“Kids make us better. That’s why we do everything within our means to make kids better.” This is the heart and soul behind Shriners Hospitals, whose mission is to “provide the highest quality care to children with neuromusculoskeletal conditions, burn injuries and other special healthcare needs within a compassionate, family-centered and collaborative care environment”. (www.shrinershospitalsforchildren.org)

The T.Cares Program stands firmly behind the Shriner’s mission and we’re honored to help create memorable experiences for their warriors, just like how we were able to surprise Caiden with a fun-filled afternoon with the Phillies.

After overcoming the rare disorder he was born with, Caiden was given the memory of a lifetime (as you can see through his smiling face in the photos). But truly, it was his strength and determination that encouraged us all.

It was through our T.Cares program that we were able to partner with Shriners Hospitals and the Phillies to host five year old Caiden, his brothers Michael and Brandon, and their parents Katie and Mike to a VIP meet and greet at the Philadelphia Phillies game on August 18 at Citizens Bank Park. They were able to meet many of the players including Catcher, Cameron Rupp who later shared via his Twitter: “Definitely made a memory of a lifetime yesterday!! Caiden you are the man!”.

Caiden and his family have an incredible and inspiring story, which is why we were honored when Caiden’s mom spoke to our Tickets.com family about their journey.

In Katie’s words…

Caiden was born with Amniotic Band Syndrome (ABS) and Ectrodactyly. ABS occurs when the fetus becomes entangled in string-like bands, it occurs randomly. In Caiden’s case it completely amputated his right leg at the knee. Ectrodactyly- Split hand/foot malformation is a rare form of a congenital disorder in which the development of the hand/foot is disturbed. Caidens right hand and left foot were affected.

This syndrome was discovered early on in the pregnancy, at my 11th week ultrasound. The doctor asked if we had family history of Dwarfism, I told him “no”, he then went on to say that it didn’t look like the baby had any legs.

Mike’s unit was set to deploy to Iraq in a couple weeks, I was prepared to be a pregnant single mom for the next year, but to now have a complicated high risk pregnancy on top of it was a little scary! Luckily, his unit allowed him to stay back (Rear Detachment).

I had so many appointments that I lost count, and with each appointment it seemed like we got more bad news, at one point they weren’t sure if he had any legs or hands. Finally at my 20 week scan when we found out we were having a boy they saw that he had 2 hands, one was “normal” the other had a couple digits, and that he did have a foot!  I’m grateful that we found out early, because it gave us time to educate ourselves and prepare for what we could do. We had 2 little kids at home as well, (Michael was 3 and Brandon just turned 1). We took every opportunity we got to explain to the boys about their brother.

As a mom your job is to protect your kids so I was going to do whatever I had to do to make sure all 3 of my boys were okay!

Caiden’s Challenges

The only thing that I would consider a challenge was the fear of the unknown! Google could only answer so many of our questions! Even with high tech ultrasounds we weren’t going to 100% know what we were dealing with until he was born. When a child is born with bone deformities there is always the chance that there could be other issues, so wondering if his heart would be ok, or if he was going to be deaf or blind or if there were any other internal problems that an ultrasound wouldn’t be able to tell us was scary. So instead of driving myself crazy over things that were completely out of my control, I took it one day at a time. I had to have faith that I could handle whatever was going to be thrown at me. It’s kind of funny to think about how much we worried because if we would have known then what we know now we would not have anything to worry about!!

Shriners saw Caiden for the first time when he was 6 weeks old and from that moment we were part of a family, a family that I didn’t necessarily plan to be a part of but one that I am thankful for everyday. I remember our first appointment and Doctor Kozin looked at Caidens foot and said, I want those toes, they will make beautiful fingers. I’m sure I probably looked at him like he was crazy! But at the same time I knew we were in the right place and that Caiden was in the best hands!

Day in the Life

A typical day in the life of Caiden is just like any other 5 year old. He just started Kindergarten this year so he spends his days at school, he gets to ride a bus so that’s a big deal to him!

He loves WWE, any chance he gets to play with his wrestlers or wrestle his brothers he takes it. He took a break from fall sports this year, running is a challenge for him so until he gets running legs we will have to find other things for him to do. He does attend a motor development class at the Kennedy Krieger Institute that will start up again next week, there they work on all kinds of skills. They teach him wheelchair basketball, tennis, baseball and swimming. He started wrestling last year and that will begin again in the winter. He loves to play outside…..baseball, soccer, riding his scooter. He loves swimming, he would spend all day in a pool if he could!

