Supriya Christopher was sitting inside an old bank, describing the architectural details around her, when I realized our conversation was already making a pretty good case for visiting Savannah.
Outside her office were Bay Street and the Savannah River. Inside were the kinds of details you don’t usually find above your desk in a modern office building.
I was on the other end of a virtual call from the Seattle area. I’ve followed the Savannah Bananas around the country, but I haven’t visited their hometown yet.
That was part of the reason I wanted to talk.
You may find it funny that I am researching this after the Banana Ball season is over, but as you’ll see, the team’s economic footprint extends far beyond the final pitch.
What happens when you go to Savannah for Banana Ball, then discover you haven’t left yourself enough time for Savannah?
Christopher, Visit Savannah’s director of public relations, had plenty of ideas. But the most interesting part of our conversation went beyond where to eat or book a hotel.
Savannah is figuring out how to turn the excitement surrounding its famous team into an experience that reaches businesses and neighborhoods beyond the ballpark.
The October playoff weekend offered a chance to try it.
The Savannah Bananas get people talking about Savannah
Christopher’s job takes her around the country. Increasingly, she said, mentioning Savannah prompts a familiar response.
“Wherever I go, I’m going to meet somebody who comes up to me and says, my God, I love the Savannah Bananas.”
That’s a useful introduction for someone whose job is getting people interested in a destination.
Christopher was careful to point out that Savannah’s appeal did not begin with Banana Ball. The city already attracted travelers interested in its history, architecture, food and culture.
The team adds another reason to pay attention.
“The energy that it has brought to Savannah and to the interest it has brought to Savannah is just unbelievable,” she said.
I’m interested in what happens after that initial recognition. Someone might first encounter Savannah through a video of a trick play or a dancing player. Eventually, that person may want to see where the whole thing started.
Getting them interested is one step. Helping them build a worthwhile trip is another.
A playoff weekend that didn’t require a game ticket
Visit Savannah’s October 1–4 Banana Ball Playoff Weekend was designed to spread the celebration throughout the city.
The organization promoted player appearances, watch parties and special offers at participating businesses. A free mobile Playoff Pass connected visitors with discounts, check-ins and rewards. Fans didn’t need a Grayson Stadium ticket to participate in the citywide activities.
Christopher described restaurants and hotels developing banana-themed drinks, meals and desserts. Businesses displayed playoff signs. Visit Savannah staff wore Bananas gear and helped promote the weekend.
“Everyone was in the spirit of the bananas,” she said.
Then the weather became a problem.
Christopher recalled rain arriving as the festivities were getting underway. Even so, she said, people came out.
The idea interests me because it addresses something a stadium alone cannot: not everyone who wants to be part of Banana Ball can get into a game.
A citywide celebration gives those fans something to do. It also gives ticket holders a reason to spend time - and potentially money - outside the stadium before and after the game.
That doesn’t make every restaurant customer a Banana Ball tourist. It does create an opportunity worth measuring.
What do we know about the tourism impact?
For specific information about tourism data, she brought Lauren Cleland, Visit Savannah’s vice president of strategic marketing and director of digital marketing, into the conversation.
Cleland had preliminary information from the playoff weekend, including responses to a survey of Playoff Pass holders.
“So we did a survey to pass holders afterwards and those respondents alone reported $312,000 in spending,” Cleland said.
She emphasized that the respondents represented only a subset of pass holders. She also reported median spending of $1,000 among visiting groups in the survey.
Those figures are an early indication of spending among respondents - not a completed calculation of what Banana Ball added to Savannah’s economy. The interview did not establish the survey’s sample size or full methodology.
Cleland said a fuller economic-impact report was expected in late November, after additional hotel reporting and analysis became available.
That’s the follow-up I want to see.
There’s a difference between observing an enthusiastic crowd and establishing how much additional business an event generates. The first can be seen in the street. The second takes more work.
Where should Savannah Bananas fans stay?
