Ticketmaster Auctions

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trevster2k

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LOS ANGELES — Don't be surprised if the best seats for a summer concert are available only via an auction.

Ticketmaster, which dominates the ticket business, is fighting back against online ticket resellers by letting customers bid up the prices for the best seats and returning profits to promoters and artists.

It will auction the best seats to many top summer tours, including Madonna, Shakira, Kelly Clarkson, Red Hot Chili Peppers, Bon Jovi and former Pink Floyd composer Roger Waters.

The Internet has made it easy for speculators to buy tickets and resell them at huge prices at online sites such as Craigslist and eBay.

Ticket sites StubHub and RazorGator do nothing but resell tickets, charging both sellers and buyers service fees.

Ticketmaster auction money is split between the promoter and artist, with Ticketmaster taking a service fee.

Waters will perform Pink Floyd's complete Dark Side of the Moon with a backup band at New York's Madison Square Garden on Sept. 12. Regular top ticket prices are $175; the first four rows' minimum Ticketmaster auction bid is $500. Seats are being resold on StubHub and RazorGator with asking prices soaring to $4,600 and $7,000, respectively.

With the Ticketmaster auctions, "the whole point was to try and recapture revenue that's being generated on the back of the artist and promoter," says Arthur Fogel, president of tour promoter TNA International, which is behind Madonna's summer tour.

The best seats for Madonna's Confessions tour have a face value of $350. The Ticketmaster auction averaged $400 to $500 a ticket, Fogel says.

David Goldberg, Ticketmaster executive vice president, calls the online bidding for show seats "a market solution to an industry problem. It makes it a much more level playing field."

The problem is that the hottest shows sell out in minutes on the Internet. And, Fogel says, resale websites have made it easy for the ordinary computer user to become a ticket broker.

Auctions "move the concert market even further from its roots: music for the people," says Gary Bongiovanni, editor of trade magazine Pollstar. "Concerts are supply and demand, and the person with the most coconuts gets the prize."


Yay, now scalpers will charge even more money for their tickets since they had to pay more through the auction system. This solves nothing, IMO. And average fans will be left out in the cold now. At least before, people could still get lucky and snag some good seats through the regular sales. Sounds like you will need big money now to outbid others for a decent ticket, hmmm.
 
That's wonderful.

The only problem it solves is lost revenue for the artist/promoter.

It doesn't protect the fan at all.

Ah well, that's the market at work for ya.

U2 better offer floors for $50 next time. :mad:
 
Didn't any of you get the memo? Only rich people are allowed to go to concerts. Fuck the fans!
 
Axver said:
Didn't any of you get the memo? Only rich people are allowed to go to concerts. Fuck the fans!

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Guess which one is the fan and guess which one is ticketmaster.
 
Yes, that auction news was a big let down for me when the Roger Waters tickets went on sale a few weeks ago. I'm lucky I even managed to get lower level seats, never mind that they're almost directly opposite the stage.

Ticketmaster can stuff it.
 
GibsonGirl said:
Yes, that auction news was a big let down for me when the Roger Waters tickets went on sale a few weeks ago. I'm lucky I even managed to get lower level seats, never mind that they're almost directly opposite the stage.

Ticketmaster can stuff it.

Yes, apparently they believe the poorer you are, the better your vision.

The only good thing is that most of the stuff deemed popular is shite to me, I hope. Although, the next U2 tour will be insane, I hope TM doesn't touch the GA tickets or we're all f**ked. Good luck trying to go see multiple shows when you are in a bidding war for each ticket for each show. And what happens if you want 2-4 tickets but only win the bid on 1 or 2 and they are not together? What a dumbass idea this could end up being even though I already think it is one.
 
I think and hope some of the bigger artists that are known for "caring" about their fans won't allow this to happen.

Surely U2 would be one of those bands. I think they have enough pull to say no to this idea for their tours.


I wish someone could take ticketmaster down.
 
I have a love/hate relationship with Ticketmaster/House of Blues

Today I received the pre-sale email from HOB for Elton John. I logged on and got fantastic seats (row 18 on the floor). The total price was $324.50

Ticket: $149.50 x 2 (High but still cheaper than U2)
Building Service fee: $2.00 x 2
HOB Service Charge: $9.50 x 2

It's free to join HOB and get the pre-sale emails/codes but you pay for it everytime you buy a ticket through them :|

A few months back I went to see Coldplay and bought my tickets via a Ticketmaster Auction. When tickets first came on sale I tried to buy tickets via the internet but alas there were no tickets for fah :( Magically, I received notification of the Auction and how I could bid on the very best seats to see Coldplay. After reading the info carefully I placed my bid for two tickets at $130 each. No sooner had I and several others placed bids for this sold out concert ~ a second concert was announced and tickets went on sale. I could have gotten great seats for the 2nd show but I didn't buy them as I was already committed to my bid for tickets for the first show.