Shriners means everything to us! Without them, I honestly do not know how things would have turned out for Caiden. As a single income Military family, I don’t know how we would have been able to afford all of the things that Shriners has done for us! They have done everything – prosthetics, equipment, surgeries and therapy…… all without asking us for anything!

Caiden’s First Phillies Game and T.Cares

Caiden just thought we were going to a game. He had no idea that he was going to get VIP treatment! He won’t really describe the experience for me…… however, when asked what his favorite part was he said ” When they won, duh!” He also ranked his dance off with the Phillie Phanatic and being allowed to have two water ices a close 2nd!!!

The T.Cares program gave Caiden and our family a once in a lifetime opportunity! Without the program we would have never met the Phillies players or been able to go onto the field for batting practice. We are just a regular family that was given the chance to be treated like VIP for the night and that was pretty awesome! All of us had an amazing time, especially my 3 boys!    

As for what’s next, I have no idea! We are in for some major changes this year as Mike is getting Medically Discharged from the Army, so we will be moving and changing from the military world to the civilian world! Trying to decide where we want to live and finally put down our roots after moving every 3 years is a big deal and at the top of our list! But I also want to grow Caidens Celtic Warriors and do more fundraising on behalf of Shriners and Camp No Limits.

On behalf of our Tickets.com family, we thank Katie and her family for being a voice for children everywhere who have a similar story to Caiden and for including us in their journey. Today, Caiden is cared for by Scott Kozin, MD, and Corinna Franklin, MD, at the Philadelphia Shriners Hospital. Caiden’s newest prosthetics include Ironman and Phillies logos!

With 22 locations around the U.S. Shriners Hospitals are constantly providing for the education of physicians and other healthcare professionals and conducting research to discover new knowledge that improves the quality of care and quality of life of children and families.

Learn more how to get involved in serving your community with our T.Cares program on ProVenue.Tickets.com #ExperienceIsEverything

ProVenue^®

Tickets.com is proud to announce the 3.7 release of ProVenue, a major release containing many exciting new features! Here are some of the highlights of the release:

• Event Ticket Quotas – A per patron account ticket quota value can now be defined at the event level and enforced through all sales channels including via our DirectConnect APIs. Fine-grained control can be used to determine which seats are controlled by the quota value.

• Lock Patron Account – It is now possible to lock a patron account that effectively freezes different actions for the account until some resolution or customer service issue is resolved.

• Improved Multi-Organizational Support – Support has been added for self-service setup and administration in two key areas:
  • Service Charges
  • Print Formats
• DirectConnect APIs – The release includes numerous enhancements to the Patron API as well as a new Bulk Price Update API

Many other smaller enhancements contained in the release are focused on MyProVenue self-service setup. For example, venue maps and static images used in MyProVenue are now not only defined in ProVenue, they are automatically transferred to the online servers requiring no manual intervention.

ProVenue/ProVenueOnline^®

The release of ProVenueOnline 62.2 delivers a number of major renewal enhancements are now available including:

• Auto-Renewals – Payment plans in ProVenue can now be configured to trigger an auto-renewal feature; when patrons select the payment plan they are presented with special terms. For a follow-up season, the rollover process in ProVenue will automatically create an order with future scheduled payments using the patron’s default credit card in their digital wallet.

• Renewal Delivery Options – During the renewal process, a patron can now select a delivery method based on setup rules created in ProVenue. A full season renewal, for example, might offer a digital delivery, while a partial season package might only offer mail as an option.

MyProVenue™

A new release of MyProVenue, our responsive, mobile-friendly ticket purchase and management experience includes a number of enhancements and performance improvements. The addition of Data Protection capabilities (the ability for patrons to opt-in or out of marketing opportunities) is entirely self-service, driven from ProVenue setup.

Our engineering team constantly looks for an edge employing the latest technologies. With the latest release of MyProVenue, we have significantly improved the page rendering time across the application.

We are aggressively launching MyProVenue for more and more clients. If you are interested in learning more about how your organization can benefit from MyProVenue, please contact sales@tickets.com.

