The Kansas City Royals and Aramark are tweaking some of Kauffman Stadium’s premium dining and general concessions spaces, two years after completion of the ballpark’s $250 million renovation.

One change is the development of a new outdoor bar in the 16,582-square-foot Diamond Club behind home plate. A portion of the club’s glass wall along the first-base line will be removed to build a 1,400-square-foot destination, extending from the club’s back corner and spilling out to the main concourse. The intent is to bring new life to “dead space” created after the Diamond Club was built during the park’s three-year facelift, said Kevin Uhlich, the Royals’ senior vice president of business operations.

The Royals are in talks with two team sponsors, local microbrewery Boulevard Brewing Co. and spirits maker Diageo, about the possibility of branding the bar. No deal has been signed.

Elsewhere in the park, Aramark, the Royals’ food provider, will add Asian stir fry to one stand after the concessionaire’s fan surveys showed a preference for more international flavors at the ballpark. The stand, the Fry Works location on the first-base side of the main concourse, sells french fries and chicken fingers, among other items. It will be subdivided to accommodate the Asian theme. Aramark is still determining the exact menu, Uhlich said.

On the View Level in the upper deck directly behind home plate, the Royals plan to add another bar, which Uhlich said has yet to be themed.

Aramark will expand offerings at the barbecue stand along the outfield plaza. Photo by: KANSAS CITY ROYALS

In the outfield plaza, where Aramark runs the Royals All-Star Barbecue stand, the vendor will expand the menu with such state fair-style foods as sausage on a stick, said Scott McGinn, Aramark’s district manager. The goal is to increase activity in the area, where traffic for the barbecue stand hasn’t been filling the nearby seating area, Uhlich said.

In a market where barbecue reigns supreme, though, the stand’s two 1,400-pound smokers will remain intact and the site will continue to sell ribs, pork sandwiches and smoked turkey legs.

In addition, Aramark will expand its MLB food truck program to the outfield plaza with a rotating menu. The concessionaire first introduced the trendy trucks last year with Wok in the Park at Coors Field in Denver and Just Loaf’N Po’Boys at Turner Field in Atlanta.

At Kauffman, the Bud Light Party Deck above right field will be rebranded as the Budweiser Patio. To date, more than a half-dozen MLB ballparks plan to have Bud-sponsored outfield decks activated for the 2012 season (SportsBusiness Journal, Jan. 30-Feb. 5 issue).

In Kansas City, the upgrades will cost about $800,000, a sum paid by the Royals, Uhlich said. The improvements will be completed by April 13, the Royals’ first home game. Come July, Kauffman Stadium will be in the national spotlight as the site of the MLB All-Star Game.

SHOVELS POISED: The lawsuits continue over the San Francisco 49ers’ stadium project in Santa Clara, but the legal battles have not stopped the team from getting subcontractors on board in preparation for construction.

The Santa Clara Stadium Authority, owner of the proposed $1 billion stadium, has approved five companies to build structural steel, metal decking, precast, elevators and escalators, and foundations, said Jack Hill, 49ers’ project executive.

As of last week, contract approvals were pending for electrical, HVAC, plumbing and fire protection.

Officials were working out the contract language before signing those deals, said Hill, former manager and developer of Cowboys Stadium.

Last week, the Santa Clara City Council filed suit against a local grassroots group opposed to publicly subsidizing the stadium through three bank loans. The group collected the requisite 5,000 signatures from Santa Clara voters in an attempt to force a referendum on the stadium issue.

City officials think the measure is illegal because the initial stadium plan was approved by voters in 2010 before the bank commitments.

As a judge considers the action, the 49ers are moving ahead with an official groundbreaking in a “May to June time frame,” Hill said.

The general contractor is a joint venture between Turner Construction and Devcon Construction.

Don Muret can be reached at dmuret@sportsbusinessjournal.com. Follow him on Twitter @breakground.

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Paciolan has signed a three-year deal with Givex that puts stored-value technology in the hands of a team’s season-ticket holders to manage their accounts.

Value on Flyers and Sixers tickets will be good at Xfinity Live! establishments like the Broad Street Bullies Pub. XFINITY LIVE! PHILADELPHIA

The partnership ties Paciolan, a ticketing software firm with about 500 accounts at major league and college sports facilities and other venues, to Givex, a leading maker of electronic gift cards. With those systems linked, season-ticket holders can now go online and add value to their bar-coded tickets to buy food and retail concessions on a game-by-game basis.

Paciolan clients such as the Philadelphia Flyers and 76ers, two teams using older stored-value technology the past four years, have been responsible for loading value at the request of season-ticket holders. Now, to add value to a game ticket, season-ticket holders access their accounts through the team’s website, where a list of games and stored value balances appear for each event. They can then select a ticket, enter the amount desired and type in a credit card number to complete the transaction.

As with the older system managed by the teams, the new platform gives season-ticket holders the flexibility to roll value over from game to game.

The Flyers and Sixers will be Paciolan’s first teams to activate Uptix, the brand name Givex uses for its stored-value program. Both teams use the technology as an incentive to renew season tickets. This season, 8,000 Flyers season-ticket holders and 3,500 Sixers season-ticket holders have stored-value tickets, said Mark DiMaurizio, vice president of technology solutions for Comcast-Spectacor, the company that owns the Flyers and Wells Fargo Center, the home arena for both teams. They can also use cash and credit cards to pay for concessions.

Halfway into the 2011-12 season, more than 50 percent of the teams’ season-ticket customers holding stored value tickets have used the technology, DeMaurizio said. Historically, that number has jumped to 95 percent by the end of the season, he said.

The Uptix program goes live March 16 for the Heat-Sixers game, followed by the March 18 Penguins-Flyers game.

Two weeks later, on March 31, the day of a Flyers-Sixers doubleheader, the new stored-value system will be expanded to Xfinity Live! Philadelphia, the new retail and entertainment district down the street from the arena. Season-ticket holders for both teams will be able to use their game tickets with stored value there after the NHL and NBA games.

“There is a downtown environment now [in south Philly],” said Dave Butler, Paciolan’s CEO. “When you wire all that in, as a fan, a few hours before the game you can go to the sports bar and buy a beer and a hot dog, and a hat and a jersey with your ticket,” Butler said.

The new Uptix system can also be used by single-game buyers for Flyers and Sixers games with some restrictions.

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