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How To Get Packer Tickets
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Packer Tickets are EASY to get. The trick is, how much are you willing to PAY? One excellent source is an outfit in Green Bay called PACKER FAN TOURS. More information is given about them down below in the TICKET BROKER section. Otherwise, other options are provided on this page. Do your homework, look around, educate yourself, and you can save yourself a few bucks by shopping around. However, there ARE opportunities to buy tickets at FACE VALUE from the Packer Ticket Office! (Please e-mail me if you find any of this information to be out-dated, changed, or incorrect). From the Packers Ticket Office The BEST way to get tickets is to buy them from the Packers Ticket Office for FACE VALUE! How can this be when Lambeau Field is sold out? Here's the story: The Packers reserve an allotment of tickets for the visiting team. Sometimes the visiting team will not use all of their tickets and will return them to the Ticket Office. Also, the Packers reserve a number of tickets for the team, VIP's, and various comps. If they do not distribute all of these tickets, then those will also be sold through the ticket office. The only problem with this is the tickets will be made available on short notice. If tickets will be available they will usually be put on sale on or around the Thursday before the coming game if the game is on Sunday or Monday. The only way to find out if tickets will be on sale is to call the Ticket Office and ask. Their phone number is (920) 569-7501. It is rare when this happens but there have been more opportunities lately which I think are related to the stadium renovation project. It's a dynamic situation as more seats are added. If you can just up-n-go to a Packer game on short notice, give the Ticket Office a call and see if you get lucky! I suggest calling Wednesday afternoon before a game weekend and again on Thursday if they have no details for tickets. If tickets are available, the word gets out and people start calling. If you get their "Tickets Are Sold Out" message while on hold, it's their standard message which never changes. Stay on the line. If you do get tickets, they will hold them at their Will Call window for you to pick up on game day. The Packers also reserve tickets for their own use. Sometimes these are returned for whatever reason and are available at the last minute, many times on game day. This is rare and only SINGLES may be available. I don't have much experience getting tickets this way but the only way to get them is to be at the Will Call window on game day and ask for tickets when they open. Chances are you won't get tickets this way but if you're in town and have nothing to lose, go for it.
There are a number of professional ticket brokers out there who wheel and deal Packer tickets. Many of them are shoddy operations, some of them being run out of the home the ticket broker(s) live in. I'm not saying they're dishonest, but some of them will give you a hard time if you don't play their game. Some of them have been arrested for selling tickets illegally. However, there ARE honest ticket brokers. The best ticket broker and the one I personally recommend is Packer Fan Tours. You can call them at 1-800-851-PACK or visit their web site at www.packerfantours.com. This outfit is officially endorsed by the Green Bay Packers. They will not hassle you, they will not cheat you, they will not give you a hard time. They merged with EventUSA so their name and logo may be changing in the future. Packer Fan Tours is located in Green Bay. Other ticket brokers that you can trust here in the Milwaukee area are: TicketKing: (414) 273-6007 for your Green Bay Packer Tickets (Click on the link to visit the TicketKing web site) Connections Ticket Service: (414) 964-1313 (Click on the link to visit the TicketConnections web site) Front Row Tickets: (414) 281-8100 If a ticket broker is NOT listed here, DON'T USE them. If you're going to use a ticket broker, use one listed here, preferably PACKER FAN TOURS. Some or all of the ticket brokers listed have Green Bay offices; I'll leave it up to you to get their Green Bay phone number if you're looking.
The Packers ticket officice usually sends out the actual tickets around the end of July, so that's when you can expect them to hit the street. People with excess tickets many times will place classified ads in the various newspapers around Wisconsin. The best newspapers to follow are the Milwaukee Journal and the Green Bay Press Gazette. Don't be expecting some fan out there is going to sell you tickets for face value as a favor. They're putting ads in the paper because they want top dollar. But they will usually ask an amount that's under what the ticket brokers are asking. You have to be vigilant and keep checking the ads throughout the season. If there's a specific game you want to go to start looking two to three weeks before the game. If you're just looking to go to any game, end-of-July and August are good times to watch for ads as people look to unload their extra tickets. Once in a while you'll get a true bargain but it's very rare. Just look in the TICKETS section of the classifieds. The Green Bay Press Gazette has a good search engine for their classifieds on-line so you can go to www.greenbaypressgazette.com and keyword on TICKET and/or PACKER.
I know of three personal web sites run by fans where people with tickets for sale can post messages. They are: www.packer.com (Don't confuse with packerS.com) E-mail a seller, make a deal, it just may work out for you.
There are two ways to get tickets on game day at Lambeau Field: 1) Walk around the parking lot with a NEED TICKETS sign (a method that works well if you "know" how to work the crowd and you're willing to wear out shoe leather) or 2) Strike a deal with the scalpers in the "Scalper Pit." There is an area blocked off to the east of Lambeau Field and north of the Hutson Center. You won't get many breaks from the professional scalpers (they've been doing this for years and they know the routine so don't think you're going to out-horse trade them). If you're lucky, you'll run into a regular guy with an extra ticket or two and is willing to sell them at a price lower than general asking price. If you strike out, then you should have a Plan B, which is walk up the street and watch the game in a nearby sports bar. You'll be in the shadow of Lambeau Field and surrounded by Packer fans, so you can't lose by enjoying the game in such an atmosphere even if you fail to get a ticket.
I know of one outfit here in Milwaukee that has bus trips to Green Bay for selected games throughout the season. You meet at a specific location and ride up to Green Bay in a luxury motorcoach. They usually stop for a meal along the way, they pay for gas and parking, and a game ticket is included int he price. It won't do you much good to hook up with these guys if you live outside the Milwaukee area, but I know there are other outfits in the major cities around Wisconsin. Ask around, watch the ads in the sports section of local newspapers, and you'll find them. They're out there. The group here in Milwaukee is Parkland Travel. Call them at (414) 764-0800 and they'll send you a brochure with available games and pricing once they have their trips arranged.
Season Ticket holders have the option of donating extra tickets to charities. The charities then in turn sell the tickets at FACE VALUE and generate revenue for their cause. There's only one catch to this: VERY FEW people donate tickets to these charities so it's next to impossible to get tickets like this, but the possibility is there. Call the charities to get on their list for tickets: Boys and Girls Club in Green Bay: 1-800-242-5827 Reis Foundation: (920) 793-4442 If you're someone who HAS season Tickets, you're more than welcome to donate your tickets to these charities so other fans can enjoy them. You get a tax break and you don't lose your seats if someone causes a problem.
Once the schedules are announced in the Spring and you see a Packer game that you'd like to attend outside of Green Bay, then you need to start planning right away. Call the box office for the team the Packers will be visiting and find out when single game tickets go on sale. Many teams are unlike the Packers; you can just buy tickets at the box office for face value! This isn't true for all teams, but tickets will be long sold out for sure if you wait until the season starts. If an away game is sold out for any reason, you can always call Packer Fan Tours (listed above) and they will secure the tickets you need for an away game. Don't need to say much about ebay. Be the high bidder and the tickets can be yours. The problem with ebay is there's usually someone who doesn't know their options and will always bid much higher than what tickets are selling for through other sources. If you see tickets that might be had for a good price, call a ticket broker and compare prices; usually the ticket brokers will be cheaper than the high bid for an auction. Put in a bid that's lower than what the ticket brokers are selling for. If you win the ebay tickets, you're that much ahead. If the bidding goes too high, get the tickets from the broker. YOU don't have to be the one who pays too much. ebay's web site is, of course, www.ebay.com.
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