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Archive for category ticketmaster

Live Nation Profits Plunge

Aug 13

Posted by jjones in Live Nation, Uncategorized, economy, ticketmaster

Live Nation reported loss of $27.2 million in the 2nd quarter of 2009, based on revenue of $1.06 billion. This is in contrast to a net loss of $652,000 in the same quarter of 2008.

This is interesting for several reasons. First, last year at this time, Live Nation didn’t have their own ticketing operation. They were giving a piece of every ticket sold to Ticketmaster. One would think that the extra, say, $5-10/ticket would add up and make their profits go higher. Apparently, this has not been the case. From what I’ve heard, they’re actually losing money on their ticketing services right now. Secondly, it’s striking how high their revenue is, over 1 billion dollars. It would be interesting to see a breakdown of their expenses and income. How much went to artists, production staff? How much did they make from concessions, ticket fees, etc? How many and which shows did they turn a profit on or lose money on? How much extra money do their VIP packages bring in? Or their “Red Carpet” program?

One thing Live Nation has done in order to try to create more revenue is their “No Fee Wednesday” promotion and “Half Price Ticket” days. Approximately 500,000 tickets have been sold through these programs. The idea is that the money they lose on ticket prices they’ll make up with more attendance and on-site revenue, such as beer and parking. Will it work? It’s tough to know. When we see next quarters results, it will give us a better idea. Also, next quarter should be their biggest of the year, as their bread and butter is summer amphitheater shows, which should almost all occur in their next quarter.

Seeing that Live Nation is still losing money, it makes one understand the case for a merger with Ticketmaster to increase efficiency. However, if the merger is denied by the government, maybe it will make Live Nation (and Ticketmaster) think of more innovative ways to do business like the “No Fee Wednesdays” which in the end, will benefit everyone in the industry and fans.

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Miley Cyrus Tour to be all paperless

Jun 5

Posted by mmiller in paperless tickets, sports tickets, stubhub, the eagles, ticketmaster, tom waits

The upcoming Miley Cyrus tour will be all paperless, in response to complains because of her her last tour being one of most sought after tickets in years, and also one of the highest priced tickets on the secondary market. Paperless ticketing means no actual tickets are issued and the buyer must attend the show, and bring their photo ID and the credit card issued. This will be the first ALL paperless tour at a scale this large. Tom Waits was the first all paperless tour, but his venues were theaters, not arenas like Miley is playing. AC/DC had the best tickets be paperless for their tour, but the majority of tickets were still standard paper tickets. What does this mean for Mileys tour?

I predict that fans will actually be hurt by paperless ticketing and this could be the last time it is used at a show like this for the following reasons:

  • Given the age group of her fans (tweens), how many have their own credit card to scan at the show? Does this mean parents will have to goto the show, too, even if they don’t want to and be forced to buy another ticket?
  • Ticket brokers will still come up with ways to resell tickets (escorting buyers in, anyone?).
  • The arenas will still sell out, and many fans will still be without tickets, however the secondary market will have a much smaller supply due to the paperless ticketing, driving prices sky high.  In the end, the same moms who were complaining about all the ticket brokers reselling Miley tickets last tour will now be wishing they would come back so her daughter could get in for under $1000/ticket.

With all the current legislation in the works for the ticket industry, I  wouldn’t be surprised if anti paperless ticketing legislation was drafted because people complain they can’t resell their tickets if they end up having to work, and because they have to buy an extra ticket for the parent even if they don’t want to attend.

It will be interesting to see how loudly parents complain and what ticketmaster does in response and what it means for the future of paperless ticketing.

The video that explains paperless ticketing for the Miley tour(an instant classic!):

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Congressional hearings scheduled for Live Nation/Ticketmaster merger

Feb 20

Posted by jjones in Live Nation, ticketmaster

Congress has scheduled hearings in the house and senate next week about the proposed merger between Live Nation and Ticketmaster. From the official press release about it: “We have a responsibility to ensure that this merger does not result in higher prices and fewer choices for music fans across the nation.”

During the 8 years of the pro-business Bush administration, roadblocks to mergers were virtually nonexistent. Things might be different under the new administration, but it’s too early yet to tell. In my opinion, having one company that owns all the venues, promotes the shows, sells tickets on the primary market and also on the secondary market and even has exclusive contracts with the talent seems to be a bit too much. While some might argue that consolidating all of those things would create less redundant expenses and in turn lower prices for consumers, I think anyone with half a brain knows that won’t be the case. What will happen is they will use their exclusive control of every facet of the concert industry to increase their bottom line virtually unopposed with no competition to entice them to stay competitive or reduce fees. They might also use the power of their virtual monpoly to coerce artists to play by their rules, it’s not like their former parent company hasn’t tried things like that before. Hopefully, congress will see through whatever promises LN and TM make and deny the merger.