Other Notable Product Updates

• Product Design – As highlighted in this year’s ProVenue Exchange in Scottsdale, Arizona, we are working with many of our clients to focus on design, the creation of compelling User Experiences through content and User Interface Design. One key area has been the work we have done with clients to design new Navigation Maps. We are now offering our design services on a consulting basis and will be launching a Product Design Gallery to showcase some of our newest designs. Clients interested in our services will now be able to browse the gallery for ideas. If you are interested in utilizing our design services, please contact marketing@tickets.com.

• Utilities and Tools – We are building new utilities intended for client use and new tools that will initially be used by internal Tickets.com personnel to improve our operational efficiencies and assist in streamlining your business processes.
  • Patron Merge Utility – After completing a beta period and when launched for general use, this utility can act on a file that identifies pairs of duplicate patron accounts, merging a “source” patron into a consolidated “target account.”
  • Load Import Staging Table Utility – A new utility will enable clients to load the import staging tables which can then be used to initiate an Import Run to bulk create new sales.
  • Patron Load Tool – Initially for use by Tickets.com employees, this tool allows for the bulk import of patrons.

We have been very busy over the past few months renewing client contracts and upgrading some of our partners to our latest and greatest features.

The University of Vermont is migrating from ProVenueMax to ProVenue for their Athletics and Arts ticketing. They chose to upgrade to ProVenue because of its powerful features and functionality that empower their students and fans, and increase box office efficiencies.

UVM will implement online student ticketing via ProVenueOnline and MyTickets.

This will allow students to bypass the box office and to get a free student comp ticket online. Only UVM students will have access to the student tickets as the link will sit behind a UVM credentialed website. The link will also be masked to prohibit students from sharing the link with non-students. Rules and ticket quotas will be established barring students from accessing more than one (1) free ticket per event. Tickets will be delivered through our Tickets@Home and Apple Passbook.

Syracuse University Schine Box Office, Northwest Florida State College Mattie Kelly Arts Center, College of DuPage McAninch Arts Center, and Alabama Theatre have also chosen to upgrade from ProVenueElite to ProVenue. Advanced features such mobile tools, Ticket Forwarding, MyProVenue and marketing services will be utilized across these amazing venues in the near future!

We value each one of our clients, and take pride in helping them reach their goals using their own, unique branding. For more information on Tickets.com and the ProVenue platform, please visit provenue.tickets.com or email sales@tickets.com.

This month we are celebrating our longest client relationship as Pavilion Theatre Rhyl reaches its 25^th Anniversary. For a quarter of a century an eclectic mix of artists and performers have appeared at the seaside venue, with Tickets.com by their side from the very start.

Since partnering with us in 1991 the theatre has progressed from using the original DOS system Pass2 to using our ProVenue suite of products to manage all ticketing requirements. In recognition of the theatre’s development and strategy to constantly evolve and innovate its business processes, the Pavilion also uses ProVenueOnline® and ProVenueConnect.

From the beginning we have worked closely with operations manager Val Simmons who has worked at the theatre since it opened. Speaking about our partnership, Val said: “Since we first engaged Tickets.com in 1991, we have not only seen our systems and processes advance greatly but also our relationship with the staff there.”

“The support desk is always on hand to resolve any queries that we might have and the onsite training provided is excellent. We’ve really enjoyed working so closely with the Tickets.com team over the last 25 years and look forward to many more!”

On Sunday September 18^th, the theatre will celebrate its 25^th Anniversary with a special Gala Concert, which will feature an all Welsh cast. Pavilion Theatre Rhyl is renowned for its variety of productions and events, making the flexibility of its ticketing system an important feature for Val and her team:

“We need to be able to determine how and when we sell tickets and thanks to Tickets.com, we are able to manage the sales process ourselves very easily and efficiently.”

The entire Tickets.com team sends huge congratulations to Val and her colleagues at the Pavilion Theatre Rhyl for achieving this fantastic milestone. Our relationship is a true partnership and we are delighted that we can continue to offer the products, technology and service to support the theatre in their determination to innovate and succeed for many more years.

For more information on the Pavilion Theatre, Rhyl, visit www.rhylpavilion.co.uk

Football League Two side Yeovil Town FC, has recently migrated to ProVenue to manage all of the club’s ticketing requirements having been a Tickets.com client since 2012.

It was a quick turnaround for the projects and support teams here to get the new system up and running in time for the start of the Football League season and ProVenue was installed and live by the time the club played their first home league game – a 2-0 win against Notts County.

