Break into Sports Through Ticket Sales: Getting a Career in the Sports Industry

"I want to work in marketing, public relations, or community relations!"

Mark Washo, senior vice president of ticket sales for the Chicago Fire of Major League Soccer, often hears this from people looking to enter the sports industry. When candidates hear about ticket sales, he says, they turn down the job immediately without even knowing what it entails. Washo hopes to provide a clear picture of being a ticket sales representative for a professional sports team in his first book, Break Into Sports Through Ticket Sales.

It is hard to doubt Washo's qualifications to write this book. Prior to working for the Fire, he worked in sales capacities for the Buffalo Bisons minor league baseball team, the Washington Bullets (now known as the Wizards) of the NBA, and D.C. United and New York/New Jersey Metro Stars (now the Red Bull); both of Major League Soccer. While with the Metro Stars he served as the Vice President of Ticket Sales. Prior to working in professional sports, he worked in insurance sales, which he credits to preparing him for his sports career.

Within the book, he provides a lot of useful information that prospective employees will have difficulty finding anywhere else. One of the first chapters explains the problem of declining attendance across all professional sports. This is attributed to the fact that ticket prices are going up and families cannot afford to go out to sporting events as much anymore. He also says it is because teams tend to cater to the corporate dollar, marketing to business people who use games as a way to entertain business clients. Another reason is that fans lose interest if a team is losing, or that attendance will increase after a championship year, and then fall off next season and in the years to come.

Washo illustrates all this to explain that professional sports teams who did not need ticket sales staff now must add them to help sell tickets and bring fans back to the stadiums and arenas. The declining attendance climate is a great reason to start your sports career.

Throughout the book, he provides tips to help you land interviews and succeed in sales. He encourages readers to directly contact the Director of Ticket Sales of the team they want to work for. When you write your cover letter, you should directly say you are interested in a ticket sales position. These positions are where the most openings exist, and you shouldn't just inquire about "any opportunities available" because marketing, community relations, and public relations often hold the least openings and are tough to break into without prior sports industry experience.

For those lucky enough to get a ticket sales job, you will learn excellent tips on how to succeed, based on the author's insurance industry career as well as his time in sports. He teaches his readers about the basics of cold calling, gaining referrals, finding sales prospects, and how to present yourself at networking events and to your clients at games. You will also learn what makes sales professionals successful, which deals with everything from building relationships with clients to setting weekly and monthly goals for yourself.

Washo ends the book on a high note by describing what marketing, community relations, and public relations actually entail. He defines each job title, and then breaks it down into responsibilities these employees deal with. The point in doing this is to show you how all these jobs go hand in hand to work with the ticket sales department, but once again, people who won't consider ticket sales don't realize this.

Another high point is the interviews with other successful ticket sales employees. He talks to them about how they broke into sports, what they do on a daily basis, what sacrifices they had to make for a career in professional sports, and advice they have for others entering the industry. These case studies will help you learn the industry like it is without any sugar coating.

I got this book a few days before I attended a sports and entertainment career fair, and I have already read it twice. Washo comes out and provides information that is not even taught in sports management degree programs. He is also very specific about the terms he is using (such as cold calls and referrals) and shows exactly why a start in ticket sales equals a good route to a sports career. At the same time, though, he will tell you about the downside of the field and have you questioning your prior work experience and personality traits to see if you really want to enter the field.

If you come out still certain that this is for you, then more power to you. However, I can see why this would hold some people back from pursuing a so called "glamorous" field. I even questioned if I should really be pursuing a sports career, but on second read, I'm ready to get out there after graduation and go after sports jobs. I will certainly be keeping this book on hand as a guide, and I hope Washo updates it soon to make it relevant to today's sports industry climate.