wrestling / News
Report From Day One of WWE’s WrestleMania Week Sunshine Package
Hello everyone! Name’s Sean Kelly. I used to have a weekly column round these parts a few years ago. Nice to be back, if only for WrestleMania!
And that brings us to you, dear reader. Over the next few days, I’d like to take you, the 411 faithful, on a Virtual WrestleMania-week tour. I’ll be chronicling each of the events that come with the Sunshine package – taking pictures, giving details, and answering your questions so you get a sense of what it’s like to attend WWE’s official WrestleMania festivities. My hope is to give you some insight into how this crazy weekend works in an informative and moderately interesting way. And who knows? Perhaps in the future you’ll be inspired to take the plunge and I’ll be reading YOUR WrestleMania journal right here, on 411mania!
WHAT IS THE SUNSHINE PACKAGE?
So what is the Sunshine Package, anyway? In short, WWE offers several different tiers of Travel packages. The higher up you go, the better the seats get and the more extras are thrown in. For WrestleMania 33, the best bundle is the Sunshine Package, which you can get for 4 or 5 nights. I got the 4 night package.
Here’s what it includes:
OVERALL
– 4 night hotel stay in the Orlando area
FRIDAY-SUNDAY (depends on what meet & greets you pick)
– One VIP Ticket to AXXESS
– One Premium VIP ticket to AXXESS
FRIDAY
– One ticket to the WWE Hall of Fame (Floor Seating)
SATURDAY
– An exclusive, 2-hour reception with WWE Superstars before the NXT show
– One ticket to NXT Takeover: Orlando (Rows 1-4)
SUNDAY
– Bus transportation to and from WrestleMania
– One ticket to WrestleMania (Rows 1-4)
– Collectable Chair from WrestleMania
MONDAY
– A tour of the WWE Performance Center – includes lunch, round-trip transportation, meet & greet with NXT stars and live NXT matches
– One ticket to Monday Night RAW (Rows 1-4)
If you get the 5 day package, you get an extra night hotel stay, a ticket to Universal Studios Orlando, and a ticket to SmackDown Live! (rows 1-4). I didn’t get the 5-night package, so I won’t be covering SmackDown. Who needs them anyway?
Note – I will also be attending/reviewing the Hulk Hogan meet & greet taking place at his pop-up Beach Shop. It’s not part of the travel package, but I figured I’d throw it in for fun.
A QUICK DISCLAIMER
Money is a sensitive topic. People have strong feelings about finances, especially when it comes to reading about how someone else has an expensive thing and others do not. However, it’s a huge part of the travel package topic and I feel it is better to be upfront and factual about it. I don’t want anyone to feel bad, I promise.
Also, I know that one can attend WrestleMania on a budget. This isn’t about that.
We cool? OK, HERE COMES THE MON-AY!
HOW MUCH DOES IT COST?
How much does a 4-night Sunshine Package cost? The quick answer is $6,650. However, if you’re going with more than one person (I’m not) the cost gets reduced as the hotel portion of the bill is split accordingly. For example, if 4 people purchase Sunshine Packages together, the cost gets reduced to $5,900 per person. However, everything has to go on one credit card, so you’ll need someone with $23,600 of spare credit who’s VERY trusting to purchase everything all at once.
Let’s face it – $6650 is a lot of money. I could be investing this in my kids’ college funds, after all (fingers crossed for scholarships)! So is the price worth it?
I have no idea what the face value of the tickets are, as each ticket has a bunch of Xs where the price would normally be. However, I’m assuming only Sunshine Package holders or VIPs get the top-tier seats, so if an ordinary schlub like me wants to be up close for all the shows, I either have to get a Sunshine Package or purchase tickets separately on a site like Stubhub.
