Secondary Ticket Markets: Yay or Nay?

[RaceBoarder]

Just an idea that I've had floating in my head for a while here now, and the talk of the Frozen Four tickets on the D-1 board brought it back to the forefront....

Simple question: Are secondary ticket markets good or bad? Should (Can?) teams and venues take more steps to eliminate them or should they be partnering with them?

Just curious how others felt on this subject... Personally, I don't see a simple answer either way, but I am leaning towards being against allowing secondary markets as they are now... I do feel that teams and venues should be doing their best to make sure that tickets are going to people that truly want them and intend to use them... I wouldn't have a problem paying a premium in order to see something implemented to allow this...

Here in Chicago, Hawks tickets and concerts are my main examples... The "For profit" brokers own such a significant % of the available tickets that they are able to artificially drive up prices... I do understand that this is supply and demand in it's simplest form... The problem arises when these vendors earn enough profits that they simply start eating tickets instead of lowering ticket prices as an event approaches... They simply hang tickets out there at an outrageous price hope for a big score... Only at the last minute do these tickets finally come down, but at that point it is such a hassle to acquire them, you have to weigh that in as well...

So what are your thoughts and experiences with the secondary ticket markets for sports, concerts, and other events?

[FlagDUDE08]

Re: Secondary Ticket Markets: Yay or Nay?

They want to drive up prices for convenience? That's their prerogative. There's no one saying you have to utilize their service.

[RaceBoarder]

Re: Secondary Ticket Markets: Yay or Nay?

Well yes and no... The problem comes in when events have little or no seats available to the one-off consumer... Hawks tickets are a prime example... About 98% of actual seats in the building are sold off on a season ticket basis... There are under 500 that went on sale as "single game" tickets in a building that seats ~21,500... About 20-25% of the seats sold as season tickets are sold directly to "for profit" brokers that have no intention of ever personally attending a single game.... A good chunk of the remaining seats are owned by people who attend some games, but sell others at a profit to pay for their tickets... I'd venture that over 50% of the United Center is owned by people that never intend to go to the game on certain dates... That's where my beef is...

[aparch]

Re: Secondary Ticket Markets: Yay or Nay?

I like the secondary ticket market if I can take advantage of what the "ideal" reason for it is: Season ticket holders, or just ticket holders, looking to get money for a ticket they cannot use. I have never paid more than face with any of my purchases on StubHub.

As for the ticket brokers using it to inflate the prices and profit... Good for them. If I had the resources to do that, I'd probably jump into it too with how popular teams are in Chicago as "THE Ticket" to get. I just hope that there is a bit of "market correction" when some of these super-brokers have to eat too many tickets.

[RaceBoarder]

Re: Secondary Ticket Markets: Yay or Nay?

I like the secondary ticket market if I can take advantage of what the "ideal" reason for it is: Season ticket holders, or just ticket holders, looking to get money for a ticket they cannot use. I have never paid more than face with any of my purchases on StubHub.

As for the ticket brokers using it to inflate the prices and profit... Good for them. If I had the resources to do that, I'd probably jump into it too with how popular teams are in Chicago as "THE Ticket" to get. I just hope that there is a bit of "market correction" when some of these super-brokers have to eat too many tickets.

That's why I'm sorta stuck in the middle on the issue... Last August and September, I attended about 6 baseball games here in Chicago for about $35.... That was probably about 1/6th of the face value of the tickets that were used... Like I said earlier, Supply/Demand in it's simplest form... Unfortunately, I don't see that "Market Correction" coming anytime soon for certain teams, and will probably never happen for one off events like concerts...

[Priceless]

Re: Secondary Ticket Markets: Yay or Nay?

I was comparing prices on StubHub and AceTicket last night for seats to the AFC title game and the Hockey East playoffs. Tickets are going on AceTicket for 4 times face value. Over on StubHub (where fans sell the tickets, SH takes a 15% commission) the prices are much more reasonable. I have four tickets currently listed on StubHub but I am also going to see how much AT will give me for them. If they're going to use the system, so am I.

As for buying, if I had to use one, I'd use StubHub since 1) prices are usually more reasonable and 2) I'm buying directly from another fan (usually) not a broker.

[goldy_331]

Re: Secondary Ticket Markets: Yay or Nay?

How about craigslist? I have sold some Gopher tickets there for face value when I had a conflict.

[CLS]

Re: Secondary Ticket Markets: Yay or Nay?

I wonder if the question isn’t so much directed to whether you buy directly from the venue/team or buy from a secondary market as it is what pricing policy they vendor you buy from uses.

Primary markets for pro sporting events tend to have variance from seat location to seat location, but tickets don’t vary as much from event to event. Also primary markets tend to try to push season tickets, which gives them income sooner and minimizes their risk. In Race Boarder's situation with (Black?) Hawks tickets, they could, if they wanted, price the game tickets and season tickets such that more "one of" tickets were available. They choose not to.

