Why scalpers?

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RA-D

War Child
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Dec 11, 2004
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Sorry for sounding ridiculously stupid, I'm sure there is a really obvious answer to this slippling my mind.

Why do whoever has power over ticket distribution, at a guess Clear Channel (?), consciously choose to distribute tickets to brokers and scalpers instead of putting them up for general sale to the public?

Do they pay more for the tickets than us? Its not like the concerts are not going to sell out to us fans anyway, the level of debate currently flowing is testiment to that, so why choose to sell to these profiteers and engineer more controversy than to the general public?

Thanks for any replies.
 
RA-D said:

Do they pay more for the tickets than us? .

Bingo. The brokers and agencies pay far more to Ticketmaster then what we would pay ($50 for GA).....so Ticketmaster gets more money by selling them to agencies for double or triple their value......and then the agencies will sell them to fans for double or triple THAT value.

As for bad publicity,Ticketmaster doesn't care. They have a stranglehold over ticketing here in the United States. You can't hurt a monopoly, so they don't care about bad press. In fact, the US government investigated them in the midnineties (Pearl Jam were witnesses and had decided to not tour with Ticketmaster)....and nothing came out of it.

U2 beat the system last time by offering GA tickets to fan club members. They didn't secure the tickets themselves this time around, and they (and we) all got ripped off by Ticketbastard.
 
I guess (and I'm no expert) because scalpers will inevitably get more cash for tickets, thus kick back more cash to whomever they got them from.

Supply and demand really - despite scalper costs being a ridiculous joke, some people will simply pay way over the odds to see their favourite band.

It sucks for those fans who can't afford hundred, or indeed thousands of dollars in some cases. That said, there are people to whom a thousand dollars isn't a great deal of money to pay.

Wish I was one of them! LOL
 
Most of the scalpers tickets are bought by big business - and in places like NY, Chicago & LA - it is the brokerage houses.

The amount of money they spend on entertainment is unbelievable. To spend $1,000 on tickets for a client with even a small portfolio happens all the time.

As far as supply goes - the promoter & the people at ticketmaster are skimming tickets off the top. Not much left for the real fan
 
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