Season Passes are time-bound, tiered memberships built around a specific campaign - from a singular event like an album release or tour, to seasonal content like a podcast season or video series.

Every artist, creator & brand needs to own the relationship with their fans. But today creators really only have access to a single membership model, the recurring subscription. And while this model’s proven effective for many types of creators and use cases, in talking to creators we’ve heard loud and clear that this model also has some important limitations and drawbacks that make it ill-suited for many types of creators and fanbases.

Some of these challenges include:

• They require a long-term commitment from a creator to provide consistent value to members indefinitely
• They’re hard to effectively manage and maintain over time
• They can lead to subscription fatigue for fans
• They often have unclear ROI for creators and unclear value to fans, feeling more like pure patronage than a clear value exchange between creator <> fan
• Most membership platforms today are siloed and one-size-fits-all, requiring creators to send fans to another platform they don’t control, while sacrificing their branding
• Perhaps most importantly, they don’t fit many common creator use cases - such as an album release, tour, or new season of content (e.g. podcasts, book release, video content, sports leagues & event series) - all of which are time-bound in nature

Season Passes are time-bound, customizable, and cross-platform memberships built around a specific event or campaign.

We believe Season Passes are a compelling alternative to (and can even complement) a traditional subscription membership, with numerous benefits for both creators and fans such as:

• Time-bound: Engage fans without the commitment of a never-ending subscription, and without worrying about contributing to subscription fatigue for fans.
• Campaign-based: Align pass perks & benefits with your existing campaign goals, be that engagement, ticket / merch sales, or content streams.
• Give more value to fans: Offer fans clear and tangible value - from early or exclusive access to content, to members-only events & experiences, to exclusive commerce - without creating tons of additional work for yourself.
• Flexible: Seasons are designed to give creators unparalleled flexibility and customization, giving you control over everything from season duration, to pass tiers & pricing, to perks & benefits, and finally to the overall layout & design of your site. Design a season around a one-off use case such as an upcoming release or tour, or create regularly recurring seasons around a seasonal content schedule.
• Cross-platform: Season Passes are onchain, making them creator-owned and cross-platform by default. Drive fans to your own domain rather than yet another platform you don’t control, and offer pass perks & benefits across the platforms you already use, including Shopify, Ticketmaster, Discord, and more.

Season Passes are rolling out today in private beta. During beta we’ll be working closely with select partners to design and create unique seasons around their upcoming campaigns, while we continue to collect feedback and iterate on the product experience.

To apply for early access, join the waitlist and tell us how you’d like to use Season Passes.

This is just the beginning for seasons and season passes on Bonfire. Stay tuned for more exciting updates and announcements soon.