Kansas City Chiefs fans struggling with ticket payments can finance them on a team-issued credit card. Got a dirty windshield? Buffalo Bills boosters renewing season tickets online enjoy a free car wash. Ford Field, home of the Detroit Lions, claims the NFL’s first all-you-can-eat section. Jacksonville Jaguars supporters choose between a dozen ticket packages. The Oakland Raiders even subsidize the train to the game.

NFL teams, confronting the worst economy many have ever faced, unveiled a rush of new ticket-sales initiatives this off-season that just 12 months ago would have been unthinkable in the country’s most popular sport.

According to a SportsBusiness Journal survey of the NFL’s 32 teams, only three—the Baltimore Ravens, Philadelphia Eagles, and Tennessee Titans—did not try a new sales push or freeze ticket prices this off-season.

Giveaways, food discounts, and flexible payment plans—once the domain of other sports burdened by longer seasons and less popular games—are now seeping into the NFL, whose regular season kicks off Thursday.

“In St. Louis, the days of rolling out the football and expecting to sell out are done, and maybe across the NFL as well,” said Kevin Demoff, the chief operating officer of the St. Louis Rams, which had two games blacked out last season and are struggling to sell out this season. “We are more aggressively pushing single-games seats. It is difficult for us in this economy. Coming off a 2-14 season, it is a double whammy. We have shaken off all the people who were tangential followers.”

Teams failing to sell out within 72 hours of kickoff cannot televise the contest locally, a big hit for sponsors expecting that exposure, not to mention the loss to fans. Last year, blackouts afflicted only nine out of 256 games, but the percentage is sure to rise this season after the league informed owners last month that nearly two out of every five teams were struggling to sell out.

The NFL will never mimic the minor leagues with its well-worn staple of corny sales gimmickry, or even, for that matter, the NBA, MLB, or NHL, whose teams have five to 10 times the number of home games to sell. But football is clearly moving away from its plain-vanilla sales culture.

The most popular response to the recession has been freezing or cutting ticket prices, with 22 NFL teams taking that measure, while another five largely kept prices flat but with some increases elsewhere in their stadiums. Only four teams—the Titans, Eagles, Ravens, and Houston Texans—raised ticket prices across the board. The Dallas Cowboys opened a new stadium this year, so price comparisons are not relevant, in part because the club has been selling 2009 for several years.

Other popular approaches to the poor economy are group-ticket packages and flexible payments. Even teams like the Washington Redskins and Denver Broncos, which sold out easily, said they were more flexible with late payments.

“You have to understand the pain the consumer is going through outweighs whatever cash-flow issues you have from time to time,” said Joe Ellis, the Broncos’ chief operating officer.

The Minnesota Vikings and New Orleans Saints hired eLayaway, which manages payments, to allow fans to pay in increments as brief as weekly. Historically, teams require either lump-sum payments or are allowed two installments. The Chicago Bears became the final team this off-season to accept credit cards. “That got a voluminous response,” said George McCaskey, the club’s senior director of ticket operations.

Eight teams this off-season, for the first time in their history, staged town-hall meetings or conference calls for season-ticket holders with coaches and executives.

“We are doing a variety of outreach initiatives where season-ticket holders feel a more passionate connection,” explained Mark Wilf, president of the Vikings, which held its "State of the Vikings" meeting at Minneapolis’ Municipal Theatre.

With every fan precious, no detail is too minor. At an Atlanta Falcons town-hall meeting, one fan asked team owner Arthur Blank why the cannons that shoot T-shirts into the crowd can’t reach the Georgia Dome’s upper deck. So the team hired 16 game-day workers to throw out T-shirts in the upper deck.