Take Me and My Clients Out To the Ball Game

The flight into Chicago from San Diego was pretty uneventful. You know that for me uneventful is just the most perfect way to travel. Business travelers like myself do so much moving around that everything which happens tends to get magnified and multiplied. Late departures usually put everything else out of sync. Baggage claim delays add precious time in getting to the hotel; which usually means less sleep or having to call the client and reschedule a business meeting.

Just because I’m willing to settle for a cheap hotel in downtown Chicago doesn’t mean that I want shortcuts taken in other aspects of travel. I sacrifice on the higher priced accommodations so I’m able to take in more Major League Baseball. I take clients to games, and simply use the sport as a lovely mental, physical and emotional distraction from the weightiness of every day working life.

This week is sort of a bonanza for me with respect to heading out to the ballpark. As I’ve mentioned in the past, the major metropolitan areas that have 2 baseball teams are always a treat to visit. Why? Because you are almost guaranteed there will be a home game played while you’re in town.

Chicago is no exception to this. I’ve landed smack in the middle of a 10 game home stretch for the Cubs. While my sales schedule didn’t allow for me to do much with the games from Sunday through Tuesday, I was able to not only get out to that elusive day game, but I was able to take my very best Chicago client and his 2 young sons to today’s game.

If you think the act of taking your customers to a sporting event is over rated, and simply something that is done for the benefit of the sales person, you should have seen the look on those youngsters faces. More to the point, you should have seen how happy and satisfied my client was to be able to get away from the daily grind of his office responsibilities.

It was almost devilish the way he snatched up his sons from their school with the serious intent on playing hooky the rest of the afternoon. This caused me to remember those precious few moments from my very own childhood when I was able to attend a day game with my father and grandfather. Perhaps this is the real reason why I love the game so much. Perhaps it’s why I work so hard to incorporate visiting games with customers into my professional life as well.

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Tags: cheap hotel in downtown Chicago, Chicago Cubs, Major League Baseball