To those complaining about tickets now...

Key Lime Lee · Post by **Key Lime Lee** » September 1, 2003 5:24 pm

http://www.nytimes.com/2003/09/01/techn ... 1TICK.html

September 1, 2003

Ticketmaster Auction Will Let Highest Bidder Set Concert Prices
By CHRIS NELSON

Three years after Ticketmaster introduced ticketFast, its online print-at-home ticketing service, consumers have so embraced it that the company now sells a half-million home-printed tickets for sporting and entertainment events each month in North America. Where ticketFast is available, 30 percent of tickets sold are now printed at home, said the company, which is by far the nation's largest ticket agency.

But consumers — many of whom have complained for years about climbing ticket prices and Ticketmaster service charges — may be less eager for the next phase of Ticketmaster's Internet evolution.

Late this year the company plans to begin auctioning the best seats to concerts through ticketmaster.com.

With no official price ceiling on such tickets, Ticketmaster will be able to compete with brokers and scalpers for the highest price a market will bear.

"The tickets are worth what they're worth," said John Pleasants, Ticketmaster's president and chief executive. "If somebody wants to charge $50 for a ticket, but it's actually worth $1,000 on eBay, the ticket's worth $1,000. I think more and more, our clients — the promoters, the clients in the buildings and the bands themselves — are saying to themselves, `Maybe that money should be coming to me instead of Bob the Broker.' "

EBay has long been a busy marketplace for tickets auctioned by brokers and others. Late last week, for example, it had more than 22,000 listings for ticket sales.

Venue operators, promoters and performers will decide whether to participate in the Ticketmaster auctions, Mr. Pleasants said. In June, the company tested the system for the Lennox Lewis-Vitali Klitschko boxing match at the Staples Center in Los Angeles. The minimum bid for the package — two ringside seats, a boxing glove autographed by Mr. Lewis and access to workouts, among other features — was $3,000, and the top payer spent about $7,000, a Staples Center spokesman, Michael Roth, said.

Once the auction service goes live, Ticketmaster will receive flat fees or a percentage of the winning bids, to be decided with the operators of each event, said Sean Moriarty, Ticketmaster's executive vice president for products, technology and operations.

Along with home printing, auctions are central to "a new age of the ticket," Mr. Pleasants said. In the second quarter of this year, tickets sold online, with or without home printing, represented 51 percent of Ticketmaster's ticket sales. The rest were sold by phone or at walk-up locations.

Ticket Forwarding allows season ticket holders for several sports teams (including the New York Knicks, Rangers and Giants) to e-mail extra tickets to other users, with Ticketmaster charging the sender $1.95 per transaction.

TicketExchange provides a forum for season ticket holders to auction tickets online. The seller and buyer pay Ticketmaster 5 percent to 10 percent of the resale price, a fee the company splits with the team.

In the case of the ticketFast home-printing service, buyers pay an additional $1.75 to $2.50 per order, with the fee set by the event operator. Home printing has won converts among people who want tickets immediately, instead of receiving them by mail or a delivery service or having to stand in line at a will-call window.

One satisfied customer is Brian Resnik, 29, of Tampa, Fla., who says the home-printing fee is a bargain compared with the $19.50 that Ticketmaster charges for two-day shipping through United Parcel Service.

But some other users, who praised the convenience of home printing, objected to being charged an extra fee.

"It's kind of mind-boggling to me," said Joe Guckin, 41, of Philadelphia, who used ticketFast to buy tickets for a Baltimore Orioles home game last season. "You're printing up the ticket, on your printer at home, your paper, your ink, etc. — and you have to pay for that?"

The company replies that home-printing consumers are helping to pay for the technology that makes the service possible.

Ticketmaster has spent $15 million to $20 million to outfit almost 700 stadiums, arenas, theaters and concert halls in this country and Canada with bar-code scanners that read and authenticate the tickets and computers that capture information such as which seats are filled and which doors have the most traffic, Mr. Moriarty said. In 2003, the company has sold 400,000 to 600,000 ticketFast tickets each month.

Some ticketFast customers, like Diane DeRooy, 52, of Seattle, complain that Ticketmaster assesses a lot of fees even before levying the print-at-home charge. A ticket to see Crosby, Stills & Nash on Friday at the PNC Bank Arts Center in Holmdel, N.J., for example, carries $13.80 in venue, processing and convenience fees, plus a $2.50 charge for the home-printing option. Without the fees, a ticket costs $30.25 to $70.25.

Many of those customers are skeptical about Ticketmaster's plans to auction the best seats to concerts.

"The band's biggest fans ought to have the best seats, not the band's richest fans," said Tim Todd, 47, of Kansas City, Mo., who used ticketFast recently to buy tickets for a concert by the rock group Phish. Ticketmaster would be, in essence, official scalpers, Mr. Guckin said, voicing a sentiment expressed by some other customers.

Industry watchers agree that auctions will affect all concertgoers. Prime seats are undervalued in the marketplace, said Alan B. Krueger, a professor at Princeton University's Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs, who has studied ticket prices. He predicts that once auctions begin revealing a ticket's market value, prices as a whole will climb faster.

Gary Bongiovanni, editor of the concert industry trade magazine, Pollstar, predicted that all ticket prices would become more fluid. After a promoter assesses initial sales from an auction, remaining ticket prices could be raised or lowered to meet goals.

The notion of ticket auctions is annoying, Mr. Resnik said, but he is resigned to them.

