Average prices boosted slightly for Cubs' season ticketholders

The baseball side of the Chicago Cubs was not happy with a 95-win regular season because the team squandered a division lead and then bowed out of the postseason in the wild-card game.

The business side sent out invoices to season-ticket-holders Thursday with an average price increase of 2.65 percent.

"I think they (ticketholders) are excited to turn the page and look ahead to 2019 and are ready for another season of Cubs baseball," said Cale Vennum, the Cubs' vice president of ticketing. "For the 2019 season, we will see a very slight increase across the ballpark. It's going to be, on average, 2.65 percent across all of our price points."

Vennum added: "Some season ticketholders will see a decrease in their price. The decrease will be as much as 5.28 percent. Others will see a price increase. The highest price increase would be 9.5 percent. As we do every year, these actions are geared to ensure that all of our season ticketholders see a great value in their seats."

There again will be different levels of pricing, based on the desirability of dates and opponents: Bronze (seven games), Silver (17), Gold (23), Platinum (13), Marquee (17) and Diamond (four).

Season ticketholders can purchase Bronze upper reserved outfield seats for as low as $8 per game and as high as $52 for Diamond games.

Club box home plate tickets will range from $85 to $259.

A season ticket in the bleachers will range from $19 per game on Bronze dates to $79 on Diamond dates. Total cost for a bleacher season ticket will be $3,984, up slightly from $3,920 last season.

The Cubs will renumber every seat in the ballpark, going from a system of aisle/row/seat to section/row/seat.

The new system will renumber upper-deck tickets as the 300 and 400 levels of the ballpark instead of the 400 and 500 levels. The bleachers will be the 500 section.

"If you've sat in the seats at Wrigley Field, it's not uncommon for an usher to come by and help (people) locate their seats as they're walking down the aisle," Vennum said. "We wanted to be in line with the experience people see at other sporting venues and hope that it helps people more easily find their seats. It gave us the opportunity to more appropriately number the upper level. If you look at the upper level at Wrigley Field, it's actually closer to the field and more commensurate with mezzanine or club-level experience in most other stadiums."

The new seating map for the ballpark is on cubs.com.