Mercedes-Benz Stadium’s first season of going cashless was a success, providing substantial cost savings and delivering a double-digit jump in per caps, according to stadium owner AMB Sports & Entertainment.
The three-year-old venue in Atlanta saved $350,000 through operating efficiencies, spread across the 49 events held over the past year at the stadium. Those events brought in 2.5 million fans overall.
AMBSE, which also owns the Atlanta Falcons and Atlanta United FC, declined to disclose the specific per cap that fans spent on average for food and beverage during that time, but said it increased overall by 16.2% across all events.
Since going cashless, per caps for Falcons games are up 11% and 13% for United games, said Steve Cannon, CEO of AMBSE.
The venue’s first-year results for going cashless also helped lock in the Falcons for the top spot in the NFL among fans for food and beverage for the third year in a row, Cannon said. The streak started when Mercedes-Benz Stadium opened by debuting a new low-cost concessions menu that featured $2 hotdogs and soft drinks and $5 beers, among other items. AMBSE’s approach to concessions has since been replicated at various levels by several other teams and sports venues.
As for the cashless system, AMBSE pointed to data that showed roughly 95 percent of fans noticed the same or an increase in speed through concession lines, and during peak times a 20-to-30 second reduction in wait times.
The system delivers droves of data on consumer behavior, allowing the company to better track what’s purchased and where, and then make adjustments as needed.
To prep fans for the change, AMBSE did extensive testing and messaging, and the results during that time weren’t all positive.
“It started all the way back in 2018, where we were essentially testing how people would adopt going cashless, so throughout the year of 2018, before we went cashless, we increased game-over-game, match-over-match, we continued to make certain points of sales from cash to cashless,” Cannon said. “We tested, we observed the data, we saw that transaction times went down, we saw fans push back, so we spent 2018 getting very comfortable before we went all in, in 2019.”
When AMBSE decided it would move ahead with its cashless plan starting with Atlanta United’s first match in 2019, the team reached out to all of its supporters and season-ticket holders with an extensive communication plan. “On our app, we communicated very clearly and everywhere we could, that we were going cashless,” Cannon added.
The results following the first full year of the rollout has Cannon recommending that any new venue should start a similar program from Day 1 of its operations.
“I really see absolutely no downside to this, and that’s what I would tell any other event venue,” Cannon said. “You eliminate cash handling, you’ve got cash handlers, security people, a cash room, you’ve got to count cash drawers out, all that reconciliation and accountability, for us that cost was somewhere between $350,000 and $400,000. That’s completely removed from the system, and theft, breakage is non-existent.”
Not every fan has warmed to the concept. To appease those who still want to use cash, or don’t have access to a bank account, AMBSE placed 10 “reverse ATMs” throughout Mercedes-Benz Stadium. Fans can insert cash and receive a universal debit card that can be used for food and beverage purchases inside the stadium or to make purchases anywhere else.
Roughly 1.2 percent, or 30,000, of the 2.5 million fans that went through Mercedes-Benz Stadium’s gates, used the reverse ATMs, Cannon said.
