From outdated to all-in-one: how BMI Leisure propelled TeamSport’s business

TeamSport is one of the biggest karting venues in the UK. Because of their exponential growth, they needed to find a solution for their software to keep up. BMI Leisure helped them achieve their goals by providing an all-in-one solution to optimize opera­tional efficiency, guest experience and revenue.

Dominating the karting industry

When opening their first track in 1992 in Guildford, Surrey, TeamSport had a clear goal of creating the best karting experience and providing new standards in the industry. Currently having 35 tracks in the UK, two in Germany, one in the Nether­lands, over 1,000 employees in total and an average of 1.3 million visitors per year, TeamSport can right­fully call itself the number 1 indoor karting in the UK.

All 38 (and counting) tracks are comple­mented by food & beverage, with some tracks offering additional leisure activ­ities as well. They are recog­nized as one of the Top 30 large companies to work for in the UK.

Embracing change with BMI Leisure

TeamSport’s outdated timing platform was no longer fit for their size and growth ambitions. A part of marketing consisted of exporting customer email addresses from the reser­vation software into a stand­alone marketing platform. But then if they wanted more infor­mation on a customer, they needed to tie a customer to a particular product or experience, and they could only tie them to member­ships by merging files. It was all very time-consuming and cumbersome.

The online booking was not effective at all, resulting in long queues, loss of time and lots of employees needed to register guests. Calcu­lating sales of the last month, making reports, changing products, updating email templates, or changing condi­tions across multiple sites, all had to be done manually and repeated 30 times for each venue. Another major issue was reporting and analytics. For example, it took half a month to calculate last month’s sales. A large and growing center such as TeamSport required an improvement in its opera­tional efficiency.

With multiple venues across the UK, Germany, and the Nether­lands, finding a software centralized for multi-location businesses was a must. Additionally, TeamSport wanted to improve customer expec­ta­tions with digiti­zation and offering online booking.

Reaching business milestones

BMI Leisure’s software platform provided a centralized solution, addressing every aspect of customer inter­action from reser­va­tions and sales inquiries to inventory and stock control.

The software was a catalyst for TeamSport’s business growth, propelling them to new heights. The reporting and analytics capabil­ities allowed the business to generate monthly sales reports within seconds, enabling the team to make informed decisions quickly. Automation engines also simplified multi-venue management, making product changes and email template updates a breeze.

Tangible benefits

Opera­tional efficiency

• Online booking
  TeamSport is now able to place products online effec­tively, efficiently, and with fewer people working on it. Additionally, the possi­bility to register customers in advance has removed long queues and waiting times. Since the new software, more than 90% of bookings are placed online. That number rose from 35%.
• Online office
  A URL based platform that allows all offices to book using the same system. This was developed in partnership with us so that the platform is uncom­pli­cated and provides only what is needed.
• Automation
  The removal of manual processes like auditing sales or calcu­lating F&B margins are now all automated. Some whole depart­ments no longer exist, TeamSport just redeployed the personnel.
• Advanced reporting
  The production of daily, weekly, and monthly reporting. Previ­ously they would not know results for weeks after the end of the month, now it’s the very next day. A good example of this is the multi-site voucher redemption & liability reporting. This provides oversight to the finance team about how much TeamSport is holding as deposit liabil­ities, but also shows them what percentages are non redeemed. Mark describes function­ality that just wasn’t possible before BMI Leisure: ​“The depth and speed of BMI Leisure’s analytics reporting allow us to do things we simply couldn’t before.” Reports that once took multiple groups a full day to generate have been automated under BMI Leisure, all but elimi­nating the tedious repetition required by software that’s not optimized for businesses with multiple locations. ​“Consid­ering the size of our business, the analytical data insight we get is chalk and cheese (very different) compared to BMI Leisure’s compe­tition”.
• Headcount reduction
  There was a direct effect on overhead, with an increased customer foot flow, and reduction of opera­tional costs and people needed for service. The costs of their call center are drasti­cally reducing thanks to online booking. Only half of the amount of people are needed anymore, they can place them in different depart­ments and don’t have to hire extra people.

Guest experience

• Speed
  Thanks to online booking and pre-regis­tration, more than 80% of TeamSport’s drivers prereg­ister. This results in no more queues, and our guests can immedi­ately start their activ­ities. This makes it much easier for both TeamSport staff and their guests.
• Marketing
  TeamSport’s previous platform had some marketing function­ality, but it was at once time-consuming and cumbersome. The transition to BMI Leisure has helped consid­erably. Now, they’ve got numerous triggers set up based on activity: it could be the number of visits, type of product purchased, etc.
  They can also do the inverse and track inactivity and send out auto-emails based on what customers don’t do. TeamSport used to have an army of people calling customers when it was time for them to renew, now they just automat­i­cally send two or three emails.
• Mobile app
  Prior to the BMI Leisure switch, TeamSport had no mobile presence whatsoever. Now, they can utilize the same automated triggers previ­ously mentioned from the mobile app: ​“we replicate trigger-based commu­ni­ca­tions to people in-app“, Mark says, homing in on a nuanced point regarding customer commu­ni­ca­tions in general. ​“Customers’ privacy, and their accep­tance of email has been questionable, so being able to commu­nicate through a perceived safer channel like mobile push notifi­ca­tions, is a big deal”.

Revenue

• Online conversion
  Online conversion jumped from 2 – 3% to 6 – 7% and up to 15% during holiday periods. Each 1% is worth literally millions of pounds a year.

Process the high post-pandemic demand

Despite the diffi­culties in assessing a business’ perfor­mance during the COVID pandemic, TeamSport has experi­enced a signif­icant increase in its driving numbers since its reopening. Mark expressed his satis­faction with the impressive results and attributed it to the imple­men­tation of BMI Leisure software. Prior to this, pre-regis­tration was not possible, but with the software, they can now pre-populate and pre-register all partic­i­pants in a group, which has improved customer experience and opera­tional efficiency. It’s clear that the software has allowed TeamSport to handle high consumer demand effec­tively.

To conclude

In summary, TeamSport’s switch to BMI Leisure’s all-in-one solution enabled them to provide their customers with a seamless and efficient booking process, sophis­ti­cated automation engines, advanced analytics and reporting capabil­ities, and a reduced overhead cost. Key improve­ments were made regarding guest experience, opera­tional efficiency and revenue. BMI Leisure’s platform allowed TeamSport to make strategic decisions quickly and cater to its customers’ evolving needs across multiple venues, ultimately contributing to their remarkable success.