How to Eliminate Drive-Thru Holiday Light Display Frustration and Friction with SimpleTix
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Riley Manning has worked as a travel and entertainment writer for more than 10 years. Today, he writes about unique events and the technology that helps make them happen.
During the Winter holiday season and especially during the month of December, some of the most beloved and popular attractions are the local drive-thru Christmas light displays. As magical and lovely as these lights can be, holiday light drive-thrus can have issues that can make your guests’ experience less than ideal.
Leverage your event ticketing platform to help you eliminate:
- Frustrations around sold-out events
- Traffic on the main roads
- Long lines at the entry
- Wait-times for concessions
Instead of your attendees waiting in seemingly unending lines this year, why not make their experience a bit easier and merrier and help them plan this year’s holiday lights visit with SimpleTix, the Eventbrite alternative that will help save you and your attendees time and money so that they can focus on enjoying this holiday tradition with their loved ones.
Holiday light attractions are just one of many types of events SimpleTix serves to make your attendees’ experiences smoother and more delightful!
Timed Entry and Pre-Sale Tickets
Some advantages to using SimpleTix when attending drive-thru holiday lights this year include timed entry and presale ticketing features. Presale ticketing and timed entry help attendees avoid those long lines, which allows you to be more effective with crowd control.
Timed entry ticketing lets you place attendees in specific time slots, so they don’t arrive all at once. This way, the main neighborhood roads in addition to surrounding residential side streets won’t be bottlenecked in bumper-to-bumper traffic at 7 PM–you can stagger the guests to come throughout the evening. Timed entry is also key when it comes to overall safety because it limits the number of people and cars in a neighborhood or at a venue at any given time.
With pre-sale only tickets, you can also limit the number of cars per day, again decreasing traffic along the holiday lights route, which can eliminate families waiting in line for what seems like forever only to spend a minute or two driving by each attraction’s festive light displays.
An Eventbrite alternative like SimpleTix will also help families pre-plan when they are expected to enter the light attraction rather than driving all the way there in an attempt to see the lights only to find out that the line is too extensive.
Reduce Long Lines
It’s pretty clear at this point that the biggest drawbacks of drive-thru holiday light attractions are definitely the high-traffic routes and the dense lines. Creating lasting experiences like seeing neighborhood lights not only brings the family together but makes the holiday season truly special.
It’s a shame to let the frustrations of the system get in the way of your attendees’ fun. That’s why it’s so important to spread the word about SimpleTix, which can help reduce the frustration of waiting in line by getting people into the gate faster so that they can spend more time taking in the experience, not wasting hours stuck in line!
With an Eventbrite alternative like SimpleTix, presale tickets allow entry lines to move along more quickly because no one is purchasing their tickets at the point of entry and clogging up the line.
Furthermore, there’s no time spent exchanging cash for admission, calculating totals, making change, or even paying per head. You can charge a flat rate per car rather than per person in each car, which makes the experience more affordable and easier for families to plan to see.
Paying per car means they no longer have to wonder which of their friends and family will attend–they can bring their whole family or several groups of friends in a few cars. Even without a flat rate, SimpleTix allows for bulk scanning; a single QR code can be used to scan an entire car, which allows lines to move along faster.
In addition to being an inconvenience for those traveling to see the lights, traffic can also be a major hassle for the residents of the nearby communities putting on the light displays. Many residents are unable to access or leave their homes due to the traffic jams and long lines of cars.
With an Eventbrite alternative like SimpleTix, you can be sure that carloads of families will be moving along smoothly and safely and that residents are not unable to leave or return home simply because they live in a neighborhood that features a holiday light display. Neighbors will be free to come and go as they please without worrying about long lines of visitors boxing them in at night.
Pre-sale Concessions
Another way in which SimpleTix, an Eventbrite alternative, allows your attendees to enjoy the drive-through holiday lights experience is through the presale of concessions. People love hot chocolate and other seasonal holiday treats!
No more schlepping to the event with a thermos of lukewarm cocoa and some stale sugar cookies. No more complaining kids turning what should be a magical holiday full of light, wonder, and lifelong memories into a visit from the Grinch!
If your venue offers concessions, you can offer holiday treats as pre-sales. With pre-sale tickets, you can also offer upsells of hot cocoa, cider, coffee, tea, s’mores, gingerbread cookies, and other assorted festive treats before the event gets started. You can also deliver these food items to the corresponding cars and have the goodies ready for each time slot with timed entry.
If your Christmas light experience also offers cocoa and treats, your light display is likely to be more popular and well-attended! Also, many families opt to visit drive-thru holiday lights close to dinnertime, often skipping the meal or going to a drive-thru fast food chain.
On top of selling cocoa and treats, with SimpleTix, you could sell hot meals so that event-goers can enjoy dinner from the comfort of their cars as they take in the twinkling lights.
SimpleTix also integrates with Square, which makes purchasing meals and treats a cinch when planning a visit to see holiday lights. In addition, pre-selling concessions are great for resource allocation, waste management, and cost effectiveness!
The Eventbrite Alternative that Helps Make Christmas Lights Memorable
This year, help your guests make this holiday lights experience their most memorable yet with SimpleTix, the Eventbrite alternative that will save you time and money so they can focus on what matters most this holiday season: making memories with their friends and loved ones!
SimpleTix has offered an affordable, premium event ticketing platform that outperforms Eventbrite and similar apps for over 12 years. Compared to the competition, SimpleTix offers better options at a better price point. To learn more, call us at +1 (855) 550-3670 or email us at support@simpletix.com.
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