For fun, I did a little research on Stubhub and came up with a Market Value Estimate of how much my package is worth. Let’s be clear, this is a MARKET VALUE estimate, not a face value estimate. I looked up how much seats were going for in the same section & row as my tickets on Stubhub. For Axxess, I am using WWE’s pricing, and for accommodations , I looked at the prices on the hotel’s website. Here’s the results:
– Hall of Fame – $80 (Floor Row D)
– NXT Takeover – $750 (Floor Row A)
– WrestleMania – $5000 (Floor Row C)
– RAW – $1200 (Floor Row A)
– AXXESS VIP – $110
– AXXESS Premium VIP – $190
– Hotel – $1116 ($279 per night)
– Performance Center Tour – Unknown, official WWE Performance Center experiences go for $1500 so let’s go with $500
– Exclusive Reception – Unknown, guessing $500?
– WrestleMania Chair – estimated $80
– Bus Transportation – estimated $30
That brings us to a grand total of $9,556, which makes $6650 seem like a pretty good deal!
Now, this isn’t an exact science. After all, I am looking at asking prices, not actual sale prices, and some of the experiences aren’t for sale elsewhere and are thus random estimates. However, at a minimum this exercise shows that buying a premium Travel Package in advance is financially better than waiting until the last minute and paying market prices on Stubhub. You avoid the stress of buying tickets on Ticketmaster and WWE plans everything for you. A travel package is certainly nice in that regard.
HOW DOES THE ORDERING PROCESS WORK?
WWE’s WrestleMania 33 Travel Packages went on sale at 10AM eastern time on October 31, 2016. The process was very straightforward. You pick your package and fill out a bunch of standard information, e.g. Name, Address, Payment info, etc. and make your purchase. It’s about 3-4 steps and presto! Travel Package, baby!
Personally, I bought my travel package the instant it went on sale. I completed the entire process in 2 minutes, as I received my confirmation email at 10:02AM. Sunshine Packages were the first to sell out, and it took a little over 24 hours to do so.
After that, there came a series of botched confirmation emails. I say this because the Travel Department kept sending out incorrect information, like incorrect number of nights, wrong package information, etc. They finally cleared everything up a few days later and told me what Section and Row I would be sitting in for WrestleMania. They even provided a rough sketch of the seating chart so I’d get an idea of the stadium layout.
A few weeks later, they sent me information on which hotel I’d be staying in. It’s worth noting that the Sunshine Package hotel is a bit more upscale than the hotels associated with other travel packages.
Then, it was radio silence for a few months until January 24th, 2017. On that day, I received an e-mail with the list of VIP and Premium VIP dates, times and Superstars that are part of WWE Axxess. I was given a link where I could request which Premium & VIP superstars I wanted to meet. They say they cannot guarantee you’ll get your selection, but if you reply right away you’ll basically get what you want. According to WWE, with each VIP and Premium VIP experience you get admission into Axxess, VIP line access to the Superstars, a professional photo with the Superstar, an autograph, and an 8×10 photo of the Superstar.
One downside is that there are certain Axxess events that conflict with other Travel Package events. For example, Bray Wyatt’s meet & greet conflicts with the WWE Superstar Reception, and Bayley’s conflicts with NXT Takeover. It’s a minor complaint, but it would have been nice to have them as options.
About a month later, I got an e-mail that my Travel Package documents had shipped via FedEx. I received them on March 1st. Note that my signature was required so you’ll need to be home to sign for a Travel Package if you ever get one.
Here’s what came in the box:
Very exciting! I should note that it was only after receiving my package that I found out my seats for RAW, NXT and the Hall of Fame. I found it odd that I got first row for RAW & NXT but third row for WrestleMania. My assumption is that the first two rows of WrestleMania are for Celebrities/Family/VIPs? Who knows why. Any ideas?
SUBMIT YOUR QUESTIONS
And with that we wrap up our intro. Do you like the concept here? I hope so. I’ll do my best to get these little articles up ASAP after the day’s events.
I’d love to hear from all of you. If you have any questions you’d like answered over the next few days, I’ll be happy to answer them. Are you interested in knowing what exhibits are at Axxess? Perhaps you’d like to learn how many rings the Performance Center has, or which Superstars were in attendance at the exclusive reception. Let me know in the comments below! I’ll do my best to accommodate your requests if my experience allows it.
Tomorrow: Hulk Hogan Meet & Greet and the WWE Hall of Fame! See you then!
Hasta luego,
This is Sean.
