Recap:
A Digital Home Run for Salt Lake City Bees’ New Ballpark
When Miller Sports & Entertainment needed a mobile app for their new entertainment district, they called Overlap to step up to the plate. The ask? Create a seamless mobile experience for fans of the Salt Lake Bees and visitors to America First Square. The app had to handle everything from event discovery to ticket purchases, all while pulling from multiple data sources and syncing with the physical spaces still under construction. No pressure.
Skills:
- Mobile UX Strategy
- Mobile App Design
- API Integration & Data Architecture
- Ticketmaster Partnership Implementation
- React Native Development
The Challenge:
Building a Mobile App for a Ballpark That Didn’t Exist Yet
Designing an app for an unbuilt venue is like creating a map to a place no one’s seen yet. The Ballpark app needed to showcase events, support ticket sales, and deliver up-to-date venue info, all while pulling from multiple external sources: two WordPress CMSs and Ticketmaster. Key challenges included:
- Navigating Ticketmaster’s API
- Caching and syncing real-time data from multiple platforms without bogging down load times
- Creating a tabbed navigation to differentiate between events at the Ballpark and America First Square
- Designing mobile-first UI from incomplete assets, with construction still in progress
Overlap had to think ahead, build smart, and solve for problems that didn’t fully exist yet.
The Solution:
One App, Two Venues, Endless Integration
Our solution started with architecture: a robust system that could pull from two separate WordPress sites and Ticketmaster, then consolidate that data into a clean, intuitive mobile experience. We structured a caching process that checked for updates three times every eight hours; fast, fresh, and efficient.
To streamline the UX, we introduced tabbed navigation, giving users a simple way to toggle between Ballpark events and America First Square happenings. Behind the scenes, we created a unified data feed that synced the app and the websites, ensuring a single source of truth across platforms.
On the front end, we tailored content for mobile (not just resized it), converting HTML assets into app-friendly displays. The design mimicked the energy of the venues, even if the venues weren’t quite finished yet.
The Results:
High Engagement, Low Crash Rates, and a Foundation for the Future
The Ballpark app didn’t just launch; it delivered. Despite launching before the venue was fully open, it quickly racked up thousands of users on both iOS and Android. Crashes and uninstalls remained minimal thanks to our streamlined architecture.
Beyond the numbers, the app established Overlap as a certified Ticketmaster Nexus partner, one of only about 80 at the time, unlocking future opportunities. It also laid the groundwork for the Downtown Daybreak app, accelerating development and improving performance.
A mobile app built for a place still under construction? That’s what we call a home run.