Daniel Parker walked into a recent Spokane Velocity soccer game with his friends, joining a large crowd that was herded into the stadium past people handing out freebies — bracelets, signs, and other small swag.
In the mix of things, Parker was handed a small raffle ticket to enter to win a free autographed Velocity jersey. He doesn’t remember who handed it to him, but he assumed it was someone working for the team.
“I know the team is fairly new, so this is exciting that there's this opportunity that I could actually win something,” he says. “It seemed very official, formal — like, team sponsored.”
Parker forgot about the raffle for most of the game, until a video came up on the big screen and the announcer reminded everyone to scan the QR code on their ticket. So Parker scanned the code, which took him to a survey.
“I put in my email and they asked me some demographic information, which I thought was a little strange,” he says. “But I was like, ‘OK, whatever.’ I wanna support the team. So I'm going to give the team some information about me so they can understand who's at the games.”
Someone else won the jersey and Parker went home. The next day, he got a text.
“Thank you for filling out the raffle entry with GRV at the Spokane Velocity. Congrats! Your entry was drawn to receive two complimentary round trip airline tickets.”
Parker didn’t know he had entered a raffle with whatever “GRV” was.
If he had been paying closer attention, Parker might have noticed that there was another logo next to the Velocity logo on the opposite side of the QR code card. The letters “GRV” are in black and white next to a circle with some swooping lines.
And again, had he paid closer attention as soon as the QR code opened a link to the “Official Sweepstakes Rules & Opt-In Consent,” he might have noticed that the first few lines explained that he was about to participate in a Great Resort Vacations sweepstakes.
But in the middle of a game, are people going to read the fine print?
Great Resort Vacations is a wholesale vacation club that’s been headquartered in Utah for nine years and opened a branch in Spokane Valley in 2022. It invites people to pay a membership fee in order to get wholesale pricing on hotels and resorts. It’s like Costco or Sam’s Club, but for vacations.
“We offer ... opportunities to become a member with our travel club at a fraction of the cost of what it costs to get into [a] timeshare,” says Mike Browne, vice president of marketing for GRV. “We average anywhere from $4,000 to $8,000 to become a member with us. We [also] have a $399 annual fee that allows people access to our discounts, access to our platform, which gives them incredible savings on cruises, hotels and resort condominium stays.”
During a Zoom interview, Browne showed the Inlander the deals that were available through their club for the second week of August. They had 166 units in places like Orlando and Daytona Beach where GRV members could book a seven-night stay for less than $400. The previous week, he said they had 19 units in Hawaii for less than $500 for a weeklong stay.
"If you traveled once a year for seven nights, and you stayed at [a hotel for] $200 a night, it'd be $1,400 a year," Browne says. "If you average that out over 10 years, it's $14,000. I think most of us can agree we'd have at least 10 vacations in us the rest of our lives, right? So what we do is provide an avenue for those who like what they see, and the time is right for them to become a member with us. This allows them to come in between $4,000 and $8,000 as an owner or a member with us, and then have access to all the deals that I just showed you."
"So if I wanted to stay a week in Hawaii, we can find that most often for under $500 for seven nights," Browne continues. "If I did that for 10 years, that's $5,000 — plus, let's say I got in at the mid to upper level, [which is] $8,000. I'm at $13,000, which is still less than I would have spent [over 10 years] just in a hotel. But I've got a condo with a kitchen. It's really a phenomenal thing."
That $13,000 figure doesn't include the annual fee of $399 a year, which would add about $3,990 to the 10-year estimate for a grand total of $16,990. But, to Browne's point, that might still be a better deal.
Browne is based in Utah, so it’s the Spokane-area director of marketing, Stephen Divilbiss, who’s at local events. Divilbiss says that he was hesitant about the product at first.
"I actually went to a presentation two years ago, and I had the same feeling that a lot of people have," he says. "[But] I really loved what they did, and seven days later, I was working in the sales office ... Who I am is really important to me, because a lot of people know who I am in this town. I love what I do, and I love our product.”
GRV hosts raffles at various large events in and around Spokane — Indians baseball games, Chiefs hockey games, even the North Idaho State Fair. Whenever GRV sponsors a raffle, the company also has a table set up where Divilbiss and other team members are ready to answer any questions participants have.
