“Bloom where you are planted” is some great advice, and Bullpen Tournaments, in the heartland of the USA, can attest to that. Bullpen Tournaments is a travel baseball and softball event owner whose events are produced exclusively at Indiana’s Grand Park and Championship Park.
SDM sat down with Bullpen’s president, Blake Hibler, to find out what makes the organization such a well-oiled machine.
Sports Destination Management: Bullpen Tournaments has found a great home in Indiana. Can you tell us about that for a minute?
Blake Hibler: We have two great parks there: Grand Park Sports Campus in Westfield, and Championship Park in Kokomo. Grand Park is on a 400-acre campus, has 26 diamonds (with synthetic infields) and 31 multi-purpose facilities, as well as three indoor facilities. Championship Park is a state-of-the-art all-turf facility, with four high school/college baseball fields and four junior/softball fields; each field at Championship Park also has a brand new state of the art lighting system.
SDM: What is the season for baseball and softball for Bullpen?
Hibler: We run March through October for our travel events. We also host our Little League Baseball and Softball at Grand Park; about 1,000 kids are enrolled in those programs.
SDM: How many events does Bullpen put on per year?
Hibler: I’d say about 75 events.
SDM: What is attendance like?
Hibler: We have a series of tours in June and July called the American Baseball Championships; overall, during that series, there are about 800 teams coming into the area over four weeks.
SDM: How many can the facilities handle at one time?
Hibler: The most we can host is 400 teams; typically, throughout the summer, we will have events bringing in between 300 and 400 teams.
SDM: What is your room night capability?
Hibler: Tournaments can use over 60,000 room nights per year, between hotels in the immediate area and those outside it. We don’t have enough hotels in the immediate area, though; there are only three in Westfield. The north side of Indianapolis and the Carmel area get the bulk of our hotel room nights.
SDM: Why is Indiana such a great area, and the two parks specifically?
Hibler: There are a lot of advantages. In Hamilton County, Westfield is one of the fastest-growing areas in the USA. There is a lot of new development – tons of restaurants, shops, walking trails, a Topgolf, plus it’s only 30 minutes from Indianapolis for families that want to go there. For those who want to stay local, we have absolutely phenomenal restaurants. Big Hoffa’s BBQ is probably the most famous of those; everyone wants to eat there.
SDM: In terms of the event breakdown, do you see more baseball, more softball or an even mix?
Hibler: I’d say it’s about 80/20 in terms of baseball/softball right now.
SDM: Being in the Midwest, you’re equidistant to people from various coasts and different areas. What kind of breakdown do you see in your tournaments?
Hibler: We see about 32 states represented a year. I would say 80 percent of that comes within four hours, and 95 percent within eight hours.
SDM: Would you say it’s more of a drive market or a fly market?
Hibler: We have some teams that fly in but it is more of a drive market. We get teams from New York, Washington State and everyone in between.
SDM: Is it mostly families?
Hibler: It’s mostly families, although as kids get older, that changes.
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