Super Bowl Parties

February is the busiest month of the year for sports groups in Phoenix — roughly a quarter of our sporting-event requests land in it. That's the WM Phoenix Open, the start of spring training, and visitors everywhere.

Super Bowl Sunday sits right in the middle of it. The advantage is that it's a Sunday, and Sundays are the quiet side of the Valley calendar — most of our demand is Friday and Saturday. The disadvantage is that Open week is happening around you.

Sports groups also run bigger than a typical night out. The most common size is 16 to 20 riders, which puts most game-day crews on the 20-passenger party bus or the 22-passenger party bus. Count the coworkers who say maybe — they usually come.

Super Bowl kickoff is late afternoon Arizona time, usually around 4:30. Everything in your day hangs off that.

That's a six- or seven-hour day. Most Phoenix groups book four hours, and four hours doesn't cover a football game — the game alone is three and a half. Book the real number up front, because extending at 8:00 p.m. on Super Bowl Sunday is not a reliable plan.

Put it in the timeline planner and send it around, so nobody's asking what time the bus comes while the first quarter's on.

Three options, and they suit different groups.

• A big sports bar. Most screens, most atmosphere, and it fills earliest. Call ahead about a reserved area for twenty people — many places take bookings for this one Sunday.
• A restaurant with a private room. Better for mixed groups with kids or anyone who wants to hear a conversation. Usually a food-and-beverage minimum rather than a table charge.
• A house party. The most comfortable option, and the one where a bus makes the most difference, because there's no host stuck sober.

Old Town Scottsdale and Tempe's Mill Avenue have the highest concentration of big-screen bars. Downtown Phoenix around Footprint Center works well for groups coming from central and west Valley. Gilbert's Heritage District is the East Valley pick.

Whatever you choose, reserve the spot before you book the vehicle. The venue's constraints set the day, not ours.

This is the version most people don't consider, and it's often the smartest.

If someone in the group is hosting, the bus doesn't take you to a bar — it collects people from around the Valley, brings them to the house, and takes them home at the end. The host gets to actually enjoy the party, and twenty cars don't line a residential street all afternoon.

The return run is the whole value. Guests who'd otherwise leave at halftime to stay ahead of their own limits can stay through the fourth quarter. Tell us the drop-off addresses when you book so the route home makes sense.

Send us the host's street address ahead of time too. Some residential streets don't take a full-size bus at the curb, and it's better to know in January.

Phoenix hosts the Super Bowl at State Farm Stadium in Glendale periodically, and when it does, the whole week changes.

A host year means road closures around the stadium, a security perimeter, designated drop zones for large vehicles, and traffic across the West Valley that doesn't resemble a normal Sunday. Vehicles book out months ahead, not weeks.

If you've got tickets in a host year, three things matter: book very early, expect the drop-off point to be further from the gate than you'd like, and agree on a pickup spot and time with your whole group before you walk in. Cell service near a stadium that full is unreliable.

Most years, though, you're watching on a screen like everyone else, and the planning is simply about getting twenty people to a bar and home. If you're doing a tailgate at any Valley stadium during the season, our tailgating page covers lot rules and setup.

Four answers and we can quote you properly.

• Where you're watching, or at least which part of the Valley.
• The headcount, counting the maybes. Game-day groups grow in the last week.
• Pickup points. One or two, ideally.
• The real end time. Straight home after the game, or one more stop?

Ask us about food and drinks on board when you call, since it depends on the vehicle. A cooler for the ride out is common for game days.

Split the cost before the day using the split cost calculator, and add the driver's gratuity to what you collect — it isn't in the quote. Collecting from twenty people after a game that ran long is a worse job than collecting in January.

If the group does this kind of thing regularly, the sporting events page covers ballgames and arena nights the same way.