Is the Roof Open?

Major League Baseball

A Question for the Ages.

Well, maybe not THE question, but the most important question if you are planning to attend a baseball game at a retractable roof stadium. Is the roof open? A few years back we developed a nifty little app-like thing that allowed MLB baseball fans attending games in Phoenix, Milwaukee, Seattle, Houston, Toronto and Miami to know the roof status of their stadiums at the flip of their phone. Covered by major sports blogs, ESPN and others—the site was widely accepted and loved by baseball fanatics everywhere despite its niche utility. An in-the-park-homerun we gave tens of thousands of fans the information they needed to be comfortable for their gameday experience.

Is The Roof Open featured a charming design and delivered simple, clear information. Click on your team’s pennant and you were given instant access to the status of the roof. Open, closed, visiting or an off-day; you had what you needed to dress appropriately for the game. Here in Phoenix (and in the other cities) that’s the difference between going in a hoodie or a tanktop.

The admin is where our app really shined. For our official team roof-flippers, the admin made the task of operating the digital roofs as easy as the real ones. Once logged in, all the operator had to do was flip the switch for the next game up or down, for open or closed. We even made it possible to update the status several games in advance.

The next season we came back stronger. It's the same ITRO that everyone loved, just with more polish. We collaborated with our friends over at Oxford Pennant from Buffalo, NY to produce real pennants which we used as invitations to find the official ITRO roof operators for all the teams.