Honestly it needs to be easier to get your feet wet. Some people don't want to pay to find out if they /want/ to make a 2-3 month commitment, play in a team environment, play competitive tf2, or all of the above. Some people can't even pay, and can't get the overwhelming desire to save what little money they have to put it towards ESEA, especially with free alternatives like UGC or just being a pug player.
Please tell them to give Tri as many promotional season-long premium codes as possible. ESEA can't lose money from people that would never pay for their first season in the first place. They will gain new members once some get a taste of what it's like, and many of these players will stay around for the future seasons (when I look in the archived spreadsheets from previous newbie mix drives, I see A LOT of familiar names).
edit: also make sure invite round robin actually gets used next season if we have 9 teams.