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As we reported a while back, YTB has teamed up with the Kansas City Chiefs NFL Team to provide fans with travel packages to the teams away games. Now, Chiefs hall of famer Bobby Bell is getting in on the action.

Bell is partnering with the Chiefs and YTB to promote the new Chiefs travel packages. Bell hopes that the packages being offered by the travel company will bring the community feel back into going to games. The Chiefs and YTB have created packages that will allow fans to meet players, purchase memorabilia and win prizes.

The partnership between the Chief and YTB will also include a fan rewards program that will make fans eligible to win prizes when booking through the YTB/Team sponsored website-www.chiefstravel.com. Bell pointed out that while this is the first program of its kind, the idea is to one day get all 32 NFL teams involved in similar reward programs.

“I think there’s a big bridge there between players and the fans, and I thought this was a great way to set up these types of events, said Bell. This is for the fans. We’re trying to get the players back involved. In my career, football was my second job basically. When people asked me what I did (for a living), I told them I worked at GM full time. The money wasn’t there then. That’s obviously not the case now, and I think its one reason why the players don’t interact with the community (as much as) we did.”

This program will be off a running in just a few months when football season begins. Hopefully the success of the partnership between YTB and the Chiefs will inspire other teams to start programs like this to reward their fans for following their favorite teams.

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YTB Travel Network Inc. - a direct sales company that sells travel packages through independent agents, is partnering up with the Kansas City Chiefs professional football team to help provide travel to the games for all of their fans.

The Travel Company will work with the professional football team to administer all online and fan based travel through the teams official travel website, www.chiefstravel.com

Chiefs fans who book through the site can chose from a variety of travel packages, and also get the opportunity to win some pretty cool prizes, including autographed memorabilia, a trip on the official Chiefs celebrity cruise, tickets to use a suite on game day and even the opportunity to become a “chief for a day.”

“Fan support at home and also on the road has been a vital ingredient in the success of this franchise over the last 20 years,” Chiefs President Carl Peterson said in a statement. “Moreover, with this new travel program we can reward our fans for that support, as each time they book travel -whether business or personal, related to Chiefs games or not -they have the opportunity to win any number of special prizes from watching a pre-season game from a luxury suite, becoming a Chiefs player for a day and enjoying other fan friendly experiences.”

I’m not sure if every team has a website dedicated to fan travel, but if not, it’s a great idea. Fans are what keep the team going, and for many fans, they are very willing to spend big bucks to see their team play and win, even if it means traveling to another state. Another plus is that many NFL fans are male, and men Love someone doing all the planning for them. Now, the Chiefs fans can simply go to the fan travel site and have the entire game trip experience done or them.

The move by YTB is beginning to look like a trend for MLM companies partnering with professional sports teams. Just two months ago, Verve (Vemma) did a deal with the Phoenix Suns which was the first of its kind as well. Expect to see more of these strategic deals as they provide great exposure to the companies that hook up with these franchises.

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