We’re sharing the information below for your consideration as you decide what events to attend this season. We understand that a higher bid fee may be cost prohibitive, and we hope that this context helps the community to better understand some of the challenges we are facing as organizers. We encourage you to share the information on this page with your team as you plan for your season. Thank you for your consideration!
What is the rationale behind a bid fee increase?
As long-time players, team leaders, and community members, we understand that cost plays an important factor in deciding what tournaments your team can attend each season. We’ve been deeply invested in ensuring accessibility and in creating playing opportunities over the past 15 years, particularly for the Women’s Division. We hope that we’ve brought value to this community through our tournaments as well as free skills clinics and resources.
During this time, we’ve cheered on the success of many long-running ultimate tournaments powered by local disc orgs and volunteers, and we’ve unfortunately seen many other quality tournaments fall by the wayside as great organizers and volunteers burnout.
In recent years, it’s become increasingly difficult to sustain ultimate events. The cost of everything has risen steadily over the years, but it has been difficult to translate some of these costs into increased bid fees (due to a number of factors such historic bid fee prices, price sensitivity from players, higher costs related to increased travel, and more). Access to field sites has become very competitive (limiting availability and driving up the price), and we’ve relied more and more on paid staff* to help run our events. Some organizers are addressing these challenges by experimenting with different bid fee structures (e.g. base team fee + additional per player fee). Others are stepping away from tournament organizing as the cost-benefit analysis trends heavily in a negative direction.
The TCT requirements for Pro and Elite teams have greatly impacted playing opportunities for Select and Classic, especially in the Women’s Division due to the already small total number of teams in the division. We’ve navigated Heavyweights through this significant change to the USAU Club Division, but we recognize that the current model we are operating under is not sustainable. Every spring for at least the past five years, we’ve asked ourselves, “Does it make sense to run Heavyweights this year?” and we’ve buried ourselves in budget scenarios. The answer is not a clear “yes” to us. Without substantial changes, we foresee ceasing operations of Heavyweights in the near future.
How does this impact my team?
Here is the impact of $100 bid fee increase for Heavyweights 2021:
| Heavyweights Bid Fee |
Cost Per Player With 15 Players |
Cost Per Player With 20 Players |
Cost Per Player With 25 Players |
| $550 (2019) | $36.67 | $27.50 | $22.00 |
| $650 (2021) | $43.33 (+$6.66) | $32.50 (+$5.00) | $26.00 (+$4.00) |
This price increase still does not fully address our concerns over the sustainability of Heavyweights, but we also recognize where we are with respect to the rest of the ultimate landscape. Much like the “regular” economy, each organizer in the ultimate community has their own competitive advantages. These advantages might include tax-exempt status, access to fields at discounted rates, close relationships with an active local volunteer community, or sponsorship from a Convention & Visitors Bureau. These advantages are often not obvious to attendees, can be influenced by tournament location, and may have a large impact on the bid fee.
Compare the costs above to a few other local sports events:
| Event | Cost Per Person | Notes |
| Naperville Turkey Trot | $40 | Relies on volunteer staff and sponsorships |
| U14 Puma Generations Soccer Tournament | $48.33 (assuming 15 players, max roster limit = 18) | Same field site as Heavyweights 3-5 games per weekend 200 teams total = drastically different economies of scale Relies on sponsorships (i.e. Puma) |
| Chicago Marathon | $205 | Relies on volunteer staff and sponsorships |
We recognize that these are not exact apples to apples comparisons, but we hope that these costs help you to contextualize the cost of Heavyweights.
Thank you sincerely for your consideration. We wish your team the best of luck this season, and we hope to see you on the fields sometime soon!
* Paid Staff
Over the past 5+ years, we’ve shifted from relying on volunteers to paying staff for two main reasons:
- We’ve found there to be a big quality difference in work (and by extension, event quality) when staff is paid. It makes sense! It’s asking a lot for people to give up an entire weekend to fill water, collect scores, and clean up after ultimate players.
- With the ultimate calendar getting increasingly busy and off-weekends at a premium, it’s been harder and harder to find people to work events, even when paying them instead of asking for volunteers.
Women’s Division Discount
Each year we’ve hosted Heavyweights, we’ve had at least 10 women’s teams at the tournament (often more). The TCT requirements for Pro and Elite teams have greatly impacted playing opportunities for Select and Classic (especially in the Women’s Division due to the already small total number of teams in the division). We’ve been very proactive in scheduling around other regional events, and, over the years, we’ve invested our time and effort into recruiting women’s teams from outside the region to foster the Women’s Division in particular. We know that this year is especially hard for women’s teams that had lower numbers pre-pandemic. We’ve gotten good interest in the event thus far, but we’ve also heard from a number of teams who aren’t sure what their team or season will look like this year.
We are offering discounts of up to $100 to Women’s Division teams by request in an effort to help with the challenges outlined here. Women’s teams can opt to receive the discount when submitting the Heavyweights bid form.
In addition, we’re asking women’s teams who register for the tournament to help us understand their interest in a modified Women’s Division.