106,000 customers, 8,300 cars, 260 employees, 22 lots, 3 stadiums, three cities, one day.
The Challenge
On May 17, 2017, three stadiums in the San Francisco Bay Area simultaneously held a series of major events. AT&T Park, Avaya Stadium, and Levi’s® Stadium squeezed a number of music, sports, and community events into only 11 hours — and as the parking management company at the helm of all three venues, Impark was tasked with:
- Operating 22 parking lots safely and seamlessly
- Maximizing profitability for our clients
- Providing the highest levels of customer service possible to all event attendees.
Planning
Recognizing that the concurrent management of all three venues — with a combined average attendance of 35,000 per event — made for some sticky logistics, Impark’s key personnel in the Bay Area went into planning mode over eight months in advance.
“Back in September 2016, during our initial meetings with the San Jose Earthquakes and Avaya Stadium representatives, the question we all asked ourselves was, ‘Could we do this if three stadiums held events simultaneously?’” Spencer Sechler, director of business development, recalls.
“After our Avaya Stadium meeting, we sat as a team back at our office and agreed that, while it would be a challenge, we had the capabilities and expertise to manage the scenario and still deliver an excellent product and service to all stakeholders,” said Impark consultant, Michael Rescigno.
The nuts and bolts of operational planning soon followed, and involved the input of our in-house event venue team of specialists and nine location managers in the San Francisco Bay Area. “We have years of experience throughout the large entertainment and sporting events industry,” Renan Molina, senior operations manager, said, “That’s why we were confident we had the capabilities to handle such a monumental task.”
The general outlook? “Should be fun,” Operations Manager Jeff Paulson recalls thinking.
Implementation
“As management, we decided we could combine our strengths and help each other out,” Jeff explains, “I’ve run baseball parking at AT&T now for 10 years, so it’s pretty much second nature. It made sense for me to apply that experience elsewhere, and so I pitched in at Avaya Stadium for my second of two games on that day.”
In fact, Jeff was one of 18 Impark personnel who worked multiple event venues that day. An additional 50 chipped in at the various event operations after working their regular, non-event shifts at our hotel, office, and medical center operations throughout the Bay Area.
The Result
“Our staff did a great job of reacting and adapting to the challenges of dual- and triple-header events,” Jeff says. Renan adds, “Even though it was a long day, all of us kept a calm and organized demeanor throughout. Our executive team is dedicated to the satisfaction and success of each operation we’re responsible for — and it really showed that day.”
That dedication is palpable across all of Impark’s stadium operations. We serve an average of 14.6M fans every year across our portfolio of stadiums and arenas, and are proud to maintain a 94 percent customer satisfaction rate.
Our clients are more than satisfied, too. “Impark has greatly increased the quality of parking at Avaya Stadium,” Luke De Vogelaere, manager of event operations for the San Jose Earthquakes, said. “In one season, we’ve lowered our average ingress wait time by 40% and our time to empty all parking lots has decreased by 33%. This was all done with the average number of cars increasing by 15%.”
About Impark
Impark is one of North America’s largest and most successful parking management companies. Since its inception in 1962, Impark has transformed from a single surface lot operator into an industry trailblazer with a portfolio of over 3,500 locations. As of 2018, we employ over 9,200 personnel in more than 240 cities and generate in excess of $1.5B in revenue.
Our strong entrepreneurial drive and dedication to superior service has led us to develop a selection of value-added services that includes revenue maximization, valet, shuttle, enforcement, automated solutions, and loss prevention.
We deliver tailor-made parking and transportation solutions in a variety of industries, including commercial office, education, healthcare, airports, hospitality, municipalities, residential, retail, and sports and entertainment.
Contact us today to see how we can drive success at your parking operation.
Spencer Sechler is Impark’s director of business development in the San Francisco Bay Area. Email him at ssechler@impark.com.
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