Five or six years ago I bought a Durham Bulls cap in the team store and it’s still my favorite hat. My wife, daughter, mother and I went to a game a couple of weeks ago and I had to go see what I could see in the team store again. I wanted to walk out of there with everything, and I don’t even really like baseball that much. I managed to hold myself to just a hat for my daughter, but there’s no denying the Bulls are doing something right with their product:

MiLB started keeping sales stats of its 160 teams back in 1993. Since then, the Bulls have ranked in the top 25 in merchandise sales each of those 22 seasons, while the Mudcats ranked 17 times.

Same thing goes for the Carolina Mudcats down the road in Zebulon (albeit on a smaller scale).

There may not be a big market here for an MLB franchise, but I love what we have with the Bulls and the product seems to get better every year. If you haven’t been to a Bulls game yet this year, make sure you check ’em out. They play 21 home games in August, so you’ll have plenty of chances to catch them.

P.S. And if you like a frosty beverage every now and then, make sure you check out the beer that’s brewed in house and served using the bottoms up filling system. You’ll even get a souvenir magnet as a reward for drinking it up.