But what if teams/venues started pricing the way the secondary market does, namely by charging what the market will bear on a game by game basis? For example, is the issue that you mind or don’t mind paying $500 for a Red Sox – Yankees ticket per se? Or do you feel differently paying $500 for the ticket to the Red Sox than you feel paying it to a reseller? What if the team eliminated resellers, but adopted the pricing strategy that the resellers use? Do you feel differently about paying $50 to a private reseller on Craigslist than you do paying $50 to Stub Hub?

And if the team farms out the ticket sales so that you can’t buy a ticket directly from the team but instead have to buy it through TicketBastahd do you consider that buying from a secondary market or not? Emotionally, I’d much rather buy a ticket from Stub Hub for, say, $50 than buy a ticket from TicketMaster for $40 plus a $5 “convenience fee” and $5 “processing fee” even if the out of pocket price is the same.

“Value pricing” is a concept that some teams have dabbled with, and I believe some teams actually do to some extent. Don’t some schools charge more for seats to “rivalry” games, or weekend games? I also have become very suspicious by that some of the arrangements between teams and resellers are disguised ways of the team charging more for attractive games or dumping tickets for less attractive games.

[FlagDUDE08]

Re: Secondary Ticket Markets: Yay or Nay?

Yes, there are some schools (like RPI) that do charge more for certain games (namely Union, CCT, Cornell, and Freakout).

Also, one thing that the Sabres do is tiered pricing based upon who the opponent is and when the game is being played. They have five tiers: Platinum, Gold, Silver, Bronze, and Value. You'll only see Value on weeknights against some of the western teams, while Platinum is typically used for the Friday/Saturday games against Toronto.

The Crunch also add $2 to the price when the opponent is the Amerks.

[burgie12]

Re: Secondary Ticket Markets: Yay or Nay?

Dynamic pricing takes it even further and is a system currently used by the Giants, Dbacks, and Cardinals and will be put into place by the Mets in 2012. The team is able to change the price of per-game tickets up to the date of the game based on anything they want (pitching matchup, opposing team, day of the week, how well the team is playing, whether it has playoff implications, the phase of the moon). You name it, they can base their ticket price on it. There is a floor (the cost of the game as sold to a season ticket holder), but there is no ceiling.

Amazinavenue link of the Vice President of Business Operations talking about the dynamic pricing

I think this was done primarily to limit the influence / ability of secondary ticket markets and keep the money in the hands of the team. But, that's just speculation.

[Priceless]

Re: Secondary Ticket Markets: Yay or Nay?

The Cleveland Cavaliers turned down requests from ticket brokers that weren't local and subsequently have seen their attendance drop more than 4000/game (more than 20%). Yes, they suck, but they sucked last year too. Judging by the pictures Darren Rovell has tweeted, ticket brokers in Atlanta are getting killed on Hawks tickets. Dynamic pricing is a double-edged sword...the club may end up with unused tickets but can rake in the dough if they get a favorable matchup (like Strasburg's debut). Or they can sell tickets to the brokers, take the cash and pass the risk/reward on to them.

[RaceBoarder]

Re: Secondary Ticket Markets: Yay or Nay?

I wonder if the question isn’t so much directed to whether you buy directly from the venue/team or buy from a secondary market as it is what pricing policy they vendor you buy from uses.

Primary markets for pro sporting events tend to have variance from seat location to seat location, but tickets don’t vary as much from event to event. Also primary markets tend to try to push season tickets, which gives them income sooner and minimizes their risk. In Race Boarder's situation with (Black?) Hawks tickets, they could, if they wanted, price the game tickets and season tickets such that more "one of" tickets were available. They choose not to.

But what if teams/venues started pricing the way the secondary market does, namely by charging what the market will bear on a game by game basis? For example, is the issue that you mind or don’t mind paying $500 for a Red Sox – Yankees ticket per se? Or do you feel differently paying $500 for the ticket to the Red Sox than you feel paying it to a reseller? What if the team eliminated resellers, but adopted the pricing strategy that the resellers use? Do you feel differently about paying $50 to a private reseller on Craigslist than you do paying $50 to Stub Hub?

And if the team farms out the ticket sales so that you can’t buy a ticket directly from the team but instead have to buy it through TicketBastahd do you consider that buying from a secondary market or not? Emotionally, I’d much rather buy a ticket from Stub Hub for, say, $50 than buy a ticket from TicketMaster for $40 plus a $5 “convenience fee” and $5 “processing fee” even if the out of pocket price is the same.

“Value pricing” is a concept that some teams have dabbled with, and I believe some teams actually do to some extent. Don’t some schools charge more for seats to “rivalry” games, or weekend games? I also have become very suspicious by that some of the arrangements between teams and resellers are disguised ways of the team charging more for attractive games or dumping tickets for less attractive games.