“We very much want them to know they're interacting with us,” Browne says. “That's why our logo is on [the raffle tickets] ... Then, when you actually scan it, it mentions that Great Resort Vacations is the sponsor of the jersey giveaway. So we in no way represent that we are the Velocity or we are the Zephyr, or we are the Chiefs or the Indians. We feel that with all of our partners, that we're representing who we are, and that we're the sponsor of said giveaway. And they all feel very comfortable with it.”
After their staff raffle off the prize, they then use the survey information to identify people in their target demographic.
Browne says that people who are between 27 and 70 who are either married or living with a partner usually get a message saying they’ve won a door prize. If they go to claim it at the booth, they’ll get a little swag, like branded chapstick or a squishy ball, and “a choice of vacation.”
“Typically, we'll offer them a choice of up to a seven-night cruise, a seven-night hotel stay, or a two-night hotel stay with airfare included. Do we offer a free vacation? The answer to that is no, we never bill it as a free vacation. We mention to them that they would have a choice of a complimentary vacation, and we go through what the stipulations of that [are].”
The stipulations are that the couple must attend a 60-90 minute presentation at the Spokane Valley office. During that presentation, they’ll be introduced to GRV’s wholesale model and asked if they want to join. The couple does not have to join in order to get the complimentary vacation, Browne says. They will, however, have to pay taxes on the trip.
Browne also says that GRV might share the data they’ve collected with the sports team they’re working with, depending on the partnership, but they don’t sell the data to anyone else.
“That's to be compliant with telemarketing laws,” he says. “It does us no good to sell data to somebody who's not a sponsor and doesn't have permission to contact that person.
This is the Spokane Indians’ first year partnering with GRV, which will have tabled at about a third of the team’s home games, usually on Friday and Saturday nights, the Indians' Senior Vice President Otto Klein says.
“So far, I’ve been very impressed with their customer service,” Klein says. “We appreciate that, because our team is also built on customer service, so our values align on that.”
Divilbiss has been great to communicate with, he says, and is mindful of the fans first. The Indians will be reevaluating their contract with GRV this fall, and Klein says that as long as ticket buyers are having a good experience, GRV will be welcomed back.
After reading the text the day after the Velocity game, Parker was curious if he really did win two plane tickets.
“It's 2024 — we get a lot of spam calls and texts all the time,” Parker says. “But because it said the word Velocity in the text message, I was like, ‘OK, great.’ This is the thing that I signed up for and it looks like I might have won something. So call them up. It was like, I don't wanna get scammed, but this is a tasty enough opportunity. Let's give it a shot.”
When Parker called, a receptionist asked for some more information about him and his spouse, and then asked to set up an appointment for a presentation. Parker said he’d have to talk to his wife and call them back.
He then started Googling. He came across an ABC Nightline story from 2016 about a timeshare scam that shared some similar elements to his experience — the promise of a vacation in exchange for sitting through a presentation.
He decided not to call GRV back. He hasn’t heard from them since.
According to initial complaints filed with the Better Business Bureau earlier this year against various GRV offices, people who did attend presentations and sign contracts with GRV had trouble canceling their memberships or activating points, which were included in an Elite package.
GRV responded to each complaint. The company wrote that they enforce a three-business day cancellation policy, which was in writing on the contract. The couple trying to cancel their membership had been using it for a year already.
Regarding points, GRV responded: "The cost of activating points is $0.015 per point. This was explained multiple times and is very clear in the contract. It is disclosed no less than five times in the group presentation."
Browne and Divilbiss say they want people to be genuinely interested in their product.
“We're very transparent,” Browne says. “I'd rather be honest and upfront with somebody and have them not be interested than to have them be interested under a false pretense.”
For some fans, that’s not how it feels. One of Parker’s friends received the same text he did and didn’t feel comfortable following up with GRV. Parker has been telling other friends not to enter the raffle.
He says he still loves the Velocity and will attend soccer games in the future, but feels like he has to be more skeptical about what’s put on the screen or in his hands.
“I'll basically never give my information away or scan a QR code again because I don't know where it's gonna go,” Parker says. “They've broken my trust in some ways.”
On Aug. 21, USL Spokane's vice president of marketing and communications, Dave Sonntag, told the Inlander via email that the Velocity and Zephyr care deeply about the fan experience.
"It is important to USL Spokane that every fan has a great experience, and fans’ trust in us is our top priority," Sonntag wrote. "We are currently in discussion with Great Resort Vacations (GRV) about future promotions at our games. If any fan has questions about their entry in a GRV promotion, please contact Stephen Divilbiss with GRV at [email protected] or (509) 435-8905. Fans can also reach out to us at [email protected] with any questions or concerns."