The decision to move across to ProVenue was made to boost the club’s online ticket sales and experience for its fans; already sales online are up on last season’s per-game average and feedback from supporters has been very positive.

“We’ve received some great feedback from the club since they went live with ProVenue,” Robert Baker Ticket Office Manager at Yeovil Town said. “We’ve worked really closely with Tickets.com to ensure that the new system was designed and built to meet our ticketing needs – and, against a tight deadline, the team delivered exactly what was required. Their in-depth understanding of the club is invaluable and we have a fantastic relationship with the team there.”

For more information on Yeovil Town F.C. please visit http://www.ytfc.net/

Tickets.com is proud to partner with Round Rock Express and Minot Y Men’s Rodeo in multi-year ticketing deals. Each organization chose ProVenue, the revolutionary full-service integrated ticketing solution pioneered by Tickets.com, as their preferred platform.

The Round Rock Express is an affiliate of the Major League Texas Rangers baseball team. Home games for the Round Rock Express are played at the Dell Diamond, a facility owned by the City of Round Rock and leased long-term to RSR Sports, who run and maintain the facility. Over a half million tickets are sold each year to games and events at the Dell Diamond, and fans will now be able to utilize ProVenue features, such as MyTickets™ to easily manage, forward and print tickets. For more information on the Express, visit www.RoundRockExpress.com.

Minot Y Men’s Rodeo will be utilizing ProVenue features for its annual four-day rodeo event at the North Dakota State Fair Center in Minot, ND. The multi-year agreement will deliver secure and reliable ticketing technology for the rodeo’s customers, including ProVenue’s Access Control, Tickets@Home features and marketing solutions.  Minot Y Men’s Rodeo serves as the Finals of the Badlands PRCA circuit and is a 501(c)(3) that benefits the Triangle YMCA Camp. For more information on Minot Y Men, please visit http://www.minotysmensrodeo.com.

Are you interested in learning about how the revolutionary ProVenue platform can help your organization? Click here to request more information.

In 2016, we launched our T.Cares program to make a difference within our communities and to create a positive impact around the world. Read more about our T.Cares program here.

Most Recently, we invited three baseball players, Rich, Chris and Moose from the Special Olympics New Jersey team to attend batting practice with the New York Mets at Citi Field! Tony Vlahovic, Special Olympics NJ Team Coach shared, “The anticipation of all three athletes leading up to the Mets game included multiple phone calls, texts and emails.  All communication expressed their excitement of being together and watching a Mets game. Jeff Baldino, Senior Director of Competition, and I did not share any details of the day and we were very excited to see their faces as the day unfolded. The smiles started immediately as we entered the field. Rich said he never thought he would be on a big league field and Moose repeatedly claimed it was one of the best days of his life!”

What makes the Special Olympics NJ Organization such an amazing T.Cares Partner is their dedication to providing year-round sports training and athletic competition in a variety of Olympic-type sports for children and adults with intellectual disabilities, giving them continuing opportunities to develop physical fitness, demonstrate courage, experience joy and participate in a sharing of gifts, skills and friendship with their families, other Special Olympics athletes and the community.

Specifically, “The Special Olympics Baseball program has developed an incredible heart and soul for players and coaches alike since it began in 2013.  The pure joy and love for the game of baseball and each other has progressed over the past 3 years. This program enables athletes who were never given an opportunity to play baseball in their youth, develop their skills and actually play the game.  The memory I will always have in my heart is watching the team celebrate after winning the gold medal vs. Rhode Island in the 2014 USA Games.  The tears of happiness that we all had as we dogpiled and threw containers of Gatorade on each other (primarily the coaches getting soaked) just like on television!  The bonds that developed between the athletes and the coaches is something I have never experienced in my own professional career.  I would do anything to help and guide these incredible people not only in baseball, but also in their lives,” said Tony Vlahovic.

As a Tickets.com community we’re grateful for the opportunity to support such an incredible organization and we invite you to join us and get involved!

Help support the Special Olympics Baseball program and Special Olympics in general by taking the time to watch the games and attend practices to sponsoring events. Sponsorship funds are used to support all the sports and activities led by Special Olympics. Lastly, help generate interest and revenue among your friends and colleagues so you can can keep the dreams alive for these athletes to continue to play baseball.

To get involved or donate to the Special Olympics New Jersey, click here.