⏲ Meet the Guy Solving the Oldest Problem in Sports: Standing in Line

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Happy Wednesday,

These days, stadiums have upgraded everything; the video boards are bigger, the Wi-Fi is faster, and the premium clubs look like full-blown nightclubs.

But one thing hasn’t changed at all: fans still waste half the game standing in lines.

And the wild part? Teams still don’t know why.

They know who bought a ticket, what beer you ordered, and even the spin rate of that last pitch, but once you walk through the gate, the data goes dark. No one knows where fans go, where they get stuck, or how long they’re waiting.

And that blind spot is costing teams real money.

That’s why this week, Jake and I sat down with Sam Porta, founder of Queues, the company finally giving stadiums eyes. His Occupancy AI cut wait times at the Braves’ flagship team store from 45 minutes down to 8, and now virtually every team and league across the country is starting to pay attention.

🎧 [Listen to our full episode with Queues founder Sam Porta]

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5 Takeaways From Our Conversation With Sam Porta

1. It Started With a Starbucks Line

During his first semester at Georgia Tech, Sam walked downstairs for coffee and found a 40-minute line stretching out of the Starbucks. His reaction was simple: How does a top tech school not know this?

So he built the first version of Queues manually, analyzing hours of campus security footage to predict dining hall traffic patterns. Students loved it, it won Georgia Tech’s InVenture Prize, and Sam entered the startup accelerator.

However, the real breakthrough came later, after every part of the original idea fell apart.

2. COVID Blew Up the Company (Then Forced the Breakthrough)

When Georgia Tech’s campus shut down, Queues lost all its users and most of its team. But instead of quitting, Sam used lockdown to train himself in computer vision and build the first automated sensor on a Raspberry Pi.

His thinking was simple: fans waited in line during the 1918 pandemic, then they’d wait in line after this one. “If people were queuing a century ago, the problem isn’t going away,” he told us.

By the time students returned, Queues had its first fully automated prototype and a clear path forward.

3. Stadiums Became the Perfect Test Lab

Queues tested deployments in dining halls, parking lots, Waffle House, and State Farm Arena. But stadiums were the clear winner:

• Tens of thousands of fans

• Massive spikes in demand

• Limited time windows to sell

• Huge revenue upside per minute saved

As Sam put it, “If this can’t succeed in a stadium, it won’t succeed anywhere.” That focus led him to raise $1.2M and launch Queues as a full company in early 2023.

4. The Braves Proved the Power of Real Data

When the Braves remodeled their clubhouse store, they expected shorter lines. Instead, lines doubled (even though the store was half empty).

Queues diagnosed it immediately: the door staff were eyeballing capacity and stopping the line at ~80 people, even though the room safely held 191.

After Queues went live:

• Wait times fell from 45 minutes to 8 minutes

• Fans stopped walking past the line

• Throughput and revenue jumped

• During the All-Star Game, the line wrapped around the building but still moved smoothly

One fan even asked Sam’s team, “What happened? I’ve come to every game this year and there’s always a line.” That story helped put Queues in conversations with half of MLB.

5. Queues Is Quietly Building the Stadium OS

Sam describes the product as Occupancy as a Service: small sensors, anonymous detection, and dashboards that update every 30 seconds. No faces. No personal data. Just movement.

Teams now use Queues to understand:

• Where fans cluster

• How they move

• How long they wait

• When revenue is leaking

“If teams knew how many fans walked past a concession stand without buying, they’d rethink everything,” Sam said.

This is the missing layer of stadium intelligence, and the roadmap stretches far beyond sports: airports, festivals, city districts, anywhere that congestion shapes the customer experience.

Why It Matters

Live events haven’t had a breakthrough in operational data in decades. Ticketing is modern. Sponsorship is modern. Fan engagement is modern.

But the physical experience inside the stadium has lagged behind.

Queues is one of the first companies to close that gap. It’s turning lines, movement, and congestion (things stadiums have always had to guess about) into measurable, fixable, revenue-driving decisions.

If Sam is right, the next generation of venues won’t just be smart. They’ll be responsive.

🎧 [Listen to our full episode with Queues founder Sam Porta]

📩 And don’t forget: Bottom of the Ninth is back this Friday with the top three stories in sports and business from the week.

See you then,
Tyler & Jake