As it turns out, Coldplay were great as were the seats but the auction left a bitter taste in my mouth.

Earlier this month I tried to get RHCP tickets but alas, there were no tickets for fah :( I declined Ticketmaster's generous option of bidding on tickets :wink:
 
*points to Tom Petty's "Money Becomes King"*

Nothing particularly new or suprising about people putting $ ahead of the music and the fans. Its been going on for ages.
 
I just don't understand the "convenience" charge. I recently bought 2 tickets for a show. Each ticket = $48.50. Each ticket's "convenience charge" was $10.70. Then there was the "order processing fee" of $4.80. So my two $48.50 tickets ($97.00) cost me $123.20 :der: The extra $15.50 in fees makes no sense to me. If they want to charge fees, include them in the cost of the ticket. It's not like I have a choice to go to another ticket seller and buy them (meaning not on the resale/black market/ebay route). Damn monopolies!!! And had I bought a better seat to this particular show ($72 face), my "convenience" charge would have increased as well, to about $12.50. I'm sure the Order Processing fee would have been more too. Yeah, show me the logic there :mad:

And to top this all off... I tried to get tickets for said show above at the moment it went on sale at 10:00am (I didn't care for the pre-sale tickets that were popping up, so I took my chances on the regular sale). So, being that I'm a new American Express Gold Card owner, I thought I would use "the password" to see what tickets were offered. Nothing came up. Had to go the regular route sale. So that evening, I thought for the heck of it I'd type in the password and see 'Best Available'. Prime section Loge tickets came up in the high-end of the ticket pricing range, but I had already bought tickets earlier in the day, and I wasn't willing to pay the $72+ per ticket, which would probably, after all was said and done, cost me about $200 for the pair :madspit:
 
If it weren't for ticketmaster, I'd pobably go see a lot more shows. I hate putting money in their pocket and because of that I go to only shows that I have a moral obligation to see (Jane's Addiction or The Pixies) or if I buy tickets as a gift for someone.

Ticketmaster can suck me and then GFI. Monopolistic bastards. :mad:

And any band that charges over $100 for a ticket is insane if they think I'm droping that much money on a show (except a fully reunited Floyd, or if someone figures out a way to raise John Lennon and George Harrison and gets the Beatles back together). I'll stick with paying $10 in Manhattan and seeing 5 bands (one of which may be good).
 
trevster2k said:

And what happens if you want 2-4 tickets but only win the bid on 1 or 2 and they are not together? What a dumbass idea this could end up being even though I already think it is one.

You bid on 2 or 4 tickets and they will be together.

I'll take the risky minority view here and say it is a good idea.
BTW- TM does this only with the consent of the artist.

In fact, I just won 5th row center for Roger Waters on the TM auction for far less than a scalper would have charged me. There are lawn tickets available for $30 as well to the show. I am planning to see him only once on the tour, and I think it's more fair for the fans in a particular city to get good seats. With U2's $50 GAs, you have too many fans IMO from out of town taking away spots from the residents of a particular city.

:runs:
 
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ntalwar said:
With U2's $50 GAs, you have too many fans IMO from out of town taking away spots from the residents of a particular city.

Ever thought that's because U2 doesn't tour properly so people have to travel long distances to see them?
 
Axver said:


Ever thought that's because U2 doesn't tour properly so people have to travel long distances to see them?

True - I was referring more to people in say, New York who travel to Philadelphia or Boston. The US East Coast has too much of that IMO and forces a lot of residents of the cities to use scalpers or not even be able to see U2.
 
martha said:
You don't travel to see the band at all?

I did travel to another city to see U2 in addition to my own city, so I am guilty of it. Had premium tickets been priced at their true market value however, it may have discouraged me a bit. That's part of the reason I'm not traveling out of town to see Roger Waters again, and I feel it's fair. I don't think that U2 especially encourage this practice. The ellipse policy and similar setlists are examples of things that help discourage it, whether or not they were designed to do that.
 
ntalwar said:
The ellipse policy and similar setlists are examples of things that help discourage it, whether or not they were designed to do that.

Ellipse policy, maybe (though then why only in North America, not Europe?). Stale setlists is just because they're lazy.
 
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