Big Ten home games as you want (retail value: $315), but if the Gophers lose when you’re scanned in, your run is over. The pass is deactivated.

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According to ESPN’s Darren Rovell, 41 fans took part in the experiment with half of them risking it against MSU last week. A game Minnesota pulled off late. A bigger decision looms with Michigan visiting next week. The Wolverines are national title contenders and have yet to drop a game this season.

It’ll be interesting to see if this strategy gets picked up by other arenas. Especially ones with teams who struggle to sell tickets. Yes, I’m talking about you NHL.