HARTFORD, July 13 2011:  As the Connecticut Whale drives to increase its season ticket base greatly for the upcoming 2011-12 American Hockey League season, numerous Connecticut business groups and associations have joined forces with the Whale in a “grass roots” effort, and are offering special incentive deals to their members to become Whale season seat-holders.

CT Whale“Making deeper inroads into the local business community is the most important part of our objective to re-energize Hartford as a hockey market,” said Whalers Sports & Entertainment president and COO Howard Baldwin, Jr..  “We are excited by the response so far from some of the areas best-regarded and most-influential chambers and professional groups.”

Numerous local chambers of commerce either have launched, or will soon launch, programs to incentivize their memberships to invest in Whale season subscriptions.  Those include the Metro Hartford Alliance, the Greater Valley Chamber of Commerce, the Middlesex Chamber of Commerce, the Quinnipiac Chamber of Commerce, and the chambers of commerce of Branford, Bristol, East Hartford, Glastonbury and Meriden.

Among other business and professional associations partnering with the Whale are: the Advertising Club of Connecticut, Business for Downtown Hartford, the Connecticut Bar Association, the Home Builders Association of Greater Hartford, the CT Society of CPAs, I.A.T.S.E. Local 84 and the Rockledge Men’s Club.

The support of all of these groups will be a key component of the Whale’s off-season campaign to “Skate to 3,000” season tickets for the 2011-12 Connecticut Whale season.

A special early bird discount on 2011-12 season seats is available now. Call (860) 728-3366 for information on that, as well as all Whale ticket packages, group sales and VIP packages.