I gave Christopher a practical scenario: suppose I bring my wife, possibly our college-age son, and we have enough time to explore. Where should we base ourselves?
Her recommendation for a first visit was the Historic District.
“I would suggest that you and your wife and son stay in the historic district, especially for someone who has never been to Savannah,” she said.
She also made a distinction that matters when choosing a hotel: Grayson Stadium is in Daffin Park, outside the downtown Historic District she was describing.
In other words, staying downtown for sightseeing and staying within walking distance of the ballpark are different decisions.
Her advice was to choose a base that lets us experience the city, then arrange transportation to the game.
That makes sense to me. If I’m traveling across the country, I don’t want to select an entire week’s accommodations around one evening without considering everything else we want to do.
Christopher discussed several types of lodging, from luxury hotels to bed-and-breakfasts. The right choice depends on the traveler’s budget, preferred location and plans - not simply whether a property appears near the stadium on a map.
Her first recommendation wasn’t a restaurant
It was a trolley tour.
“I always tell everybody you start with the trolley tour,” Christopher said.
Her suggestion was to ride a full loop first, roughly 90 minutes on the tour she described, before beginning the hop-on, hop-off portion. Learn the layout and hear the stories. Then decide where to spend more time.
I like that approach. Otherwise, I’m the guy finding something interesting on the last afternoon and wondering why nobody mentioned it earlier.
Christopher described the appeal of moving between historic surroundings and contemporary restaurants, shops and cultural attractions. She also suggested considering a trip to Tybee Island for a different pace.
For planning, she pointed to VisitSavannah.com, where travelers can research the destination and explore its itinerary-planning tools.
The takeaway wasn’t to cram every attraction into a checklist. It was to leave enough room in the trip to discover something beyond the reason you booked it.
Why Banana Ball fits more than one kind of visitor
“The unique quality of the Savannah Bananas is that they bring everyone together,” Christopher said.
She talked about couples, families, individual travelers and different generations finding something to enjoy.
Her own family has a baseball background. Her husband played at the Naval Academy, she said, and their visits to Grayson have included the kind of small moment that becomes a family story: he caught a ball in the stands and gave it to a young boy.
Our conversation turned to whether that sense of connection survives in larger stadiums.
I told her about my experiences on the road, where performers and cast members moved through the crowd. The drum corps might be nearby. Princess Potassia might stop to talk. Even in a large venue, there were moments when the show felt close.
Christopher knew the experience from Grayson. I knew it from other stops.
It made me more curious about seeing the team at home.
Could Savannah build more weekends around Banana Ball?
Cleland described the recent Banana Ball playoff promotion as an initial test rather than a finished formula.
“I think we showed this was proof of concept,” she said.
She said the effort came together with less than two months of preparation and saw room for stronger coordination and more advance planning in the future.
Cleland also raised the possibility of connecting citywide experiences with other Banana Ball occasions, such as a draft, city selection or training activities.
Those were possibilities discussed in our interview, not a newly announced event calendar.
But the question is a good one: how can Savannah give fans more reasons to visit throughout the year?
A player appearance, a watch party or an event at a local business doesn’t need to duplicate the stadium experience. It can offer something different - and introduce a visitor to a part of the city they might otherwise miss.
I still need to make that first Savannah trip
At one point, Christopher offered a fairly accurate assessment of my enthusiasm for covering Banana Ball.
“You’re a kid in a candy store.”
Fair enough.
But this conversation gave me something more specific to pursue than another reason to say the Bananas are fun.
I want to understand how their hometown is responding. Which businesses participate? What do visitors do beyond the game? How many return? And what will the completed research tell us that the early excitement cannot?
I also want to take that trolley ride.
The Bananas are already a reason for me to go to Savannah. After talking with Christopher and Cleland, I’m less worried about finding things to do and more concerned about leaving myself enough days.
See additional Savannah Bananas On SI content!
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