"I guess the capitalist inside me would say, `Hey, if that's what they can get for tickets, I guess that's just something I can't afford, like a yacht and a Learjet.' "

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hawaiiboy · Post by **hawaiiboy** » September 1, 2003 6:17 pm

Thanks fo posting this Key Lime. Lets all hope that this idea somehow falls flat. This will just make it far more difficult for regular Parrotheads to go to the shows,not even being considered are the pholks that do not have access a computer or a credit card. Hopefully Jimmy will not play along with this.

f2cdlzrd · Post by **f2cdlzrd** » September 1, 2003 6:20 pm

We can always hope and pray for the best!

Phins Up!

TheJoker · Post by **TheJoker** » September 1, 2003 6:22 pm

ticketmaster is the evil beast

dean_siu · Post by **dean_siu** » September 1, 2003 6:34 pm

I really don't think this would make that much of a difference.....most the good tickets reach the brokers instead of the real fan anyways. The only difference here is that Jimmy (or any artist participating) would get a bigger piece of that entertainment dollar instead of the legalized scalpers (i.e. ticket brokers) taking advantage of the public.

Mplsfins · Post by **Mplsfins** » September 1, 2003 6:34 pm

This will not be legal in Minnesota. A flat fee must be imposed for
the sale of a ticket and scalping is not legal in Minnesota.
My 2 cents worth.

Jason

*wahine*surfer · Post by *wahine*surfer » September 1, 2003 6:34 pm

ticketmaster s****!! i really hope that jimmy doesn't go along with this stupid idea

its already hard enough to find tickets at decent prices...

SchoolGirlHeart · Post by **SchoolGirlHeart** » September 1, 2003 6:40 pm

This is one *seriously* horrendous idea!!! I predict it will price the average fan right out of the market....

Air M'Ville Cap'n · Post by **Air M'Ville Cap'n** » September 1, 2003 6:42 pm

"The band's biggest fans ought to have the best seats, not the band's richest fans," said Tim Todd, 47, of Kansas City, Mo.

Good call Tim Todd

Phins1026 · Post by **Phins1026** » September 1, 2003 7:07 pm

You have got to be f'n kidding me. Someone needs to pump some fresh oxygen into those executive board meetings over there at Ticketmaster.
Sounds like another example of getting screwed without even a kiss.
I can hardly wait for this.

SchoolGirlHeart · Post by **SchoolGirlHeart** » September 1, 2003 7:13 pm

Perhaps a letter writing campaign is in order.....

Or a boycott....

bumper · Post by **bumper** » September 1, 2003 7:30 pm

I can see the demand supply side of the reasoning. But I do not think it will work, people will not pay 1k to see a performer, the masses have better sense then that

gumbo gal · Post by **gumbo gal** » September 1, 2003 9:10 pm

this totally and royally s*cks!

I hope too that Jimmy does not decide to play along. I still think it would be a good idea for Jimmy to do what the Dead did with the mail order thing. Sure, you might get lawn seats, but then again, you might get front row! AND you would get them for face value. I would volunteer to work on the mail order staff for free (well, maybe to get a couple good pairs of seats once a year and help out my good pals here from BN too)

sirgumby77 · Post by **sirgumby77** » September 1, 2003 10:47 pm

Just watched this on the news----the ARTIST must AGREE to this. Lets hope Jimmy does not agree to this.

freddie · Post by **freddie** » September 1, 2003 10:52 pm

oh crap, what next..................

Love and Luck · Post by **Love and Luck** » September 1, 2003 11:24 pm

SchoolGirlHeart wrote:Perhaps a letter writing campaign is in order.....

Or a boycott....

Where do I sign?

dean_siu · Post by **dean_siu** » September 2, 2003 12:13 am

I really don't forsee this being much more of a problem than the current situation.....they are only talking about the best seats being auctioned off and these are usually not available anyways.

How many times have you (or someone you know) been first in line to get tickets for a particular venue only to have no prime seats available when tickets are released?

The brokers somehow get their hands on these before they go on sale. It sucks that these end up selling for $500-$1000....but if I'm ever gonna pay that price to sit in the first few rows.....I'd rather have the money go to Jimmy (or even split between Jimmy, the venue, tour management, etc.) than to have a ticket broker who does nothing make the bulk of the money on these ticket sales.

Sure.....I'd rather have a lottery or some other form of access that gives true fans access to prime tickets at reasonable prices....but its not there now and I don't see it changing for the better anytime soon.

PA PAR8 HED · Post by **PA PAR8 HED** » September 2, 2003 10:22 am

If this took the place of "scalping", I wouldn't mind it so much. But it seems to me, the agents and brokers and ebayers will continue to get and resell tix the way they have always done it. TM will now take those few good seats that had been available and run up the prices on those too! OUCH!

I'd like to see Jimmy try what Bruce seems to be doing. Hold back some of the best seats and do a ticket drop so close to the event that there is almost no chance to resell them.

CRC Parrothead · Post by **CRC Parrothead** » September 2, 2003 10:44 am

I just have to believe that Jimmy wouldn't go for this.

But since it's kind of a slap in the face to scalpers, would he??

East Texas Parrothead · September 2, 2003 12:12 pm

It this happens, I doubt I'll be able to afford to see Jimmy. I've seen those tickets on EBay....at $1,000 a pop, it's too rich for my blood.

This is not good news. I understand about wanting to recoup what the scalpers make, but we're the ones who will ultimately pay. The scalpers will get theirs, make no mistake about that.

Sheesh.

Thank goodness for RadioMargaritaville....that'll be my only way to "see" a show.