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Ticketmaster tests no-fee events

Nov 22

Posted by jjones in Live Nation, ac/dc, the eagles, ticketmaster, tom waits

Recently, Ticketmaster started testing some “no fee” events.

The first test events are some Eagles shows. “No fee” events mean all the buyer pays is the face value and no added “convenience fee” or “facility fee”.

Obviously, this move is for several reasons: the slumping economy and Live Nation becoming a major competitor in January. The head of Ticketmaster has said if it works, they want to make all events fee-free.

Personally, I think this is an excellent idea. Even if the “no-fee” price is the exact same as the event would have been before when convenience fees were added in, it gives the ticket buyer the perception of being a “better deal”, and no longer can hordes of college kids (or Pearl Jam) bitch about the “god damn Ticketmaster and their exorbitant convenience fees!”. In addition, if Live Nation adds convenience fees, and Ticketmaster doesn’t have them, suddenly Live Nation will become the “greedy ticketing company” and Ticketmaster may become “the good guys”.

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Paperless Tickets: The Wave Of The Future Or A Bust?

Sep 26

Posted by mmiller in ac/dc, paperless tickets, ticketmaster, tom waits

Earlier this year, Tom Waits became the first artist to use Paperless tickets. AC/DC has followed suit with their upcoming arena tour, and while not all of their tickets are paperless, they did make all fan club tickets paperless, along with most of the premium seats in the venue.

The idea behind paperless tickets is that they cannot be resold because no paper tickets are ever issued, not even at will call. Often times with traditional will-call tickets, a broker will meet the buyer at the venue, pickup the tickets from the will-call window and then hand them off to the buyer. With paperless tickets, the original buyer’s credit card and ID are scanned at the door as they enter, so in theory there is no way to resell or transfer the tickets.

Will this be the wave of the future? No.
Why? Because there are many disadvantages to this:
1) What if someone buys tickets for an event and then something comes up and they cannot go? With paperless tickets, they just have to eat them and they cannot be resold (even for face value).
2) What if someone is meeting a friend at a show and their friend ends up being very late? Since the whole party has to be present to enter, one person might miss part of the show because the other person is late.
3) For a normal event, anyone attending just hands their ticket to the person at the door, the ticket is scanned or ripped and they are let in. With paperless, their credit card has to be swiped and then a receipt has to print out. While this may not sound like a lot more time than traditional tickets, when you multiply it by 20,000 attendees, it could make long lines even longer.
4) I personally attended a Tom Waits paperless ticket show earlier this year and when I got to the door, my credit card was swiped and it kept giving an error, so I was told to goto the customer service line to get my tickets, where I waited for about 20 minutes along with many other people who said “For some reason it didn’t let me in..” Once I got to the front of the line, someone looked up my info and miraculously, my tickets were found and given to me. Obviously, there are some bugs in the system. Are they fixed yet? Will they be?

In my opinion, paperless tickets will never become the norm because of all the above problems, especially the no resale issue. When you take into account that Ticketmaster now owns Ticketsnow, as well as still having their own “Ticketexchange”, they have quite a financial stake in making sure that ticket resale continues to flourish and grow. It is against their best interest to use paperless tickets.

Additionally, ticket brokers will always find a way around things like this. For example, when I attended Tom Waits, I noticed no one’s ID were checked, just credit card scanned. If someone wanted to resell their paperless tickets, they could purchase them with a prepaid credit card, then simply mail the card to the buyer. Simple? Yes. Will it work? Unless they start actively checking ID’s, yes.

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New Ticketmaster Delivery Fees

Sep 17

Posted by jjones in ticketmaster

Recently, Ticketmaster sent out a survey to ticket buyers to get their feedback about prospective changes to the way they deliver tickets. Most of the questions revolved around how buyers would react to changes in delivery fees. Currently, Ticketmaster prints and sends tickets via US Mail for free and charges around $2.50 for delivery via Ticketfast (where the tickets are emailed and the buyer prints them out themselves). The new fee structure proposed in the email was:

Ticketfast – $1.50

US Mail – $4.00

From other brokers I’ve spoken to, the general consensus is that this will further help legitimize ticketfast as a delivery option and make ticket buyers less weary of ticketfast tickets being counterfeit or duplicated many times.

We will have to wait and see if Ticketmaster decides to go ahead with these changes, but reguardless, I believe the industry will eventually be all electronic tickets, with tickets being bought, sold and resold all electronically, with nothing physical ever changing hands. As a ticket broker, this seems like a good thing, as waiting to have tickets in-hand and having to physically ship everything will be a thing of the past.

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