I'd gladly pay a "premium" price to the team... I have no problem paying $60-80 for a 300-level Hawks ticket... What bugs me is that my money goes to someone who doesn't care about the team and is just piggy-backing off the team's success... Like I said, my main beef is people who are "Season Ticket Holders" but sell 35-38 games on Craigslist or Stubhub...

I know it's not apples to apples, but there is some precedence for this... When Hannah Montana (Miley Cyrus) craze was at it's peak in 2008/2009, ticket brokers were charging (and getting) insane amounts for tickets.... Seeing a pair of good seats go for $1000+ was common... Several steps were taken in order to make the tickets available directly to fans (mainly kids obviously, so that might have aided in these steps being taken)... First of all, strict ticket limits were put into place... I believe was 2 adult tickets per credit card billing address... I don't remember the exact rules, but you couldn't use multiple names, addresses, credit cards, etc. to get around the limit... The biggest thing was that you couldn't get your tickets ahead of time and the tickets were non-transferable... You had to pick them up at Will Call at your venue... You would need to have all members of your party at the Will Call Window... From the Will Call Window, you went DIRECTLY into the venue... Do not pass go, do not collect $200.... I believe that you also had to have the credit card that the ticket's were purchased with at the gate as well for verification... Basically they made it nearly impossible for someone to pass off the tickets once they received them...

That's the kind of restrictions I had in mind... Allow the tickets to be obtained by people that truly want to use the tickets... Make it so a season ticket is tied to an ID, something like a season pass at a Ski Hill or Theme Park... With team endorsed resale options like TicketMaster's Ticket Exchange, limits on the resale or exchange of tickets can be put in place... Only allow transfers/resale of tickets through that medium.... Give them 1/2 a season's worth of transfers... That's more than enough to allow people to work around life... Can't make 20 NHL games? Then don't get season tickets... There is minimal cost for teams to implement something like this... It can be done...

[FlagDUDE08]

Re: Secondary Ticket Markets: Yay or Nay?

Dynamic pricing takes it even further and is a system currently used by the Giants, Dbacks, and Cardinals and will be put into place by the Mets in 2012. The team is able to change the price of per-game tickets up to the date of the game based on anything they want (pitching matchup, opposing team, day of the week, how well the team is playing, whether it has playoff implications, the phase of the moon). You name it, they can base their ticket price on it. There is a floor (the cost of the game as sold to a season ticket holder), but there is no ceiling.

Amazinavenue link of the Vice President of Business Operations talking about the dynamic pricing

I think this was done primarily to limit the influence / ability of secondary ticket markets and keep the money in the hands of the team. But, that's just speculation.

I actually kind of like this idea. I wonder if they would also take the secondary source's price into consideration when determining these. Oh heck, just like options trading, let's get the teams some ticker symbols!

[aparch]

Re: Secondary Ticket Markets: Yay or Nay?

Dallas Stars already do this, thanks to their arena sponsor. American Airlines set up the stars with a similar system to their ticket pricing, allowing the Stars to dynamically price game tickets. Floor is what the season ticket holders paid, with the ceiling being a percentage above that. If a whole lot of people buy Red Wings tickets at once, the price jumps like airline tickets. If Coyotes tickets aren't popular, you can pick them up cheap.


Another thing I've noticed is that teams, artists, or the venue itself (Cubs, Trans-Siberian for example) block off tickets to sell day/week of the event. Great for impulse buys at face value if you weren't deadset on attending until hours before.

[St. Clown]

Re: Secondary Ticket Markets: Yay or Nay?

Yes, there are some schools (like RPI) that do charge more for certain games (namely Union, CCT, Cornell, and Freakout).

SCSU does this for their tickets, too. Back when I was in school all tickets were $10 except for the Gopher games when tickets were sold for $18. Now the school has taken it even further where they have numerous price brackets (and much more expensive tickets), even to the point where if you want to buy a ticket to certain games you must also buy a ticket to a lower demand game like UAA, MTU or some small, non-conference school.

As for secondary markets, I like them. Until some ten years ago MN made it illegal to sell a ticket for a profit on the secondary market. What this created was a black market; people would still sell tickets for a profit, but the cops would waste time and effort patrolling Vikings games with undercover units looking for people trying to make a buck. They even had some cops selling tickets, looking for buyers willing to pay the premium prices, but those were far less common than looking for the sellers. A lot of tickets would go unused.

The only reason people take umbrage with these ticket brokers is that we allow ourselves an emotional attachment to the teams and being "real fans." Secondary markets exist everywhere else, in almost every other market in the world, and nobody says boo about it. When's the last time you bought a gallon of milk directly from the farm? Eggs? Beef? Produce? We're just so accustomed to it in other facets of life that we don't even notice. They're even de facto required in some industries now. Ever go to the manufacturing plant to buy your last brand new car, or did you go to a dealership?